Posted on 10/08/2007 10:11:47 AM PDT by William Tell 2
Columbus Day was originally celebrated Oct. 12, the day Christopher Columbus landed in the New World, but it is currently celebrated the second Monday in October.
However, in some quarters, "celebrate" is not the appropriate term.
Since about 1992, Columbus Day has been not only a celebration by Italian-Americans, but a day of protests by some - not all - Native Americans and by those who describe themselves as "multiculturalists."
It is important to note who these "multiculturalists" are: people who think Western civilization is an evil culture. They want to portray the European/American culture as uniquely causing death and destruction.
As is usually the case, these protesters are not motivated by altruism. The invective directed at Columbus is really directed against the American system of capitalism and democracy. Columbus is nothing more than a proxy to attempt to discredit our government by attempting to demonize our historical roots.
Despite Columbus Day being celebrated since at least 1866, it became a target for the American liberal on the 500th anniversary in 1992. It was excoriated as a day that began the advent of slavery. It was deemed a day in which the destruction of the utopia created by Native Americans in what we now call the Americas commenced.
For example, in 1993 a leaflet was distributed to a Philadelphia elementary school class by a teacher. It was titled: "Gifting the White Man ... Despite the Betrayals. "
The document stated: "Far from being the savages Christopher Columbus described in his log, native peoples of the Americas were advanced in many ways - and were more civilized than their discoverers. From the moment Europeans set foot in the West, the world has been enriched by Indian achievements and wisdom. In return, native peoples have been paid back with five centuries of cruelty, betrayals and relentless attempts to take their lands and destroy their culture."
The paper then lists in two separate columns: "Indian Gifts to White Men" and "White Man's Gifts to the Indians." Included among Indian gifts is government.
According to the leaflet's authors, "The American federal system derives not from Europe - whose nation's knew nothing of democracy - but Indian tribal organizations."
This leaflet distributed to schoolchildren claimed Europeans knew nothing of democracy, a concept and word created by the ancient Greeks.
Perhaps the most egregious example of the political perversion of history occurs in Denver. For over a decade now, the annual Columbus Day parade has been disrupted by groups allegedly representing Native Americans who say Columbus brought slavery, war and destruction to America. According to them, America was paradise of peace, freedom and individual rights before the Europeans arrived.
The suggestion that Europeans and Americans were unique in conquest of other peoples and lands is absurd. The idea that the true history of European conquest and American conquest needs to be taught if there is any fairness or balance to history is deceptive.
If the "multiculturalists" wanted to be fair and balanced about teaching history, then they should teach about the practice of human sacrifice by the Aztecs and cannibalism by the Caribes. (The word "cannibal" is derived from the mispronunciation of the name Caribe by the Spanish.)
If "multiculturalists" wanted to present a comprehensive history of the New World, they should mention that the Taino Indians of Cuba had conquered and enslaved the Ciboney, who had displaced the Gauanhatabey. The Tainos in turn dreaded the Caribs, who had already conquered the Igneri.
If multiculturalists really want to educate students about slavery, then they should teach not only about the enslavement of Native Americans and Africans by Europeans but about the enslavement of Native Americans by other Native Americans, as well as the enslavement of Africans by other Africans. They should teach that slavery was practiced among the Aztecs, the Incas and the Mayas as well as Tlingit, the Haida and other tribes. But this would be counter to their objectives.
The Roman statesman Cicero once said, "The first law of the historian is that he shall never dare utter an untruth. ... There shall be no suspicion of partiality in his writing, or of malice."
Multiculturalism is merely the attempt to elevate some cultures at the expense of others. Until multiculturalist historians heed the words of Cicero, the PC torchbearers will continue to the divide rather than unite.
Michael P. Tremoglie is the author of the conservative novel "A Sense of Duty" available at Barnesandnoble.com and Amazon.com.
One of the present day cultural issues I address in my novel is the way the liberal multiculturalists have done the exact same thing they condemn - that is the demonization of certain classes, cultures and/or ethnic groups at the expense of others.
My novel uses the liberal media ( white liberals) who demonize police officers (primarily white working class), African-Americans demonizing Italian-Americans, and certain minorities and feminists demonizing white male Christian, ethnic groups.
Once he got to the West Indies he did some remarkable exploration.
If Columbus had never sailed, America would have been discovered within a few years by Europeans. Pedro Cabral discovered Brazil in April 1500, while sailing from Portugal to India. Instead of having Columbus Day in October, we could have a Cabral Day in April.
Of course before CC, we had the Norse, the Irish, the Chinese, the Welsh, and, possibly, Africans and Phoencians as well.
I have often thought that formal schooling serves both types of students poorly; those easily misled for they have no curiosity or ambition go away knowing a decreasing smattering about the world which more or less disappears over time, and those whose deep and searching need to know more is unleashed when the final bell rings.
In neither case shall you likely find these two types in general association again until such time as another constrictive assembly is required of them by some controlling force or agent.
“Dances with Wolves” portrayed the Pawnee in a savage, murderous light. It was the Sioux who were treated with kid gloves.
At the beginning of the movie, the Pawnee brutally killed the wagon master.....the guy who led Costner’s character to the abandoned soldier fort.
Also, the white woman.....”Stands with a Fist”.....a flashback scene depicts her entire family under attack, and brutally murdered, by the Pawnee.
War amongst tribes was not unusual long before the white man came to this continent. Tribes scalped one another, enslaved their enemies, and committed atrocities. Some tribes were far more peaceful than others, but some could be, and were, quite violent.
I’ve seen the movie countless times.
bmflr
Totally irrelevant.
Most reasonable people still credit Watt with "inventing" the steam engine; not Hero. The wheel was invented by Mesopotamians or Egyptians, not by the Aztecs.
Democracy applied to the Indians in North America is a joke.
The mild-mannered, kind and humanitarian Vikings may have visited America, but they didn't discover it. Please note that we don't speak a Scandinavian language today anywhere in the American continent.
I celebrate Columbus Day.
I'm a native American and I have no problem with Columbus at all. In fact, 1992 is the only time that I ever attended the parade though I have to admit, I was working a block away and only spent my lunch hour there.
As for the Aboriginal Americans go, I don't care what they think. I don't take offense when they invade Floyd Bennett Field to have their powwows or anything so don't rain on my parade. (Well, it's more my wife's parade -- my parade is in March when it's the Gay Lobby instead of the Aborigines).
Duluth, MN mayor Herb Bergson issued a proclamation that today is “Indigenous People Day” rather than Columbus Day because of the dastardly things Columbus did to the natives.
Any third grader knows that today.
The biggest disservice done to the debate on this subject is viewing events of 500 years ago by today's knowledge of the physical universe.
Mention the name Erathostenes today to any average American and see the blank stares.
How much more clueless is that average American about philosophy, political science and cultural history, or history in general.
Particularly, in the area of ethics and societal mores and attitudes at different times in the civilized world, to the extent that we can identify them 500 or 1000 years later, having a discussion about events of medieval times without a firm grasp of context is a fool's errand.
Giuseppe Garibaldi combined the little city states into one Italy in the 1860’s.
So your ‘bunch of Sicilians’ putting on their tacky parade have pretty much the same reason to do so, as a Genoan or a Napolitiano or a Lombard...(don’t get me started about the Calabrese).
Agreed about the English and the NAs themselves.....”Here chief, take these only-used-once blankets as a symbol of our good faith....”
Q: How can you tell who the gays are in a St. Patrick's Day Parade?
A: They're the ones wearing collars and cassocks!
A key seems to be the 1751 letter from Benjamin Franklin to James Parker, in which he wrote:
It would be a strange thing if Six Nations of ignorant savages should be capable of forming a scheme for such an union, and be able to execute it in such a manner as that it has subsisted ages and appears indissoluble; and yet that a like union should be impracticable for ten or a dozen English colonies, to whom it is more necessary and must be more advantageous, and who cannot be supposed to want an equal understanding of their interests.You might be interested in the following, also...
Native American Political Systems and the Evolution of Democracy: An Annotated Bibliography
http://www.ratical.org/many_worlds/6Nations/NAPSnEoD.html
I'm no expert in all of this about the Iroquois, but what bugged me was the way the it seems to me that they had a federal system, but what bugged me was this part:
According to the leaflet's authors, "The American federal system derives not from Europe - whose nation's knew nothing of democracy - but Indian tribal organizations."There might be truth in the statement that our federal system is derived from the tribal nations not Europe, but obviously democracy was known by the Greeks. Still, the difference between a republic and a democracy is important. These are subtle propaganda techniques they are using.
This leaflet distributed to schoolchildren claimed Europeans knew nothing of democracy, a concept and word created by the ancient Greeks.
It's also rotten that mispunctuated pamphlets were distributed in our schools. Where can I get a scan or copy of one of these?
The Greeks not only were familiar with democracy, but European history is full of federal systems: the Delian league, the Achaean league, the Etruscan Confederation, the League of Latium, the Schmalkaldic League, the Hanseatic League, Switzerland, the United Provinces, etc.
The Framers, as is clear from the debates, did not draw on the primitive Iroquois alliance, but from the legal foundations of European history - they made constant references to the Swiss and Dutch federal systems in the Federalist and in the debates.
If the Framers were looking for tribal alliances, they could have looked at the clan federations of their own Scottish ancestors, or that of the Poles.
You're right, of course, and boy, did I state that very poorly! What I meant to say was that the Framers might have looked to the Iroquois, I didn't mean that it was their basis or their inspiration. I don't know what to think of the claims that Jefferson studied it, etc., but I think that even studying it doesn't mean that the basis.
Perhaps I could word it thus: the Iroquois might have influenced their thinking to some extent--that might be possible--but I don't believe it's the foundation.
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Note: this topic is from December 2007. |
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Mostly by Sicilian and Neopolitan Americans whose ancestors were culturally and linguistically distinct from the Genoese Colombo.
Columbus Day was pushed by Italian Americans largely to show the larger North American community that they "played a part" in the American narrative.
As for myself, I would prefer celebrating Cortes, but that would REALLY piss off the dimestore Indians and the white liberals.
Sorry, I just realized this was an old thread that I had already commented on!
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