Monday’s federal holiday dedicated to Christopher Columbus is highlighting the ongoing divide between those who view the explorer as a representative of Italian American history and others horrified by an annual tribute that ignores native people whose lives and culture were forever changed by colonialism.
Spurred by national calls for racial equity, communities across the U.S. took a deeper look at Columbus’ legacy in recent years — pairing or replacing it with Indigenous Peoples Day.
On Friday, President Joe Biden issued the first presidential proclamation of “Indigenous Peoples’ Day,” the most significant boost yet to efforts to refocus the federal holiday celebrating Columbus.
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But activists, including members of Native American tribes, said ending the formal holiday in Columbus’ name has been stymied by politicians and organizations focusing on Italian American heritage.
“The opposition has tried to paint Columbus as a benevolent man, similar to how white supremacists have painted Robert E. Lee,” Les Begay, Diné Nation member and co-founder of the Indigenous Peoples’ Day Coalition of Illinois, said, referring to the Civil War general who led the Confederate Army.
Columbus’ arrival began centuries of exploration and colonization by European nations, bringing violence, disease and other suffering to native people already living in the Western Hemisphere.
“Not honoring Indigenous peoples on this day just continues to erase our history, our contributions and the fact that we were the first inhabitants of this country,” Begay said.
Across the country tension, over the two holidays has been playing out since the early 1990s. Debates over monuments and statues of the Italian explorer tread similar ground, as in Philadelphia where the city placed a box over a Columbus statue last year in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, a Black man, by a white Minneapolis police officer. Protesters opposing racial injustice and police…
Source : time
