The Myth of "America"

Happy Columbus Day

Columbus sailed the ocean blue in Fourteen Hundred and Ninety Two ...

May the spirit of adventure and discovery always be with you.

Wishing you a great Columbus Day

- Columbus Day greeting card

To mark Columbus Day In 2004, the Medieval and Renaissance Center in UCLA published the final volume of a compendium of Columbus-era documents. Its general editor, Geoffrey Symcox, leaves little room for ambivalence when he says, "This is not your grandfather's Columbus.... While giving the brilliant mariner his due, the collection portrays Columbus as an unrelenting social climber and self-promoter who stopped at nothing - not even exploitation, slavery, or twisting biblical scripture - to advance his ambitions.... Many of the unflattering documents have been known for the last century or more, but nobody paid much attention to them until recently. The fact that Columbus brought slavery, enormous exploitation or devastating diseases to the Americas used to be seen as a minor detail - if it was recognized at all - in light of his role as the great bringer of white man's civilization to the benighted idolatrous American continent. But to historians today this information is very important. It changes our whole view of the enterprise."

But does it?

***

"They ... brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which they exchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells," Christopher Columbus wrote in his logbook in 1495. "They willingly traded everything they owned.... They were well-built, with good bodies and handsome features.... They do not bear arms, and do not know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge and cut themselves out of ignorance. They have no iron. Their spears are made of cane.... They would make fine servants.... With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want. Let us in the name of the Holy Trinity go on sending all the slaves that can be sold."

Catholic priest Bartolome de las Casas, in the multi-volume "History of the Indies" published in 1875, wrote, "... Slaves were the primary source of income for the Admiral (Columbus) with that income he intended to repay the money the Kings were spending in support of Spaniards on the Island. They provide profit and income to the Kings. (The Spaniards were driven by) insatiable greed ... killing, terrorizing, afflicting, and torturing the native peoples ... with the strangest and most varied new methods of cruelty."

This systematic violence was aimed at preventing "Indians from daring to think of themselves as human beings. (The Spaniards) thought nothing of knifing Indians by tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades.... My eyes have seen these acts so foreign to human nature, and now I tremble as I write."

Father Fray Antonio de Montesino, a Dominican preacher, in December 1511 said this in a sermon that implicated Christopher Columbus and the colonists in the genocide of the native peoples:

"Tell me by what right of justice do you hold these Indians in such a cruel and horrible servitude? On what authority have you waged such detestable wars against these people who dealt quietly and peacefully on their own lands? Wars in which you have destroyed such an infinite number of them by homicides and slaughters never heard of before ..."

In 1892, the National Council of Churches, the largest ecumenical body in the United States, is known to have exhorted Christians to refrain from celebrating the Columbus quincentennial, saying, "What represented newness of freedom, hope, and opportunity for some was the occasion for oppression, degradation and genocide for others."

Yet America continues to celebrate "Columbus Day."

That Americans do so in the face of all evidence that there is little in the Columbian legacy that merits applause makes it easier for them to avoid taking responsibility for their own actions, or the actions of their government. Perhaps there is good reason.

***

In "Columbus Day: A Clash of Myth and History," journalist and media critic Norman Solomon discusses how historians who deal with recorded evidence are frequently depicted as "politically correct" revisionists while the general populace is manipulated into holding onto myths that brazenly applaud inconceivable acts of violence of men against fellow humans.

For those of us who are willing to ask how it becomes possible to manipulate the population of a country into accepting atrocity, the answer is not hard to find. It requires normalizing the inconceivable and drumming it in via the socio-cultural environment until it is internalized and embedded in the individual and collective consciousness. The combined or singular deployment of the media, the entertainment industry, mainstream education or any other agency, can achieve the desired result of convincing people that wars can be just, and strikes can be surgical, as long as it is the US that is doing it.

Never has this process been as blatant and overt as in recent years when the time has come for America to legitimize the idea of global domination. A Department of Defense report titled Joint Vision 2020 calls for the US military to be capable of "full spectrum dominance" of the entire planet. That means total domination and control of all land, sea, air, space and information.

That's a lot of control.

How might this become accepted as "Policy" and remain unquestioned by almost an entire population?

The one word key to that is: Myths. The explanation is that the myths the United States is built upon have paved the way for the perpetuation of all manner of violations.

Among the first of these is that of Christopher Columbus. In school we were taught of his bravery, courage and perseverance. In a speech in 1989, George H.W. Bush proclaimed: "Christopher Columbus not only opened the door to a New World, but also set an example for us all by showing what monumental feats can be accomplished through perseverance and faith."

Never mind that the monumental feats mainly comprised part butchery, part exploitation and the largest part betrayal of host populations of the "New World."

***

On their second arrival in Hispaniola, Haiti, Columbus's crew took captive roughly two thousand local villagers who had arrived to greet them. Miguel Cuneo, a literate crew member, wrote, "When our caravels ... were to leave for Spain, we gathered ... one thousand six hundred male and female persons of those Indians, and these we embarked in our caravels on February 17, 1495.... For those who remained, we let it be known (to the Spaniards who manned the island's fort) in the vicinity that anyone who wanted to take some of them could do so, to the amount desired, which was done."

In 1500, Columbus wrote to a friend, "A hundred castellanoes (a Spanish coin) are as easily obtained for a woman as for a farm, and it is very general and there are plenty of dealers who go about looking for girls; those from nine to ten (years old) are now in demand."

Such original "monumental feats" as were accomplished by our nation's heroes and role models were somewhat primitive. Local inhabitants who resisted Columbus and his crew had their ears or nose cut off, were attacked by dogs, skewered with pikes and shot. Reprisals were so severe that many of the natives committed mass suicide and women began practicing abortions in order not to leave children enslaved. The population of Haiti at the time of Columbus's arrival was between 1.5 million and 3 million. Sixty years later, every single native had been murdered.

Today, "perseverance and faith" allow us to accomplish much more and with far greater impunity. The US continues to liberate Iraq and Afghanistan with 2,000-pound bombs in civilian areas and purge Pakistan via drone attacks on weddings.

Neither case is of isolated whimsy. It was and remains policy.

In "A People's History of the United States," celebrated historian Howard Zinn describes how Arawak men and women emerged from their villages to greet their guests with food, water and gifts when Columbus landed at the Bahamas. But Columbus wanted something else. "Gold is most excellent; gold constitutes treasure; and he who has it does all he wants in the world, and can even lift souls up to Paradise," he wrote to the king and queen of Spain in 1503.

Rather than gold, however, Columbus only found slaves when he arrived on his second visit with seventeen ships and over 1,200 men. Ravaging various Caribbean islands, Columbus took natives as captives as he sailed. Of these he picked 500 of the best specimens and shipped them back to Spain. Two hundred of these died en route, while the survivors were put up for sale by the archdeacon of the town where they landed.

Columbus needed more than mere slaves to sell, and Zinn's account informs us, "... desperate to pay back dividends to those who had invested, (he) had to make good his promise to fill the ships with gold. In the province of Cicao on Haiti, where he and his men imagined huge gold fields to exist, they ordered all persons fourteen years or older to collect a certain quantity of gold every three months. When they brought it, they were given copper tokens to hang around their necks. Indians found without a copper token had their hands cut off and bled to death.

"The Indians had been given an impossible task. The only gold around was bits of dust garnered from the streams. So they fled, were hunted down with dogs, and were killed."

As a younger priest, the aforementioned De las Casas had participated in the conquest of Cuba and owned a plantation where natives worked as slaves before he found his conscience and gave it up. His first-person accounts reveal that the Spaniards "thought nothing of knifing Indians by tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades. They forced their way into native settlements, slaughtering everyone they found there, including small children, old men, pregnant women, and even women who had just given birth. They hacked them to pieces, slicing open their bellies with their swords as though they were sheep herded into a pen. They even laid wagers on whether they could manage to slice a man in two at a stroke, or cut an individual's head from his body, or disembowel him with a single blow of their axes. They grabbed suckling infants by the feet and, ripping them from their mothers' breasts, dashed them headlong against the rocks. Others, laughing and joking all the while, threw them over their shoulders into a river, shouting: 'Wriggle, you litle perisher.' They slaughtered anyone on their path ..."

***

Full Spectrum Dominance

In a letter to the Spanish court dated February 15, 1492, Columbus presented his version of full spectrum dominance: "to conquer the world, spread the Christian faith and regain the Holy Land and the Temple Mount."

With this radical ideology, Las Casas records, "They spared no one, erecting especially wide gibbets on which they could string their victims up with their feet just off the ground and then burned them alive thirteen at a time, in honour of our Saviour and the twelve Apostles."

About incorporating these accounts in his book, Zinn explained to Truthout, "My point is not to grieve for the victims and denounce the executioners. Those tears, that anger, cast into the past, deplete our moral energy for the present ... but I do remember a statement I once read: The cry of the poor is not always just, but if you don't listen to it, you will never know what justice is."

****

Author journalist Chris Hedges believes that glorification of (the atrocities of) Columbus is one of several myths that sustain the illusions that justify the imperial visions of the United States.

In conversation with Truthout, he said, "It's really easy to build a holocaust museum that condemns Germans. It's another issue to build a museum that confronts our own genocide, the genocide that was perpetrated by our own ancestors towards Native Americans or towards African-Americans. I am all for documenting and remembering the [World War II] Holocaust, but the disparity between the reality of the [World War II] Holocaust or the reality of the genocide as illustrated in the [World War II] Holocaust museum and the utter historical amnesia in the Native American museum in Washington is really frightening and shows a complete inability in a public arena for us to examine who we are and what we've done."

Noam Chomsky holds a similar view. "We have [World War II] Holocaust museums all over the place about what the Germans did," Chomsky told Truthout. "Do we have one about what we did? I mean about slavery, about the Native American population? It's not that the people involved didn't know about it. John Quincy Adams, a great grand strategist, who had a major role in these atrocities, in his later years when he reflected on them, referred to that hapless race of North Americans, which we are exterminating with such insidious cruelty. They knew exactly what they were doing. But it doesn't matter. It's us."

Explaining how the mythology of a country becomes its historic reality, Chomsky stated, "If you are well-educated, you can internalize that and it. That's part of what a good education is about, enabling people to live with those contradictions. And you see it very consistently. In the case of, say, the Iraq war, try to find somebody who had a principled objection. Actually you can, occasionally, but it's suppressed."

Historical revisionism and amnesia are critical for nation-building, opines Paul Woodward, the writer and author of the blog "War In Context". He elaborates, "Every nation is subject to its own particular form of historical amnesia. Likewise, imperial powers have their own grandiose revisionist tendencies. Yet there is another form of historical denial particular to recently invented nations whose myth-making efforts are inextricably bound together with the process of the nation's birth ...

"Whereas older nations are by and large populated by people whose ancestral roots penetrated that land well before it took on the clear definition of a nation state, the majority of the people in an invented nation - such as the United States or Israel - have ancestry that inevitably leads elsewhere. This exposes the ephemeral link between the peoples' history and the nation's history. Add to that the fact that such nations came into being through grotesque acts of dispossession and it is clear that a psychological drive to hold aloft an atemporal exceptionalism becomes an existential necessity. National security requires that the past be erased."

Robert Jensen is an author and teaches media law, ethics and politics at the University of Texas. In an essay where he justifies his decision to not celebrate Thanksgiving as a holiday, he says, "Imagine that Germany won World War II and that a Nazi regime endured for some decades, eventually giving way to a more liberal state with a softer version of German-supremacist ideology. Imagine that a century later Germans celebrated a holiday offering a whitewashed version of German/Jewish history that ignored that holocaust and the deep anti-Semitism of the culture. Imagine that the holiday provided a welcomed time for families and friends to gather and enjoy food and conversation. Imagine that businesses, schools and government offices closed on this day. What would we say about such a holiday? Would we not question the distortions woven into such a celebration? Would we not demand a more accurate historical account? Would we not, in fact, denounce such a holiday as grotesque?"

Of course we would.

But our story is different, and once again this year, on October 12, we will once again "Hail Columbus."

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Authors: Dahr Jamail and Jason Coppola

Article Source: truthout http://www.truthout.org/1012091

Bhaswati Sengupta contributed to this report.

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Dahr Jamail, an independent journalist, is the author of "The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan," (Haymarket Books, 2009), and "Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches From an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq," (Haymarket Books, 2007). Jamail reported from occupied Iraq for nine months as well as from Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Turkey over the last five years.

Jason Coppola is the director and producer of the documentary film "Justify My War," which explores the rationalization of war in American culture, comparing the siege of Fallujah with the massacre at Wounded Knee. Coppola has worked in Iraq as well as on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.

Indigenous Peoples Across the Americas Say No to Columbus

UCTP Taíno News - As the U.S. gets ready to celebrate Columbus Day, Indigenous Peoples across the Americas are mobilizing to call attention to the actual legacy of the 1492 arrival. Genocide, colonization, and globalization are some of the themes that will be focused on at anti-Columbus rallies, protests, marches, sit-ins, conferences, and memorial services. Events are scheduled to take place over the weekend through Monday, the official Federally recognized holiday, in Denver, Colorado, Alcatraz, California, Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, Honolulu, Hawaii, New York City and throughout Columbia to name a few.

Arguably America’s most controversial holiday, “Columbus Day” was created 100 years ago in Colorado and later became a National holiday. Opponents of the holiday have long pointed out that Columbus himself was an African slave trader according to his own writings. His actions in the Caribbean launched an era of modern colonialism, rape, pillage, genocide, cultural destruction, slavery, economic & environmental devastation.

With Colorado being the “birthplace” of Columbus Day in the U.S., it is no wonder that one of the most intense manifestations against the holiday takes place annually in protest of the Denver’s Columbus Day Parade. Actions there are organized by the Transform Columbus Day Alliance a coalition that rejects the celebration of Christopher Columbus historical misconceptions regarding Columbus and his "discovery" of the Americas. The Alliance includes a local American Indian Movement Chapter, several Peace and Justice organizations, and even a group called Progressive Italians to Transform the Columbus Holiday.

The United Confederation of Taíno People (UCTP) is another member of the Transform Columbus Day Alliance that is also supporting several other anti-Columbus Day actions. The UCTP has endorsed the annual Papal Bull Burning in Honolulu, Hawaii, a “Remembering our Ancestors” memorial in New York City, and a protest in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico against the that city’s proposed erection of a Columbus monument. The action in Borikén (Puerto Rico) is being organized by a local group called Movimiento Indígena Chib’al’o Jíbaro-Boricua. In collaboration with local organizations, the UCTP is coordinating an international coalition against that project and plans to launch a web page dedicated to that issue.

The Annual Sunrise Gathering on Alcatraz Island is scheduled to take place on Monday, October 13th in conjunction with the “International Day of Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples 2008.” These events are being organized by the International Indian Treaty Council and American Indian Contemporary Arts under the theme “Celebrating our Survival and Challenging the Myth of Columbus and “Doctrine of Discovery.”

In perhaps one of the largest manifestations taking place over the “Columbus Holiday” weekend, Indigenous organizations and communities throughout in Colombia will mobilize to protest the U.S. Colombia Free Trade Agreement, Plan Colombia and the policies of the Bush-Backed Uribe Government. The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia, ONIC, has announced that mass protests will join the forces of indigenous, peasant, and popular movement.

With regard to the mobilizations in Columbia, the Association of Indigenous Councils of Northern Cauca (ACIN) called on “national and international public opinion to express solidarity with the indigenous, peasant, afro-Colombian and working people of Colombia.” For the ACIN October 12th marks the date over 500 years ago when “European Colonialism clenched its predator claws on this hemisphere. Those claws have maintained a grip on our peoples ever since.”

The ACIN further notes that the mobilizations in South America and throughout the Americas are a demand for dignity, justice, liberty and respect for life.

UCTPTN 10.11.2008

Photo Credit: Indymedia

Denver's Ultimate Persecution of Columbus Day Resisters to Begin Today

Vindictive Trial of the Elderly and Disabled Shows City's True Colors

Denver (Colorado AIM) - On Wednesday morning, May 28, at 8:30am, in Courtroom 117M in the City and County Building, 1437 Bannock Street, Denver, the City of Denver is scheduled to begin its final round of prosecutions of the 83 Columbus Day protesters, who were arrested on October 6, 2007.

In the final drama of arrests and trials, that Colorado AIM estimates have cost the city over $1 million, the City will embark on its most mean-spirited and cynical prosecutions to date.

Wednesday's case involves the persecution of:

- a 67-year-old American Indian elder, who is a diabetic amputee, and was arrested in her wheelchair the day of the protest (Irma Little)

- a 60-year-old European-American man, who was former Controller for the State of Colorado, and is a retired lawyer, professor and minister (Dan Whittemore)

- a 32-year-old, blind, Italian-American man who stood in solidarity with American Indians against the racism of the Columbus Day parade (Nicholas Delmonico)

- a 63-year-old, European-American teacher who has protested the Columbus Day holiday, in an attempt to educate the Colorado public, for the past fifteen years (Katherine "Kate" Goodspeed)

The prosecution of this group of social justice advocates is more evidence that the administration of Mayor John Hickenlooper, and the office of City Attorney David Fine, are not interested in the pursuit of justice, and are not interested in a principled resolution of the annual Columbus Day conflict in the streets of Denver. They are interested in the vindictive assertion of their power, through arbitrary arrests and prosecutions of peaceful dissenters. The City has admitted in these trials that it intends to set an example for future protests, including this summer's Democratic National Convention.

The defense will be led by noted Denver attorneys Lonn Heymann of the law firm of Rosenthal and Heymann, and Qusair Mohamedbhai of the law firm of Killmer, Lane & Newman.

Italians against Columbus Day

UCTP Taino News – In solidarity with American Indian nations, a group of Italian citizens have decided to actively support protests against the celebration of Columbus Day by establishing a petition against it the controversial holiday.

The petition, which was written in Cannara (Perugia) - Italy on October 9, 2007, will be presented to Italian municipalities, presidents of Italian regions, and to Italian American associations.

Mike Graham (Cherokee) of United Native America, Oglala Lakota Patriot Russell Means, and UCTP President Roberto Mukaro Borrero (Taino) have endorsed the effort.

The Italian petition against the celebration of Columbus Day can be found online at http://www.petitiononline.com/cd1ptoit/petition.html.

An announcement from the Transform Columbus Day Alliance (TDC):

The Rocky Mountain News made a public records request and received all our TCD Defenders' summons and complaints from the police. They have posted them all as PDFs on their website, redacting only social security numbers.

This means people's home addresses and other personal info, including their charges and the terms of their arrests, are now on the web. This is legal, but extremely invasive; the Rocky doesn't do this for all arrests.

This is a special act of nastiness towards us.

Arrests are public information, but this is highly irresponsible journalism, and clearly part of the Rocky's ongoing malevolence towards this alliance, the American Indian Movement and Indian people generally.

Call or email the Rocky Mountain News and demand they remove this information from their websites. It serves no public need and is clearly intended as a form of harassment of our defenders and their families.

Main number 303-954-5000
Main newsroom number 303-954-5201

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Related Article:

Protest lawyer cites international law
Gerash takes case in Columbus Day demonstrations
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5719597,00.html

Related Archived Interviews Online:

Challenging Columbus Day: Denver Organizers Discuss Why They Protest the Holiday (Friday, October 6th, 2006)
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/06/1350258

Indigenous Activists Blast Columbus Day as "Propping Up of Racist Propaganda" (Monday, October 10th, 2005)
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/10/1335225&mode=thread&tid=25

Columbus Day protest in Denver leads to arrests

By Keith Coffman

DENVER (Reuters) - About 75 protesters, including American Indian activist Russell Means, were arrested on Saturday after blocking Denver's downtown parade honoring the Italian-born discoverer Christopher Columbus, an event they denounced as "a celebration of genocide."

Police loaded protesters onto buses after they refused orders to disperse. Most will be charged with obstruction of a roadway or disrupting a lawful assembly, Denver Police Lt. Ron Saunier said.

Police delayed the parade's start for more than an hour as they tried to head off confrontations.

American Indian groups and their supporters have disrupted the city's annual Columbus Day parade every year for nearly two decades, leading to clashes with Colorado's Italian-American community over the century-old celebration, the longest-running such commemoration in the United States.

Columbus Day, marked this year on October 8, is an official holiday for most U.S. federal government workers, many public schools, state and local agencies and the U.S. bond market. It recalls the October 12, 1492, landing of Columbus in the Americas on his search for a naval route to India, an event that spawned an era of European interest in the New World.

Means, talking to Reuters before his arrest, said Columbus was the "first trans-Atlantic slave trader" after landing in the Americas in 1492. He said Columbus started centuries of oppression of native peoples.

"By all accounts, Christopher Columbus was personally responsible for thousands of deaths of the original inhabitants of this hemisphere," Means said.

Parade organizer George Vendegnia of the Sons of Italy said his group would honor Columbus' legacy until the U.S. Congress changed the holiday's name. Some cities including Berkeley, California, have already changed the name to "Indigenous People's Day."

"It's a day for us to celebrate our heritage," Vendegnia said.

Parade opponent Glenn Spagnuolo, an Italian-American, said Columbus' legacy should not be celebrated.

"To honor someone who, by his own writings, was a slave trader, is immoral," he said. "I don't see any of my Italian culture in celebrating the occupation and destruction of native cultures."

© Reuters 2007 All rights reserved

Opinion: Columbus Day Celebrates Genocide

By Roberto Mukaro Agueibana Borrero

As Columbus Day fast approaches so does the realization that it is one of the most controversial of 8 U.S federal holidays. At least 17 States do not celebrate or recognize the holiday and plans for annual protests and related educational initiatives are well under way across the United States.

While some Americans question why there is so much controversy directed toward the “discoverer of the New World”, I am reminded of the collective “human spirit” that brought together the nations who developed the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948. The United States was among the original signatories of this Convention whose second article states that genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members
of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of
life calculated to bring about its physical
destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births
within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to
another group.

In light of this definition, as we review the legacy of Columbus - from the acts he personally committed to atrocities committed by his “countrymen” and successors - one would be hard pressed to not see the connections to the genocide of Caribbean and other Indigenous Peoples throughout the hemisphere.

Whether “mixed or full blood”, the contemporary descendants of the first Indigenous Peoples to meet Columbus, the Taino, Carib, and Arawak Peoples are survivors of what can be considered a centuries-old campaign of genocide committed against our communities. From the encomienda system to the sterilization of our women to the commodity and genetically modified foods that have been imposed on our rural or urban “ghetto-ized” communities, this genocidal campaign continues albeit in subtle forms. These vestiges of old colonial regimes masquerading as a new world order affect the well-being of not only our present but our future generations.

Although Columbus himself never set foot in the United States, Indigenous Peoples throughout the country recognize that the celebration of the federally (tax payer) funded holiday called Columbus Day is a symbol of genocide. Promotion of Columbus as a “hero” is racism as its one-sided mainstream presentation attempts to sanitize the injustices committed during his time or the injustices that continue to be committed against our Peoples today. Indeed, Columbus Day supporters vindicate the celebration of these injustices under the guise of an alleged “civilizing” of savage, non-European peoples.

With regard to racism, I refer to the Webster’s definition, which holds that it is “a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.” In the same definition, racism is further defined as “racial prejudice or discrimination.”

Again, by reviewing the motives behind the Columbus enterprise as well as his actions toward and against the Indigenous Peoples of the Caribbean, we can link not only the man himself but his legacy and symbolism directly to racism. This link can be made much in the same way there was an outcry against flying the Confederate Flag on U.S. government grounds. The Confederate flag is linked by many to the legacy of slavery and it is generally accepted that slavery in the past or present constitutes a gross human rights violation unacceptable by “civilized” standards today.

Columbus was a slave trader and the majority of his contemporaries promoted and exported this institution. Fueled by his philosophy of racial superiority, Columbus instituted systems on behalf of the King and Queen of Spain, which fundamentally denied the self-determination of Caribbean Indigenous Peoples. This racist philosophy has been supported at all levels of imposed government regimes including past and present educational systems.

Contemporary Taino descendants should have a particular interest in this subject as government and educational institutions continue to deny our right to self-determination by denying our existence. The denial of our right to self-determination is a violation of our basic human rights. Our right to self-determination was recently acknowledged by the United Nations with its adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Non-Taino academics who are elevated to the status of “experts” on our culture without any consultation with our communities are intentionally or unintentionally parties to these human rights violations. While we remain “invisible” peoples with no rights, “they” remain free to say and promote what they want to say about ancestors, our people and our heritage.

Make no mistake if you are a Taino, your rights are being violated everyday whether you want to admit it or not. These violations do not discriminate against “full bloods or mix bloods” as they are violations against our communities as a whole. Our most recent example of the violation of our rights as Taino people is evidenced by the “Grito de Caguana” protest in Boriken (Puerto Rico) and the arrest of Taino people occupying our sacred ceremonial grounds. These violations, these examples of racial prejudice and discrimination as well as the promotion of symbols of genocide against our ancestors and our peoples must not be tolerated even at the most subtle level.

Referring back to Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 3 states that along with genocide; conspiracy to commit genocide; direct and public incitement to commit genocide; attempt to commit genocide; and complicity in genocide are all punishable by law.

As we turn our attention toward the state-sponsored promotion of symbols of genocide such as Columbus and Columbus Day, it becomes ever clearer that our present and future generations can not afford our complicity. While the legacy of Columbus is a part of our collective history, it is not a legacy that should be sanctified with a national celebration at the expense of those whose ancestors gave their lives defending their liberty against a brutal and unjustifiable oppression.

Roberto Mukaro Agueibana Borrero is the President of the United Confederation of Taino People`s Office of International Relations and Regional Coordination. He is also the current Chairperson of the NGO Committee on the United Nations International Decade of the World`s Indigenous Peoples, a Special Committee of the Conference of Non-Governmental Organizations in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations - CoNGO.

Say NO to Columbus Day!

Before Columbus sailed the Atlantic, he was a slave trader for the Portuguese, transporting West African people to Portugal to be sold as slaves. The Columbus legacy is steeped in blood, violence, and death. Why Transform Columbus Day?

The Transform Columbus Day Alliance actively rejects the celebration of Christopher Columbus and his legacy of domination, oppression, and colonialism. We also reject historical misconceptions regarding Columbus and his "discovery" of the Americas. By saying NO to Columbus and his day we are saying YES to a new future of mutual respect, collaboration, and equality, a future that respects:

=the rights of indigenous peoples

=the natural environment

=democratic & economic justice

=gender equity over global patriarchy

=free and equal speech over hate speech

Indigenous Resist!

For more info visit http://www.transformcolumbusday.com/

The United Confederation of Taino People is a member of the Transform Columbus Day Alliance

VENEZUELA: The Gift of Native Tongues, On the Air

by Humberto Márquez

CARACAS, May 4 (IPS) - Eiker García and Nelson Maldonado took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, producing a long "mmm" sound, following the instructions of the professional radio presenter who was giving them breathing and elocution lessons.

García and Maldonado are young Ye'kuana Indians from the Watamo and La Esmeralda communities in the Amazon rainforest some 800 kilometres south of Caracas, where one of eight indigenous community radio stations, networked with the public Venezuelan National Radio (RNV) station, is to be installed later this year.

"We're learning to overcome our fear of the microphone and how to conduct interviews," García told IPS during a break in the lessons. He was still enjoying the excitement caused by his first airplane flight.

Maldonado told IPS that very few of their people were qualified for this work. "The community sent us on this first course because we are cultural promoters back home," he said.

Twenty-one young people from 10 different indigenous groups, nearly all of them from remote border regions, participated in the short introductory course on radio broadcasting in late April, in preparation for the installation of the radio stations next October.

The course was provided by the National Telecommunications Commission (CONATEL).

"CONATEL will assign the frequencies and provide the transmitters and other necessary equipment to instal eight FM stations, and will also give support in technical and management aspects to guide those responsible for the facilities," general services manager for CONATEL Wilfredo Morales told IPS.

RNV director Helena Salcedo said the public station has carried out trial broadcasts in indigenous languages, using its repeaters in border zones.

"The new stations will help indigenous people recover and preserve their culture, and to recognise it and value it for themselves," Salcedo told IPS.

Some parts of the country do not receive any Venezuelan radio signal at all.

Maldonado said that in the backwater of La Esmeralda, where his community is located, people can only tune in to Radio Casiquiare (the name of a river in the Amazon region), which retransmits broadcasts from government radio stations and is operated by members of the military.

In Páez, a municipality in the extreme northwest of Venezuela, between the gulf of Venezuela and the Colombian gulf of Guajira, "you can easily pick up Colombian television channels, but not Venezuelan ones," María Alejandra González, a young Wayúu woman who is studying journalism and took the CONATEL course, told IPS.

"Throughout the Guajira peninsula (most of which falls within Colombian territory but a small part of which belongs to Venezuela) we can listen to the Fe y Alegría radio station, which transmits in Wayunáiki (the language of the Wayúu, or Guajiro, people) and their news programmes cover events on both sides of the border," said González.

Fe y Alegría is a Catholic organisation, with radio stations in several parts of both Colombia and Venezuela.

González believes that the new indigenous radio station, further south where the Bari, Yucpa and Japreira peoples live, will be able to profit from the existing experience of Fe y Alegría's indigenous language radio station, especially the way it has taken up the concerns, claims and proposals of the indigenous communities.

"We also want to follow their example by creating an Indigenous Radiophonic Institute, like Fe y Alegría's but based on the new indigenous community radio stations," said Wayúu activist Anairú Canbar, who is part of the team leading the recently created Indigenous Peoples Ministry.

The eight radio stations "will begin by broadcasting in the languages of the communities where they are based, but later there will also be programmes to reach other communities within broadcasting range, in their own languages, as far as possible," Canbar said.

García is one of those preparing for the multilingual phase of the radio stations. His mother tongue is Ye'kuana, but he also speaks the language of a neighbouring indigenous community, the Yanomami people.

"We want to identify and train indigenous information workers in all the communities, to work as journalists and send their reports by radio, or by telephone to the radio stations, to provide material for indigenous newscasts, which will then interact on the network," Canbar said.

Funding for setting up the indigenous radio stations is being provided by the Information Ministry, as part of its programme for supporting community radio. CONATEL has registered 192 community stations so far. The Information Ministry also has oversight of the Venezuelan National Radio station.

CONATEL's Morales did not mention specific figures, but he said that "the investments are neither large nor costly in comparison with the service they will provide by empowering indigenous communities."

That is what young people like García and Maldonado are learning new skills for. "Get ready to project your voice," said their instructor as he gave them the microphone. "All Venezuela is listening to you now." At least a part of it will be listening, when the first of the indigenous community stations comes on air.

The planned date for this event is October 12, in many countries officially known as Columbus Day, but now celebrated by original peoples as Indigenous People's Resistance Day.

Who really sailed the ocean blue in 1492?

Who really sailed the ocean blue in 1492? Spanish scholars are on a mission to demystify Christopher Columbus's life, long shrouded in a veil of mythic heroism.

By Lisa Abend and Geoff Pingree
Correspondents of The Christian Science Monitor
MADRID

Genovese nobleman or Catalan pirate? Adventurous explorer or greedy tyrant? What if the Italian gentleman who discovered America was in fact a brutal torturer and slave owner? And what if he wasn't even Italian?

Schoolchildren may learn about a daring hero who proved the Earth wasn't flat, but because his biography is pocked with holes, Christopher Columbus is a figure around whom elaborate theories and enigmatic rumors have long circulated. This year, the 500th anniversary of his death, two Spanish scholars are working to clear up some of the mysteries.

José Antonio Lorente, a geneticist at the University of Granada, is attempting to resolve one of the greatest enigmas - the question of Columbus's origins. In 1927, Peruvian historian Luis Ulloa Cisneros claimed Columbus was from Catalonia - in what is today northwestern Spain - rather than from the Italian port city of Genoa.

Since then, theories have proliferated, some suggesting that Columbus was a Catalan nobleman who rebelled against King Ferdinand's father, King John II, by engaging in piracy on behalf of the French, and then hid his origins to win favor with the son. Others maintain that he was the illegitimate child of Prince Carlos de Viana, a Majorcan nobleman related to Ferdinand and Isabella. Still others suggest that Columbus was a Jew, whose family fled to Genoa to escape persecution.

A historian at the University of Seville asked Mr. Lorente (who had previously used genetic testing to determine that bones in the Cathedral of Seville belonged to Columbus's own illegitimate son), to help resolve the Catalan/Genovese issue.

Collecting saliva samples from hundreds of people in Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, Genoa, Valencia, and the south of France with the last name of Colón, Colom, or Columbo, Lorente is comparing their DNA with that taken from the bones of Columbus, his brother, and Prince Carlos de Viana. "This way, we can try to determine which population with the same last name as Columbus has the most genetic similarities and differences to him," says Lorente.

The study, results of which were supposed to be released last week to coincide with the Spanish celebration of Columbus Day, has been delayed due to the technological difficulties. "Right now, we haven't developed sufficient markers that can be applied to DNA that comes from bones," says Lorente. "We're working on improving it every day, but we can't say when we'll have results."

Until he finds conclusive answers, the geneticist finds the Catalan theory compelling. "Although the majority think he was Italian," Lorente comments, "there are certain aspects of his biography that suggest non-Italian origins."

But while Columbus's origins remain undetermined, Consuelo Varela, a historian at Spain's Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, has answered another question: Why, once he was governor of Hispaniola, did Columbus fall so far from favor that Ferdinand and Isabella ordered him arrested and returned in chains to Spain?

After archivist Isabel Aguirre discovered an uncatalogued transcript of Columbus's trial and brought it to Ms. Varela's attention, the answer was clear to her: Even by the uncharitable standards of 16th-century Spanish colonies, Columbus was a brute.

In her book "The Fall of Columbus," Varela uses the testimony from 23 witnesses contained in the document to show that as governor of Hispaniola, Columbus regularly used torture to maintain order on the island. "It was far more brutal than we had known," says Varela. "It was a frontier society, with terrible misery and injustice."

Columbus was also a strong supporter of slavery, refusing to baptize the indigenous people of Hispaniola so that he could enslave them (Spanish law prohibited the enslavement of Christians), and auctioning Spaniards into slavery, including a young boy caught stealing, as punishment. Varela also notes that Columbus was "surprisingly greedy. He was always tremendously worried about making money."

Although academic specialists have largely hailed Varela's work, popular readers have been less welcoming. An Italian author of historical novels recently wrote her to complain about the unflattering portrait and accused her of falsifying the document. Varela understands the resistance. "No one likes to see the dark side of a mythic person," she says.

For both scholars, it is the mythic elements of Columbus's personality and history that explains public fascination with him. "Columbus is a universal figure," says Lorente. "When you add in the fact that he never said anything about his origins, you have the perfect mystery."

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Columbus the Exploiter...

UCTP Taino News - In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue, in search of new lands, gold and the wealth that these "discoveries" would bring him. He 'discovered' and 'claimed' many islands throughout the Caribbean. But, what kind of 'discovery' is it if there are already people there? And, what right did he have to 'claim' these lands, when the Taino people had been living there for thousands of years?

As if that weren't enough, what he did next was truly despicable. Columbus wrote in his journal that the Taino were strong, well-built people and that with his weapons and 50 men he could enslave the entire population. He forced the Taino to mine for gold for him. Those who refused were killed, those who did not meet their quotas had their hands cut off and were left to bleed to death. Women and children were raped. The people were tortured, starved and worked to death.

Others were killed in even more horrific ways... they were cut in half with swords, hung in groups of 13 representing the Savior and the Apostles, roasted alive, while others were chased down by starving attack dogs and torn apart. Shiploads of Taino people were taken to the slave markets in Seville, Spain to be sold for profit. Many died enroute and were thrown overboard. Other exploiters who came after Columbus said it was possible to find your way to the Indies by following the bodies in the water.

Columbus was the first slave trader in the Americas. Millions died as the greed and brutality he brought to their shores caused death and destruction to the Taino people.

Although the truth is known about Columbus, the USA still honors him with a federal holiday.

Columbus Day is the ONLY disputed holiday with 17 states refusing to honor this murderer.

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Goodbye Mr. Columbus 2004

UCTP Taino News - This year the UCTP continued its annual, month long October campaign concerned with bringing an end to the racist celebrations of Columbus Day, and the revocation of the Papal Bull Inter Ceatera via educational outreach and direct action (protests and letter writing).

As a result of the tremendous efforts by community members and allies, and in conjunction with other national initiatives, a considerable amount of media attention (articles, radio and TV interviews) was again brought to this issue. UCTP reps, community members and allies participated in protests throughout the U.S., from coast to coast. Events took place in California (at the San Juan Capistrano Mission), Washington State and Pennsylvania. A related event, the annual Papal Bulls Burning was also held in Honolulu.

Educational materials focusing on this subject were distributed via hard copy and Internet not only in the U.S. but internationally. As usual responses to these initiatives were positive over all but even the negative reactions sparked debate and worked to keep the issue current. Our statements and education and materials were even published this year by the United Nations Observer located at The Hague in the Netherlands!

A review of some of the education materials distributed this year by visiting the UCTP Website at http://uctp.org/archives.html#7a .

Columbus Day may not go away as soon as many would like but neither will the Taino, Carib or Arawak Peoples who as UCTP rep. John Hu'acan Vidal says "are are here to stay!"

Columbus Statue Toppled in Caracas

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Supporters of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez celebrated Columbus Day on Tuesday by toppling a statue in Caracas of the explorer whom Chavez blames for ushering in a "genocide" of native Indians.

Police firing tear gas later recovered parts of the broken bronze image, which was dragged by the protesters to a theater where the Venezuelan leader was due to speak.

Two years ago, Chavez rechristened the Oct. 12 holiday -- commemorated widely in the Americas to mark Christopher Columbus' 1492 landing in the New World -- "Indian Resistance Day."

The new name honored Indians killed by Spanish and other foreign conquerors following in the wake of the Italian-born Columbus who sailed in the service of the Spanish crown.

As the left-wing nationalist president led celebrations on Tuesday to honor Indian chiefs who resisted the Spanish conquest, a group of his supporters conducted a mock trial of a statue of Columbus in central Caracas.

They declared the image guilty of "imperialist genocide," looped ropes around its outstretched arm and neck and heaved it down from its marble base. No police or other authorities intervened as the protesters drove off in a truck yelling, "We've killed Columbus!"

"This isn't a historical heritage. ... Columbus is the symbol of a conquest that was a globalization by blood and fire, a cultural massacre," said Vitelio Herrera, a philosophy student at Venezuela's Central University.

Outside the Teresa Carreno theater, the protesters hung the statue from a tree and then let it fall to the ground. Police arrested several of them.

Chavez has called Latin America's Spanish and Portuguese conquerors "worse than Hitler" and the precursors of modern-day "imperialism" he says is now embodied by the United States, the biggest buyer of his country's oil.

The base of the toppled statue was daubed with slogans such as "Columbus = Bush. Out!"

The protesters, many who wore red T-shirts with slogans supporting Chavez, repeated the Venezuelan leader's fierce criticism of the U.S.- led occupation of Iraq.

"Didn't they tear down the statue of Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq? For me, (U.S. President George W.) Bush represents barbarity and Chavez represents civilization," said 57-year-old Orlando Iturbe.

Some passersby were shocked. "I don't agree with this," said Jose Luis Maita, who watched with his wife and small daughters.

Venezuelan demonstrators use ropes to topple a Christopher Columbus statue in Caracas, October 12, 2004. Demonstrators protested during Columbus Day, a date which Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has christened as the 'Day of Indian Resistance' to commemorate the Indian people who fought the Spanish colonizers.

Source: http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=6482069

Protest blockades Columbus Day parade

Protest blockades Columbus Day parade

DENVER, Colorado (AP) -- More than 200 sign-waving and chanting protesters were arrested Saturday after blocking a Columbus Day parade for more than an hour, police said.

Police said they began making arrests after ordering the group of about 600 protesters to leave when the parade was about a block away. The 230 protesters who were arrested were charged with loitering and disobedience to a lawful order.

There were no reports of violence or injuries.

Police said the protesters, many of whom were American Indians, gathered at the state Capitol, then marched to the parade route in downtown Denver.

Most carried signs, including one that read "Not Genocide, Celebrate Pride" and another showing a crossed out picture of Columbus with the word "savage" over it.

Adam K. Becenti, a University of Colorado-Boulder student of Navajo descent, said the protest was meant to educate people about the inaccuracies in history books.

"We're grown up to believe he was the first person here" which denies the American Indians' place in history and ignores their genocide, he said.

But Carter Barnard, a member of the Sons of Italy in America, said the protesters had no right to delay the event.

"We have a permit for the parade," he said. "We don't try to stop them from their celebrations."

About 150 people were arrested during an anti-Columbus Day rally in Denver in 2000.