Columbus Day v Indigenous People's Day v Leif Erikson Day

Okay, if you aren’t mocking me… it’s not like a team jersey thing. But when they went over the Columbus, the conquistadores, the Pilgrims in Thanksgiving that later fought King Philip’s War, Andrew Jackson, the Indian Wars, &etc. in school, we were the conquerors, we were the oppressors. We were not the Native Americans, the Native Americans suffered at our hands and we built our country off of their misfortune. (ETA:) Columbus Day is a reminder of that heritage, of exploration and conquering, it celebrates the meeting of peoples from each hemisphere and reminds us of the consequences.

And I say this as someone whose family, on both sides, immigrated to the U.S. in (I think) the twentieth century.

Admittedly there are other much more important things to be worried about than Columbus Day. But that’s the topic du jour (or at least it was yesterday), and just because there are other more important things to be worried about does not mean I am totally indifferent to scrapping Columbus Day.

~Max