*Columbus didn’t “discover” America — he never set foot in North America!
During four separate trips that started with the one in 1492, Columbus landed on various Caribbean islands that are now the Bahamas as well as the island later called Hispaniola. He also explored the Central and South American coasts.
But he didn’t reach North America, which, of course, was already inhabited by Native Americans, and he never thought he had found a new continent.
You may also remember that it is believed that Norse explorer Leif Erikson reached Canada perhaps 500 years before Columbus was born, and there are some who believe that Phoenician sailors crossed the Atlantic much earlier than that.
In 1930 the US gave Iceland a statue of Erikson for their 1000th year as a country. It’s out front of the Hallgrimskirkja.
“*Columbus didn’t “discover” America — he never set foot in North America!
During four separate trips that started with the one in 1492, Columbus landed on various Caribbean islands that are now the Bahamas as well as the island later called Hispaniola. He also explored the Central and South American coasts.
You may be right; but tearing down a statue does nothing to educate those who defend it as a symbol of ethnic solidarity. People forget that many Italian immigrants suffered discrimination and racism throughout the last century and continuing today. You’ve already seen “goombah” above, and there were much worse taunts. It’s the history of immigration everywhere, and it takes generations to neutralize.
Italian-Americans in Philly have already re-named their historic “Italian Market”—it’s now the 9th Street Market, run by the 9th St Businessmen’s Association, and that name has probably been changed, too, since there are several post-feminist movement women-owned businesses there that are long-established, like Fante’s kitchenware store and Anastasio’s Fish Market. The community does not want their ethnic symbol associated with an incident of police brutality by a guy like Derek Chauvin, who was never, for all his culturally-sanctioned faults, a strong leader and an intrepid, accomplished, ocean-going explorer and innovator like Cristoforo Colombo.