Thank you for this excellent essay and for the clip from Coach Popovich. As an Italian American, I have always found it to be absurd that getting rid of the highly insulting Columbus Day holiday would hurt the feelings of people of Italian ancestry. It’s true that the Knights of Columbus have argued against eliminating this holiday, but I think to a large extent they are in minority. I completely ignore Columbus Day because I refuse to see Columbus as an Italian who should be honored in any way. He initiated an ongoing genocide, and I don’t want to be associated with any part of that.
But the question remains that has always been there everytime we approached Columbus Day. What did Columbus ever have to do with the United States or British settlements in the New World in the first place? Why not Spanish Armada day that enabled British settlements in the North America and the Caribbean?
But as for the celebration of Natives, a better solution than a day, would be a UN resolution ranting them statehood, many statehoods, for every tribe, and every nation recognizing their statehood and not recognizing the settler Americans as any kind of official statehood, just a partitioned area where they are supposed to be able to live,
I'm trying to make an analogy to the middle east here, not a particularly logical one everyone will say. But then was the UN grant and partitioning of Palestine very logical?
Again, there should be an indigenous people's day, a holiday, I agree.
Perhaps this day is an opportunity to reflect upon violence against Indigenous peoples and immigrants since our history books have failed for generations to adequately address either.
Good news: Columbus Day is solely an East Coast holiday. When we moved to California from Boston, it vanished from the calendar. When I mention it to people here, they look at me blankly, or laugh. So, the country is half way through the process of getting rid of the holiday.
Thank you, thank you for this. Our education was so deplorable that so much of what you included is sadly new to us. We must share this with the hope it becomes universal knowledge.
I like this guy's routine. He's suggesting Joe DiMaggio Day. Maybe the people who like to spice up the tribute, and add some tension to it, could celebrate Al Capone Day, too.
While I certainly agree that celebrating Columbus is not a good thing and I also agree that recognition of "indigenous" peoples is a good thing, I would prefer to recognize the geological deep-time view that we are all immigrants in America, which would be the most-inclusive unifying holiday we could define. Sadly, that'll have to wait for a time when we are not so hideously divided amongst ourselves.
Indigenous Peoples’ Day is necessary, but it should not replace Columbus Day. That would be too easy.
Columbus Day should be preserved, but as a day of mourning. It should become a Pan-American Genocide Remembrance Day. (If this doesn’t happen to Columbus Day, it will have to happen to Thanksgiving Day. Take your pick.)
Only after we white people mourn properly should we be allowed to celebrate the survival of indigenous people. No celebration should ever be allowed to erase the tragedy of post-Colombian history. Nor can we both mourn and celebrate on the same day. Thus, we must preserve two holidays: one for mourning and the other for celebration.
There is a National Day of Mourning that occurs every year simultaneously with Thanksgiving Day. But your point is valid, and I think what you're referring to is a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The USA has never had that despite its founding on genocide of one People and enslavement of another People. That is critically needed going forward.
We certainly need Indigenous People's Day! But it should be on October 11 or 13, because Columbus Day has become Italian Americans' day to get together as families, eat traditional Italian food, and just celebrate their Italian heritage. It has nothing to do with Christopher Columbus any more. He's no more real than Santa Claus. So what? Let our Italian brothers and sisters keep their day and celebrate Natives too. (Note: my best friend is Sioux.)
While I get what you're saying, Columbus must not be revered in any way. Have you ever met a person from the Arawak tribe? No, and that's because Columbus was responsible for killing half of them (more than 250,000 people!) in two years, and by 1650, all of them were gone, thanks to the genocide and slavery he started. There are many other days of the year, even other Mondays in October, and many other Italians who legitimately did great things. Would it be okay for German-Americans to have a special day each year to honor Hitler, or Belgian-Americans a day for King Leopold II? While I'm a bit confused by your assertion that Columbus is "no more real than Santa Clause," these people are a far cry from Santa Clause, who is based on kind and loving Saint Nicholas, a 3rd-century bishop from Turkey, who advocated for children, the poor, and the sick and must not be celebrated.
Yes, just rename October 12 Italian Heritage Day, forget Columbus, and it's fixed without making anybody feel bad. And of course find a really good day for indigenous peoples!
The Supreme Court would ignore that just like it did with its decision about presidential immunity or Roe V Wade. The present court’s majority is a right wing ideological cesspool 🤮
Tradition is important to people, and they have a day. Even non-believers wouldn't want to move Christmas to February, and they would call the Christmas story lies. It would be better to rename October 12 "Italian Heritage Day" (the Italians don't think about Columbus anyway) and put the newer holiday for indigenous peoples on another date. Any time during the fall harvest season would be good. They call early November "Indian Summer" because Natives used the warmer weather to finish their harvest and get ready for winter. Sometime in there would be appropriate! Not too close to Thanksgiving because that honors them (among it's other purposes) too.
Tradition isn't as important as saving lives. Upholding traditions born in blood contributes to lost lives. It's that simple. Make new holidays, ones not born in blood. That's how easy that is. Nobody's going to lose sleep over getting rid of Columbus Day.
Columbus isn't around any more to kill people. Renaming the day for the Italians would be just, no one would be hurt, we could probably forgot Columbus even better, and we could concentrate on fighting live bad guys like Putin and Netanyahu. I'll ask my Sioux friend, who's visiting later today, and see what he says. If he has strong feelings either way, I'll come back and post them. My guess is that he'd be fine with it either way.
That doesn't matter, Shirley. Your celebration of some man you never knew is an entire peoples' reminder that they are still marginalized. Think bigger in your empathy toolbox. Your connection to that holiday is only sentiment. Sentiment is tough to overcome, but it can be done. Especially when that holiday was born in genocide. Let it go.
Well! No one thought to ask the Natives, as usual. (Check out the flap over the NDSU "Fighting Sioux" nickname. The Sioux tribes fought and sued in a court of law to keep it!) Re Columbus Day, they don't care much about having a day - unless it's *every* day! But they don't want the former Columbus Day, that's for sure. It would always have the bad association with Columbus from their point of view. They would rather have a day that is only, originally theirs, not a hand-me-down from Christopher Columbus of all people. Come to think of it, they made some objections when Fargo renamed the day, many years ago.
Therefore, we can please the Natives and the Italians at the same time. Let the Italians keep Columbus Day, since it has nothing to do with Columbus any more, and create a new Indigenous People's Day with input from the tribes themselves for a change! A day that is special to them in a positive way. (Full disclosure: I am neither Italian nor Native, but have or used to have friends who are both. Lost touch with the Italian after she moved to Hawaii, and the Sioux guy is my BFF!)
After all, the Germans have their Oktoberfest, Norwegians have Syttende Mai and Norsk Hostfest, Mexicans have Cinco de Mayo, and every group seems to have something. Let the Italians keep October 12 because the Natives don't want it! And every day is Natives' Day unless they want to establish one that is special *to them* in some way.
As a mixed (Swedish and Ojibwe) woman, thank you for this article! Before starting elementary school, I knew the truth and suffered at the hands of ignorant, racist bullies when I dared speak it, which I've been told more than once is a bad habit of mine. I can't wait for the day when children are taught about Columbus the same way they are of Hitler. 💛♥️🖤🤍
Thank you for this excellent essay and for the clip from Coach Popovich. As an Italian American, I have always found it to be absurd that getting rid of the highly insulting Columbus Day holiday would hurt the feelings of people of Italian ancestry. It’s true that the Knights of Columbus have argued against eliminating this holiday, but I think to a large extent they are in minority. I completely ignore Columbus Day because I refuse to see Columbus as an Italian who should be honored in any way. He initiated an ongoing genocide, and I don’t want to be associated with any part of that.
Goes without saying.
But the question remains that has always been there everytime we approached Columbus Day. What did Columbus ever have to do with the United States or British settlements in the New World in the first place? Why not Spanish Armada day that enabled British settlements in the North America and the Caribbean?
But as for the celebration of Natives, a better solution than a day, would be a UN resolution ranting them statehood, many statehoods, for every tribe, and every nation recognizing their statehood and not recognizing the settler Americans as any kind of official statehood, just a partitioned area where they are supposed to be able to live,
I'm trying to make an analogy to the middle east here, not a particularly logical one everyone will say. But then was the UN grant and partitioning of Palestine very logical?
Again, there should be an indigenous people's day, a holiday, I agree.
If we want to talk about European contact with the Americas, perhaps we should start with the archaeological support for the travels of a Viking woman named Gudrid around 1000 AD. 3-3-21 Did a Viking Woman Named Gudrid Really Travel to North America in 1000 A.D.? https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/did-viking-woman-named-gudrid-really-travel-north-america-1000-years-ago-180977126/
It's important to know that Columbus Day was an attempt to deal with anti-immigrant violence and a diplomatic crisis with Italy that had nothing to do with Columbus' purported 'discovery.' 10-10-21 Columbus Day began with a mob killing 11 Italian Americans https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2021/10/10/columbus-day-benjamin-harrison-mob-italians/; 4-15-19 New Orleans Apologizes for 1891 Lynching of Italian-Americans https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/new-orleans-apologizes-1891-lynching-italian-americans-180971959/.
Perhaps this day is an opportunity to reflect upon violence against Indigenous peoples and immigrants since our history books have failed for generations to adequately address either.
Thank you! Just like Thankstaking, more invented history to make genocide less genocidal.
FYI: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/christopher-columbus-was-secretly-jewish/ar-AA1sb83m?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=c832647d5f1c4323b58a8ba1288526f7&ei=41
Wild that he demonized Jewish people while himself being Jewish.
I believe it was censored
My comments aren’t posting
Good news: Columbus Day is solely an East Coast holiday. When we moved to California from Boston, it vanished from the calendar. When I mention it to people here, they look at me blankly, or laugh. So, the country is half way through the process of getting rid of the holiday.
Thank you, thank you for this. Our education was so deplorable that so much of what you included is sadly new to us. We must share this with the hope it becomes universal knowledge.
It's that time of year https://youtu.be/TzJp43NOzXc?si=LUKV4H_pXPSZxhzW
I like this guy's routine. He's suggesting Joe DiMaggio Day. Maybe the people who like to spice up the tribute, and add some tension to it, could celebrate Al Capone Day, too.
As this chat was going on I remembered when I was 9 I wrote the class Columbus Day play, and this piece I wrote in penance https://substack.com/home/post/p-150260362?source=queue
While I certainly agree that celebrating Columbus is not a good thing and I also agree that recognition of "indigenous" peoples is a good thing, I would prefer to recognize the geological deep-time view that we are all immigrants in America, which would be the most-inclusive unifying holiday we could define. Sadly, that'll have to wait for a time when we are not so hideously divided amongst ourselves.
Long overdue!
All this, right here, Qasim. Love your inclusion of the Good Place meme, btw. Janet was awesome.
Probably the best meme for the subject out there :)
Yeah, good Janet was.
Indigenous Peoples’ Day is necessary, but it should not replace Columbus Day. That would be too easy.
Columbus Day should be preserved, but as a day of mourning. It should become a Pan-American Genocide Remembrance Day. (If this doesn’t happen to Columbus Day, it will have to happen to Thanksgiving Day. Take your pick.)
Only after we white people mourn properly should we be allowed to celebrate the survival of indigenous people. No celebration should ever be allowed to erase the tragedy of post-Colombian history. Nor can we both mourn and celebrate on the same day. Thus, we must preserve two holidays: one for mourning and the other for celebration.
There is a National Day of Mourning that occurs every year simultaneously with Thanksgiving Day. But your point is valid, and I think what you're referring to is a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The USA has never had that despite its founding on genocide of one People and enslavement of another People. That is critically needed going forward.
We certainly need Indigenous People's Day! But it should be on October 11 or 13, because Columbus Day has become Italian Americans' day to get together as families, eat traditional Italian food, and just celebrate their Italian heritage. It has nothing to do with Christopher Columbus any more. He's no more real than Santa Claus. So what? Let our Italian brothers and sisters keep their day and celebrate Natives too. (Note: my best friend is Sioux.)
That’s an excellent idea 👍
🖤🧡💚💙
While I get what you're saying, Columbus must not be revered in any way. Have you ever met a person from the Arawak tribe? No, and that's because Columbus was responsible for killing half of them (more than 250,000 people!) in two years, and by 1650, all of them were gone, thanks to the genocide and slavery he started. There are many other days of the year, even other Mondays in October, and many other Italians who legitimately did great things. Would it be okay for German-Americans to have a special day each year to honor Hitler, or Belgian-Americans a day for King Leopold II? While I'm a bit confused by your assertion that Columbus is "no more real than Santa Clause," these people are a far cry from Santa Clause, who is based on kind and loving Saint Nicholas, a 3rd-century bishop from Turkey, who advocated for children, the poor, and the sick and must not be celebrated.
Fully support Italian heritage day. As long as we're getting rid of Columbus Day.
Yes, just rename October 12 Italian Heritage Day, forget Columbus, and it's fixed without making anybody feel bad. And of course find a really good day for indigenous peoples!
No. Italian Americans can craft their own day. Let it go. Tradition does not outrank lies.
Tradition not outranking lies should be a motto engraved on the Supreme Court Building., where both outrank truth and probity!
The Supreme Court would ignore that just like it did with its decision about presidential immunity or Roe V Wade. The present court’s majority is a right wing ideological cesspool 🤮
Tradition is important to people, and they have a day. Even non-believers wouldn't want to move Christmas to February, and they would call the Christmas story lies. It would be better to rename October 12 "Italian Heritage Day" (the Italians don't think about Columbus anyway) and put the newer holiday for indigenous peoples on another date. Any time during the fall harvest season would be good. They call early November "Indian Summer" because Natives used the warmer weather to finish their harvest and get ready for winter. Sometime in there would be appropriate! Not too close to Thanksgiving because that honors them (among it's other purposes) too.
Tradition isn't as important as saving lives. Upholding traditions born in blood contributes to lost lives. It's that simple. Make new holidays, ones not born in blood. That's how easy that is. Nobody's going to lose sleep over getting rid of Columbus Day.
Columbus isn't around any more to kill people. Renaming the day for the Italians would be just, no one would be hurt, we could probably forgot Columbus even better, and we could concentrate on fighting live bad guys like Putin and Netanyahu. I'll ask my Sioux friend, who's visiting later today, and see what he says. If he has strong feelings either way, I'll come back and post them. My guess is that he'd be fine with it either way.
That doesn't matter, Shirley. Your celebration of some man you never knew is an entire peoples' reminder that they are still marginalized. Think bigger in your empathy toolbox. Your connection to that holiday is only sentiment. Sentiment is tough to overcome, but it can be done. Especially when that holiday was born in genocide. Let it go.
Well! No one thought to ask the Natives, as usual. (Check out the flap over the NDSU "Fighting Sioux" nickname. The Sioux tribes fought and sued in a court of law to keep it!) Re Columbus Day, they don't care much about having a day - unless it's *every* day! But they don't want the former Columbus Day, that's for sure. It would always have the bad association with Columbus from their point of view. They would rather have a day that is only, originally theirs, not a hand-me-down from Christopher Columbus of all people. Come to think of it, they made some objections when Fargo renamed the day, many years ago.
Therefore, we can please the Natives and the Italians at the same time. Let the Italians keep Columbus Day, since it has nothing to do with Columbus any more, and create a new Indigenous People's Day with input from the tribes themselves for a change! A day that is special to them in a positive way. (Full disclosure: I am neither Italian nor Native, but have or used to have friends who are both. Lost touch with the Italian after she moved to Hawaii, and the Sioux guy is my BFF!)
After all, the Germans have their Oktoberfest, Norwegians have Syttende Mai and Norsk Hostfest, Mexicans have Cinco de Mayo, and every group seems to have something. Let the Italians keep October 12 because the Natives don't want it! And every day is Natives' Day unless they want to establish one that is special *to them* in some way.
As a mixed (Swedish and Ojibwe) woman, thank you for this article! Before starting elementary school, I knew the truth and suffered at the hands of ignorant, racist bullies when I dared speak it, which I've been told more than once is a bad habit of mine. I can't wait for the day when children are taught about Columbus the same way they are of Hitler. 💛♥️🖤🤍
Me too! All the MAGAS had a Columbus Day parade yesterday
Yuck, of course, right? 🤦♀️
Lots of similarities between Columbus and Hitler for sure.