Off with pay, for Columbus Day

[Iamme]

:mad: How DARE our government agencies give themselves off like this, with pay. Nobody gives *ME* such days off. Why do we sit back and take this? They must laugh in our face everytime some birthday event is declared as some holiday (for them).

They get away with this because they know there is the police and the military. It's like they are saying, "What are you going to DO about it?" To me, this is abuse of power, and that's why I can't have respect for a government like we have that feels it can make you pay for their waste, their drumed-up holidays, their paying themselves what THEY feel like it in salaries...with perks that include pensions where they earn more than many workers do!

[Mr Manifesto]

Originally posted by Iamme
:mad: How DARE our government agencies give themselves off like this, with pay. Nobody gives *ME* such days off. Why do we sit back and take this? They must laugh in our face everytime some birthday event is declared as some holiday (for them).

They get away with this because they know there is the police and the military. It's like they are saying, "What are you going to DO about it?" To me, this is abuse of power, and that's why I can't have respect for a government like we have that feels it can make you pay for their waste, their drumed-up holidays, their paying themselves what THEY feel like it in salaries...with perks that include pensions where they earn more than many workers do!

Or, you could join a union and fight to get the public holiday for your workplace as well, instead of whining about it.

Oh, wait, unions are all run by Communists... Sorry, forgot...

[Tricky]

Ah yes. Good old Chris. The first European slaveholder and commiter of genocide (http://www.mit.edu/activities/thistle/v9/9.11/1columbus.html) in the new world. What a great guy!

[fishbob]

Absolutely true.

A crew of my co-workers planned for a month to mobilize to a certain military installation that is mostly run be civilian workers. The crew traveled on Monday and arrived on Tuesday, checked out the project site, and found the local civilian in charge of access to the building. He told the crew that they could not work on Friday because it was a government worker holiday (February 15, 2002) and that since it was going to be a long weekend, all the civilian workers were going to take off an extra day (Feb 14, 2002) and since they were going to be off on Thursday and Friday, they were going to leave early on Wednesday.

We had 5 guys travel 400 miles with all their gear and materials only to be shut down for Valentine's Day.


OK maybe it was for Presidents Day, I don't know.

[Tony]

Originally posted by Iamme
:mad: How DARE our government agencies give themselves off like this, with pay. Nobody gives *ME* such days off. Why do we sit back and take this? They must laugh in our face everytime some birthday event is declared as some holiday (for them).

They get away with this because they know there is the police and the military. It's like they are saying, "What are you going to DO about it?" To me, this is abuse of power, and that's why I can't have respect for a government like we have that feels it can make you pay for their waste, their drumed-up holidays, their paying themselves what THEY feel like it in salaries...with perks that include pensions where they earn more than many workers do!


It is an abuse of power.

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by Tricky
Ah yes. Good old Chris. The first European slaveholder and commiter of genocide (http://www.mit.edu/activities/thistle/v9/9.11/1columbus.html) in the new world. What a great guy!

Really Tricky! A lefty diatribe comparing Columbus to Hitler in the first paragraph! Gee, I thought you were above nutty stuff like that!

Allow me however, to be the very first to wish you a happy and healthy "INDIGENOUS PERSON'S DAY"

Ya crazy liberal, ya!

-z

BTW: Did you know that the horrendous genocide perpetrated against the innocent indians will be re-enacted this very Columbus Day weekend in our nation's capitol?? I think the President himself may even watch, although the outcome is pre-ordained.

Yes, you guessed it....the Washington Redskins must indure the invasion of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Stay away from those pretzels Mr. President!

;)

[Tmy]

I prefer to celebrate Pizzaro Day. Sure he was evil explorer, but at least he was honest about it. And its fun to say "Pizzaro".

Columbine day (oops freudian slip) isnt just for govt workers. Lots of private industry people have it off.

[Leroy]

Originally posted by Iamme
:mad: How DARE our government agencies give themselves off like this, with pay. Nobody gives *ME* such days off. Why do we sit back and take this? They must laugh in our face everytime some birthday event is declared as some holiday (for them).

They get away with this because they know there is the police and the military. It's like they are saying, "What are you going to DO about it?" To me, this is abuse of power, and that's why I can't have respect for a government like we have that feels it can make you pay for their waste, their drumed-up holidays, their paying themselves what THEY feel like it in salaries...with perks that include pensions where they earn more than many workers do!

I get the day off, with pay! :D sorry

[Ipecac]

Originally posted by Iamme
:mad: How DARE our government agencies give themselves off like this, with pay. Nobody gives *ME* such days off. Why do we sit back and take this? They must laugh in our face everytime some birthday event is declared as some holiday (for them).

They get away with this because they know there is the police and the military. It's like they are saying, "What are you going to DO about it?" To me, this is abuse of power, and that's why I can't have respect for a government like we have that feels it can make you pay for their waste, their drumed-up holidays, their paying themselves what THEY feel like it in salaries...with perks that include pensions where they earn more than many workers do!

Jealous. :p

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by Mr Manifesto


Or, you could join a union and fight to get the public holiday for your workplace as well, instead of whining about it.

Oh, wait, unions are all run by Communists... Sorry, forgot...

I don't know how powerful unions are in Australia, but here their power varies widely from state to state. In some states they weild enormous influence, in others (such as the one I live in) joining a union is almost as effective as joining the local "Toastmasters" society. In most they are somewhere in between. Since I don't know what state Iamme is in (or even if he is from the U.S. at all, for that matter, though since his rant is about Columbus Day, it's a safe bet that he is) it is hard to say whether joining a union would help him or not.

[Iamme]

Hi Nyar. I am from the Eau Claire, Wisconsin area, which is a regional hub of federal, state, university, lawyer and hospital workers. In other words, there are a lot of 'professional' workers here, including Party headquarters for politics.

[LFTKBS]

Originally posted by rikzilla


Really Tricky! A lefty diatribe comparing Columbus to Hitler in the first paragraph! Gee, I thought you were above nutty stuff like that!

What on earth are you talking about? Tricky didn't use the name "Hitler." You did. Hitler didn't invent genocide any more than he invented racism.

The truth is that Christopher Columbus was an instigator of the mass killing of indigenous people. That's genocide. End of story. You're the one comparing him to Hitler. And, by the way, that comparison is accurate.

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by LFTKBS


What on earth are you talking about? Tricky didn't use the name "Hitler." You did. Hitler didn't invent genocide any more than he invented racism.

The truth is that Christopher Columbus was an instigator of the mass killing of indigenous people. That's genocide. End of story. You're the one comparing him to Hitler. And, by the way, that comparison is accurate.

:what: :big:

[rikzilla]

Well,

Tricky posted a link to derogatory comments equating Colombus with Hitler, written by a fellow named Ward Churchill.

Ward Churchill is a leftist nut.

Here's what Ward's first paragraph and thesis statement looked like:

From Tricky's link:
It has been contended by those who would celebrate Columbus that
accusations concerning his perpetration of genocide are distortive
"revisions" of history. Whatever the process unleashed by his
"discovery" of the "New World," it is said, the discoverer
himself cannot be blamed. Whatever his defects and offenses, they are
surpassed by the luster of his achievements; however "tragic" or
"unfortunate" certain dimensions of his legacy may be, they are
more than offset by the benefits even for the victims of the resulting
blossoming of a "superior civilization" in the
Americas. Essentially the same arguments might be advanced with regard
to Adolf Hitler.

But Ward's a nutter...he's made other comments...equating other people to Nazis....(apparently that's his bag)

Ward is, as far as I know, the only person in the opposition movmement who
has come out stating that the people in the WTC bldg. in some way were
"Eichmanns" or deserving of their deaths. Organizers against the war
should be aware of his online public views and not be inviting him to
their rallies. One organizer in the rally put it quite well, "However,
Welch said she's concerned that controversial speakers such as Churchill
might hurt the cause.


Yeah,...that brand of anti-American honesty would surely hurt the cause! :rolleyes:

LINK (http://csf.colorado.edu/mail/psn/2001/msg01755.html)

Nice job Tricky!

-z

[LFTKBS]

Okay, got me. I should have followed the link. HOWEVER: just because Churchill may be totally off his nut on the WTC/Pentagon attacks, doesn't make his - or anyone else's - criticism of Columbus any less valid. How about this:

LFTKBS (me): "Columbus committed genocide. Arawak population of Haiti before Columbus: >= 1 million. Arawak population in 1516 after Columbus & his son finished up : ~12,000."

Not enough dead bodies for you?

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by LFTKBS
Okay, got me. I should have followed the link. HOWEVER: just because Churchill may be totally off his nut on the WTC/Pentagon attacks, doesn't make his - or anyone else's - criticism of Columbus any less valid. How about this:

LFTKBS (me): "Columbus committed genocide. Arawak population of Haiti before Columbus: >= 1 million. Arawak population in 1516 after Columbus & his son finished up : ~12,000."

Not enough dead bodies for you?

It makes his opinion suspect.

Colombus was the first European to discover through good science that he couldn't sail off the edge of the world. His discovery was very bad for specific primitive peoples...but very good for general human progress. Darwin has a theory about this, perhaps you are familiar with it?

All human history is fraught with war and conquest. An advanced society subjugates a primitive society....it's survival of the fittest writ large.

Today it's fashionable to take our modern sense of right and wrong and impose it upon our own bloody history in order to make moral pronouncements such as "Colombus comitted genocide"...but it's all just PC BS.

Colombus was a man of his time. A greater scientist and sailor-man than governor...but basically a resourceful, brave, and intelligent man.

-z

[Ed]

Originally posted by LFTKBS
LFTKBS (me): "Columbus committed genocide. Arawak population of Haiti before Columbus: >= 1 million. Arawak population in 1516 after Columbus & his son finished up : ~12,000."



So? Not to put too fine a point on it but what expansion where in the world did not leave a trail of dead bodies?

Are you saying that it is reasonable to judge with your 21st century take (which is of course evanescent) on morality the actions of someone 500 years ago?

What is even the point of your comment?

[Blue Monk]

Originally posted by rikzilla


It makes his opinion suspect.

Colombus was the first European to discover through good science that he couldn't sail off the edge of the world. His discovery was very bad for specific primitive peoples...but very good for general human progress. Darwin has a theory about this, perhaps you are familiar with it?

All human history is fraught with war and conquest. An advanced society subjugates a primitive society....it's survival of the fittest writ large.

Today it's fashionable to take our modern sense of right and wrong and impose it upon our own bloody history in order to make moral pronouncements such as "Colombus comitted genocide"...but it's all just PC BS.

Colombus was a man of his time. A greater scientist and sailor-man than governor...but basically a resourceful, brave, and intelligent man.

-z

You really ought to crack open a book every once in while.

First of all it was well understood that the world was round when Columbus set sail. The only disagreement concerned its dimensions. Columbus thought it was much smaller and he was wrong. Luckily he found land or he would have certainly sailed to his death long before he reached the Orient.

Second, the atrocities of Columbus are well-documented fact. The details recorded by those in his party and many times by his own hand so these are not liberal fabrications as you would like to suggest. There are, of course, no surviving accounts from the native populations as they all died at the hand of Columbus centuries ago. We are not talking about the normal unfortunate change in fortune that historically accompanies the clash of two cultures but rather wholesale slaughter and torture that far surpasses those of other European explorers.

He systematically tried to enslave whole peoples and then tortured and butchered them when they failed to comply. These were not military conquests similar to the toppling of the Aztec Empire but simply the brutalization of people even when there was nothing to gain.

There are descendants of the Aztecs and the Mayans alive today. There are no descendants of the unfortunate peoples who encountered Columbus. That is, by definition, genocide.

Before you respond I suggest you go to the library or consult any source you consider reliable. You will find that Columbus more than deserves his reputation as a cruel and brutal mass murderer.

[Malachi151]

Why are people against paid holidays? Just jealous I guess. The idea behind the way the Federal government handles labor is that it is trying to lead by example. Now, Columbus Day is a bit controversial due to the person being honored, but the idea of paid holidays in general are not.

I doubt that you would be complaining if it were you that was getting the paid holidy eh?

I am happy for all the federal workers who are able to enjoy their happy paid holidays :D

You know in Europe ;) they get like 6 to 8 weeks of paid vacation :D

Just call it pro-family :D

[LFTKBS]

"Darwin has a theory about this, perhaps you are familiar with it?" - rikzilla

Are you saying that it's good to wipe out huge numbers of "primitive peoples" in the name of progress? Are you also saying that genocide=natural selection? If not, what does that comment mean?

In addition, that idea no one but Columbus knew that the earth was round and you couldn't "sail off of it" is pure hooey. The philosopher Eratosthenes even estimated the circumference of the Earth way back before Columbus's great<SUP>10</SUP>-grandfather was a sparkle in anyone's eye.

"An advanced society subjugates a primitive society....it's survival of the fittest writ large." - rikzilla again

Does that make it moral?

"Are you saying that it is reasonable to judge with your 21st century take (which is of course evanescent) on morality the actions of someone 500 years ago?

What is even the point of your comment?" - Ed

I think it's quite reasonable. Not everyone living during the period in which slavery was legal in the United States thought it was moral. Not everyone living during the period of time in which Columbus & co. slaughtered the Arawaks thought it was moral - specifically the Arawaks themselves.

Are you saying, Ed and rikzilla, that because a) this happened a long time ago and b) that it happened to "primitive" people, that it was okay?

Look, here's the point: Columbus is dead. He's not sailing off to discover and subjugate new worlds. But do we want to celebrate a man whose achievements include mass killings as well as a touch of seamanship?

[Ed]

Originally posted by LFTKBS
"Are you saying that it is reasonable to judge with your 21st century take (which is of course evanescent) on morality the actions of someone 500 years ago?

What is even the point of your comment?" - Ed

I think it's quite reasonable. Not everyone living during the period in which slavery was legal in the United States thought it was moral. Not everyone living during the period of time in which Columbus & co. slaughtered the Arawaks thought it was moral - specifically the Arawaks themselves.

Not "everyone" ever believes anything. I'm sure there were dissenters, I'm sure that there were people against exploration in the first place. Again, I don't see the point of your observations. I could, tediously, provide references to many horrors of expansion, up to and including the "settling of the frontier" in this country. Maybe Columbus was worse than some, maybe he was the worst (someone has to be, after all).

I have a friend, very liberal might I add, who said that Iraq "made him ashamed to be an American". I pointed out that what we were seeing was greed, naked power, some idealism, money and so on. In short, I said, "everything that has characterized every human society from the beginning of time. So what you are saying is that you 'are ashamed to be a human'". So it is here. expansion was going to take place with or without Columbus. Saying that it was cruel or unnecessary or whatever is just silly. It went along with what being human is all about. Call it progress, perhaps. Anyway, Columbus was the putitive first one here so why not give him a do? Let me ask you this: what individual during the period 1450-1550 would you honor? Anyone? Sure scientists and artists. Soliders, explorers? Recognizing that what they did was necessary and difficult to do cleanly? I think that bost ends and means were preordained, so all that is left is primacy

Are you saying, Ed and rikzilla, that because a) this happened a long time ago and b) that it happened to "primitive" people, that it was okay?

"Okay" is a value judgement which I reject just as I reject condemnation. It was and Columbus was first is all I would say and I give him a hearty "Thank you" for the reminants of Spanish influence in our neat as hell country.

Look, here's the point: Columbus is dead. He's not sailing off to discover and subjugate new worlds. But do we want to celebrate a man whose achievements include mass killings as well as a touch of seamanship?


Goodness. "A touch of seamanship"? I really don't know how to respond to that.

[Charlie Monoxide]

I'm assuming it's to celebrate the "discovery" or "discoverer" of North America. I've always thought that it's kinda bizarre to "discover" something that's been inhabited for quite a long time.

Charlie (hey Bush - "discover" some WMD) Monoxide

[Nyarlathotep]

All this talk that happens every Columbus day about whether Columbus was a hero or a villian always makes me shake my head. It strikes me as absurd to try to judge a 15th century man by 21st century ethics. Ethical codes, like everything else, change and evolve with time, so to make a villian out of someone who lived 600 years ago because he doesn't measure up to modern day standards seems odd to me. Hitler, by the way(besides causing Godwins law to be invoked), is not a valid comparison to Columbus. Hitler's actions were immoral even by the standards of his day.

[Mr Manifesto]

Originally posted by rikzilla


It makes his opinion suspect.

Colombus was the first European to discover through good science that he couldn't sail off the edge of the world. -z

Uh... no he didn't... He was supposed to hit China... being right for the wrong reasons is still wrong.

[LFTKBS]

Originally posted by Nyarlathotep
Ethical codes, like everything else, change and evolve with time, so to make a villian out of someone who lived 600 years ago because he doesn't measure up to modern day standards seems odd to me.

Oh. My mistake. Attention, everyone: in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, murder was not immoral.

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by LFTKBS


Oh. My mistake. Attention, everyone: in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, murder was not immoral.

What he did was not considered murde in those days. Conquest of other peoples (which often involved killing large numbers of them) was considered perfectly moral and normal.

[LFTKBS]

1) Okay, I give up, Nyarlathotep. Please tell me what would be considered murder during Columbus's lifetime.

2) Just because it was "considered to be perfectly normal and moral" does not mean that it was moral. I'm sure a lot of people once believed that evil spirits were the cause of illness; that doesn't mean that it was true then.

Jesus, guys, this is why Christians get so freaked out about "moral relativism" - was it wrong then to kill people or not? If you and I climbed in a time machine and went back to late 15th century Haiti, and gave you the opportunity to stop one of Columbus's men from killing a native, would you? And none of that Doc Brown "destroying the space-time continuum/altering the future" stuff, either.

If your answer is "No, I would not prevent it," let me offer you this: after you refuse to prevent said killing, I chop off your head with a sword. Is that murder?

If yes, why? Because of the century you were born in? Why should it make a difference? How do you determine which individuals are worthy of life and which are not?

[Ed]

Originally posted by LFTKBS
[B]1

If yes, why? Because of the century you were born in? Why should it make a difference? How do you determine which individuals are worthy of life and which are not?

Time and culture.

I think that death was more matter of fact than today. Even in Europe, cities would be leveled during war (and at other times) and thousands would be put to the sword. "No quarter" was a fairly common cry on the battlefield. I also doubt if there was terrible concern over "worthy of life". I suspect that things were viewed pretty pragmatically, "is that guy worth more dead than alive?", "is there a downside to my killing him?". I suspect that you are not a big history reader. You might pick up a book on Edward III's wars in France. If you do, remember that they were fighting fellow Christians. Far away, against pagans, with no line of supply, being in a minority, surrounded (if you will) I am not sure how odd their behavior was.

[Nyarlathotep]

Originally posted by LFTKBS
1) Okay, I give up, Nyarlathotep. Please tell me what would be considered murder during Columbus's lifetime.

2) Just because it was "considered to be perfectly normal and moral" does not mean that it was moral. I'm sure a lot of people once believed that evil spirits were the cause of illness; that doesn't mean that it was true then.

Jesus, guys, this is why Christians get so freaked out about "moral relativism" - was it wrong then to kill people or not? If you and I climbed in a time machine and went back to late 15th century Haiti, and gave you the opportunity to stop one of Columbus's men from killing a native, would you? And none of that Doc Brown "destroying the space-time continuum/altering the future" stuff, either.

If your answer is "No, I would not prevent it," let me offer you this: after you refuse to prevent said killing, I chop off your head with a sword. Is that murder?

If yes, why? Because of the century you were born in? Why should it make a difference? How do you determine which individuals are worthy of life and which are not?

The simplest way I can explain it is this. Columbus lived in the 15th Century. The only morals he had any way of knowing were those of his day. We do not accept the violent conquest of other peoples but it was a perfecly acceptable thing for that day and age. Without sounding too condescending, he didn't know any better. Just as you wouldn't be as harsh on a young child who steals as you would be on an adult. The child still has to learn

If I could go back in time and stop him (and not worry about paradox and such), would I? Yes. Because our society has learned from the mistakes of his society. I do consider his actions to be mistakes but I realize that I have the benefit if 600+ years of 20-20 hindsight and this prevents me from faulting him for making those mistakes.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Nyarlathotep


If I could go back in time and stop him (and not worry about paradox and such), would I? Yes. Because our society has learned from the mistakes of his society. I do consider his actions to be mistakes but I realize that I have the benefit if 600+ years of 20-20 hindsight and this prevents me from faulting him for making those mistakes.

I believe that the word "mistake" is undefined.

[Tricky]

Originally posted by Blue Monk
the atrocities of Columbus are well-documented fact. The details recorded by those in his party and many times by his own hand so these are not liberal fabrications as you would like to suggest. There are, of course, no surviving accounts from the native populations as they all died at the hand of Columbus centuries ago. We are not talking about the normal unfortunate change in fortune that historically accompanies the clash of two cultures but rather wholesale slaughter and torture that far surpasses those of other European explorers.
I confess to posting a Googled link to a questionable source. This guy really is a bit out in left field. But as Blue Monk points out, Columbus' genocide of Indigenous People is well documented (by Columbus himself).

This is just to point out a problem with heros. They have feet of clay. Charles Lindburgh was a well known Nazi sympathizer. Ty Cobb was a well known mysogenist. Given the times that our heros lived in, perhaps their attitudes are understandible. I think it is wrong, though, to lionize them as if they were perfect. Columbus day ought to be celebrated by learning about what he was really like, not by turning him into a mythological character.

[Ed]

Originally posted by Tricky

I confess to posting a Googled link to a questionable source. This guy really is a bit out in left field. But as Blue Monk points out, Columbus' genocide of Indigenous People is well documented (by Columbus himself).

This is just to point out a problem with heros. They have feet of clay. Charles Lindburgh was a well known Nazi sympathizer. Ty Cobb was a well known mysogenist. Given the times that our heros lived in, perhaps their attitudes are understandible. I think it is wrong, though, to lionize them as if they were perfect. Columbus day ought to be celebrated by learning about what he was really like, not by turning him into a mythological character.

so there are no heros? Seems sort of sad, dosen't it?

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by Blue Monk


You really ought to crack open a book every once in while.

First of all it was well understood that the world was round when Columbus set sail. The only disagreement concerned its dimensions. Columbus thought it was much smaller and he was wrong. Luckily he found land or he would have certainly sailed to his death long before he reached the Orient.

Second, the atrocities of Columbus are well-documented fact. The details recorded by those in his party and many times by his own hand so these are not liberal fabrications as you would like to suggest. There are, of course, no surviving accounts from the native populations as they all died at the hand of Columbus centuries ago. We are not talking about the normal unfortunate change in fortune that historically accompanies the clash of two cultures but rather wholesale slaughter and torture that far surpasses those of other European explorers.

He systematically tried to enslave whole peoples and then tortured and butchered them when they failed to comply. These were not military conquests similar to the toppling of the Aztec Empire but simply the brutalization of people even when there was nothing to gain.

There are descendants of the Aztecs and the Mayans alive today. There are no descendants of the unfortunate peoples who encountered Columbus. That is, by definition, genocide.

Before you respond I suggest you go to the library or consult any source you consider reliable. You will find that Columbus more than deserves his reputation as a cruel and brutal mass murderer.

I will disregard your rude condescension, as well as your sweeping assumptions about my scholarship. You do not know me, I would beg to remind you that you haven't the faintest clue whom you are speaking to.

As far as the rest of your little rant, I would like to know your source material. Please list for me these books I should read. I will check into them and if they are backed by solid evidence and scholarship perhaps you will win me over to your viewpoint.

But let me give you a tiny bit of good advice. When trying to argue a point, it is best not to belittle or insult those you are trying to sway to your position.

-z

[Mike B.]

Originally posted by Mr Manifesto


Uh... no he didn't... He was supposed to hit China... being right for the wrong reasons is still wrong.

Yep.
He died insisting that he was in Asia the whole time, no matter what poeple said.

[Mike B.]

Well all of us in Canada, the US, and Latin America owe something to Columbus.

The hundreds of millions of people in Latin America who are Mestizos have Spanish anscestors...

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by LFTKBS
1) Okay, I give up, Nyarlathotep. Please tell me what would be considered murder during Columbus's lifetime.

2) Just because it was "considered to be perfectly normal and moral" does not mean that it was moral. I'm sure a lot of people once believed that evil spirits were the cause of illness; that doesn't mean that it was true then.

Jesus, guys, this is why Christians get so freaked out about "moral relativism" - was it wrong then to kill people or not? If you and I climbed in a time machine and went back to late 15th century Haiti, and gave you the opportunity to stop one of Columbus's men from killing a native, would you? And none of that Doc Brown "destroying the space-time continuum/altering the future" stuff, either.

If your answer is "No, I would not prevent it," let me offer you this: after you refuse to prevent said killing, I chop off your head with a sword. Is that murder?

If yes, why? Because of the century you were born in? Why should it make a difference? How do you determine which individuals are worthy of life and which are not?

It is better that you ask "What is morality?"

Here is an answer given by Dr. Shermer that recognises that morality is truly a subject, not an object.

The Secular Sphynx (http://www.skeptic.com/04.2.shermer-sphinx.html)

Just as life does not "begin" at a single point, neither does society, culture, or morality. They evolved over eons in the paleolithic environment where hunting and gathering was the way of life for small bands of hominids eking out a living and struggling to survive in a hostile environment filled with predators, parasites, diseases, accidents, and nature's quirks. Morality evolved in these small groups as individuals cooperated with one another to meet their needs (see Irons, this issue). Individuals belonged to families, families to extended families, extended families to communities, and, more recently, communities to societies. This natural progression, which is now in its latest evolutionary stages of perceiving societies as part of the species, and the species as part of the biosphere, is illustrated in the Bio-Cultural Evolutionary (BCE) Pyramid opposite.

I designed the BCE Pyramid out of a hybrid of Maslow's famous hierarchy of needs and Singer's expanding circle of ethical sentiment. It depicts the 1.5 million years over which our ethical behavior evolved in our ancestral environment under primarily biogenetic control, and the transition about 35,000 years ago when sociocultural factors increasingly assumed control in shaping our ethical behavior. Keep in mind that this is a continuous process. There was no point at which an Upper Paleolithic Moses descended from a glacier-covered mountain and proclaimed to his fellow Cro-Magnons, "I've just invented culture. We no longer have to obey our genes like those stupid Neanderthals. From now on we obey THE LAW!"



This is what I meant by my Darwin comment. But not just survival/supremacy of the fittest culture. No, I also meant the evolution of society, and it's concept of morality.

What has been said here of Colombus is basically that he was an imoral man. A murderer, slaver, and father of a genocide on two continents. All I am saying is that one cannot look 500 years into the past and pass judgement. It's not valid. Our own sense of morality has evolved. Were we to venture to another planet and find primative people living there I'm quite sure that we would be careful to adhere to our own ethics in our interactions with them. This would be the right thing to do, yet I have heard no argument here that shows that Colombus did not do what he thought was right based on the level of social/moral evolution of 1492 Europe.

-z

[rikzilla]

I was personally intrigued by Dr. Shermer's presentation at TAM this year. He said he was working on a study of the origins of morality, partly in order to refute the claim by some religionists that "There is no morality without God".

I believe his research sheds alot of rational light on the abortion debate,...and in context of this thread, also help us look at the deeds of Christopher Colombus in their proper context.

Take a moment to digest this nugget from Shermer:

Oskar Schindler or Amon Goeth?

One morning in 1995, when he was visiting Occidental College, I had breakfast with Thomas Keneally, author of Schindler's List. Out of curiosity I asked him what he thought was the difference between Oskar Schindler, rescuer of Jews and hero of the story, and Amon Goeth, evil incarnate as commandant of the Plaszow camp. His answer was revealing. Not much, he said. Had there been no war Schindler and Goeth might have been business partners and drinking buddies, morally questionable at times perhaps, but relatively harmless and ineffectual as historical personages. What a difference a war makes!

Humans have the capacity to be both moral and immoral, as Stanley Milgram showed in his famous shock experiments in which subjects believed they were delivering electric shocks to other subjects for "wrong" answers on a test. Ranging from Slight Shock to Moderate Shock to Strong Shock to Very Strong Shock to Intense Shock to Extreme Intensity Shock to Danger: Severe Shock to XXX, the results were, well, shocking: 65% administered the maximum shock possible and 100% administered a "Strong Shock" of 135 volts. Milgram expressed his own and others' amazement at what these experiments revealed about human nature (1974):

What is surprising is how far ordinary individuals will go in complying with the experimenter's instructions. Despite the fact that many subjects experience stress, despite the fact that many protest to the experimenter, a substantial proportion continue to the last shock on the generator. I am forever astonished when lecturing on the obedience experiments in colleges across the country. I faced young men who were aghast at the behavior of experimental subjects and proclaimed they would never behave in such a way, but who in a matter of months, were brought into the military and performed without compunction actions that made shocking the victim seem pallid. In this respect, they are no better and no worse than human beings of any other era who lend themselves to the purposes of authority and become instruments in its destructive processes.

Depending on circumstances perhaps any of us could become Nazis. Who's to say? Raised in a free, democratic society like America, how do any of us know how we might react in a totalitarian regime like Nazi Germany? Holocaust historian Yehuda Bauer made this observation about Himmler and human nature:

The brutal murder of whole populations, including children, has been with us since the beginning of recorded history and most probably before that. Sadism and brutality scream at us from every page of human history, and they are in no way less horrific than the Nazi variety. If we cannot "understand" Himmler, most of human history is beyond our capacity of understanding. We can put ourselves in the shoes of the perpetrators, as well as the shoes of the victims, because we all have in ourselves the potential for extreme good and extreme evil-at least, what we call good and evil. Himmler's ideas and motives are latent in everyone's subconscious. The real horror of Himmler is not that he was unusual or unique but that he was in many ways quite ordinary, and that he could have lived out his life as a chicken farmer, a good neighbor with perhaps somewhat antiquated ideas about people.

This makes sense from an evolutionary perspective since individuals in the ancestral environment would have needed to be both aggressive and cooperative, depending on context and desired outcomes. Tavris and Wade (1995), in fact, show that an individual's history, culture, generation, and immediate situation are crucial in understanding moral behavior. Without context the search for moral universals is misleading.

[shuize]

While watching the French vs. Fijian world cup rugby match I opened up my encarta program to check up on Fiji. I learned that Indians (from Asia) were imported as indentured servants to the island up until 1920.

Interesting.

All this talk of paid holidays and New World Indians made me think of that.

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by Nyarlathotep
All this talk that happens every Columbus day about whether Columbus was a hero or a villian always makes me shake my head. It strikes me as absurd to try to judge a 15th century man by 21st century ethics. Ethical codes, like everything else, change and evolve with time, so to make a villian out of someone who lived 600 years ago because he doesn't measure up to modern day standards seems odd to me. Hitler, by the way(besides causing Godwins law to be invoked), is not a valid comparison to Columbus. Hitler's actions were immoral even by the standards of his day.

This is pure BS. Many people try to make this argument, but its a crock. Basically you are saying that torture, rape, and slaughter were okay back then.

#1 The victems sure as hell didn't think so
#2 We have writings of server observers who expressed extreme revoltion and horror at the events
#3 We have writings of people that expressed outrage and opposition to the events
#4 People know that ramming a wooden spike up an man's butt until it comes out his throught, burning him alivem chopping off people's heads slowly, stretching people to death, etc is not "acceptable" behavior, they did it because they didn't care about human life and were in a state of anarchy and power. he crews of Columbus' ships were largely prisoners and thugs in the first place and people who had been abused by thier own system back home, but Columbus was not such a person and he did permit it to go one and called for the enslavement of the people because he wanted gold.

The idea of excusing people from morality because they lived in the past is idiotic.

People knew what they were doing.

People often try to excuse American treatment of the Indians for the same reasons. The US military and private citizens were butchering Natives in America up until the 1890s, killing women and children, dumping them in mass graves, mutulating people, cutting off the genetals of males while they were still alive, scalping them, slicing open the stomachs of pregnant Native women and leaving them to die, etc. Well... people say, times were different then.... But at Red Terror in the 1920s, but that was only 20 to 40 years after the very same things that we say were "acceptable" in America because it was a "different time".

Yeah right.

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by Malachi151


This is pure BS. Many people try to make this argument, but its a crock. Basically you are saying that torture, rape, and slaughter were okay back then.

#1 The victems sure as hell didn't think so
#2 We have writings of server observers who expressed extreme revoltion and horror at the events
#3 We have writings of people that expressed outrage and opposition to the events
#4 People know that ramming a wooden spike up an man's butt until it comes out his throught, burning him alivem chopping off people's heads slowly, stretching people to death, etc is not "acceptable" behavior, they did it because they didn't care about human life and were in a state of anarchy and power. he crews of Columbus' ships were largely prisoners and thugs in the first place and people who had been abused by thier own system back home, but Columbus was not such a person and he did permit it to go one and called for the enslavement of the people because he wanted gold.

The idea of excusing people from morality because they lived in the past is idiotic.

People knew what they were doing.

People often try to excuse American treatment of the Indians for the same reasons. The US military and private citizens were butchering Natives in America up until the 1890s, killing women and children, dumping them in mass graves, mutulating people, cutting off the genetals of males while they were still alive, scalping them, slicing open the stomachs of pregnant Native women and leaving them to die, etc. Well... people say, times were different then.... But at Red Terror in the 1920s, but that was only 20 to 40 years after the very same things that we say were "acceptable" in America because it was a "different time".

Yeah right.

Malachi,...did you even take a moment to read what I posted? Apparently not, because your discredited attempt to apply 21st century morals to 500 year old events is not only invalid, it's ludicrous....just plain silly. I explained why in my earlier post.. if only you had taken a moment to read prior to spewing.

Spewing moral outrage is fine if that's all you are interested in doing. It's simplistic though, and not much deserving of comment. In order to have something to debate, why don't you comment on why it's advantageous for us as 21st century humans to pass critical judgement on 15th century humans using our current moral code. Of course a study of history is essential...a dishonest revision of it is not.

Perhaps in 500 years some self-righteous moralists will look at 20/21st century abortion totals and declare that all who supported Roe-v-Wade are collectively guilty of the greatest holocaust of human history. Perhaps they will conclude that the most moral (per their own "PC" subjective moral standards) of persons in our time were the killers of abortion doctors. Why would this not be a valid criticism?

-z

[Blue Monk]

Hans Koning Columbus: His Enterprise

Kirkpatrick Sales The Conquest of Paradise

David E.Stannard (history, Univ. of Hawaii-Manoa) American Holocaust: Columbus and the Conquest of the New World

Brandon, William. The Last Americans: The Indian in American Culture. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974.

Collier, John. Indians of the Americas New York: W.W. Norton, 1947.

de las Casas, Bartolomé. History of the Indies New York: Harper & Row, 1971.

Jennings, Francis. [I]The Invasion of America: Indians, Colonialism, and the Cant of Conquest Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1975.

Koning, Hans. Columbus: His Enterprise New York: Monthly Review Press, 1976.

Morison, Samuel Eliot. Christopher Columbus, Mariner Boston: Little, Brown, 1955.

Nash, Gary B. Red, White, and Black: The Peoples of Early America Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1970.

Vogel, Virgil, ed. This Country Was Ours New York: Harper & Row, 1972.

[I]Christopher Columbus - ship's log
They...brought us parrots and balls of cotton and spears and many other things, which they exchanged for the glass beads and hawks' bells. 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.

For those of you who would have us believe that the image of Columbus as a mass murderer is somehow modern PC revisionism I hope that you will note that the details of Columbus's atrocities do not come from modern writers or the natives who might not be objective but from the many eye-witness accounts, namely those who accompanied him and later wrote of their adventures and many times from Columbus's own logs and accounts.

The most detailed account comes from Bartolomé de las Casas, a priest, who was an eye-witness to the slaughter. He transcribed Columbus's journal and included his own first hand account in his book, History of the Indies.

Translations of this book are available, de las Casas, Bartolomé. History of the Indies. New York: Harper & Row, 1971.

Enough eye-witness accounts from those who bragged of their exploits to those who were appalled exist that the actual nature of Columbus's brutality should not be in question.

Below is a woodcut from de las Casas' book depicting one of Columbus's more notorious practices, namely chopping the hands off of Indians who failed to provide a certain amount of Gold each month.

http://www.inlex.net/bluemonk/columbus/columbus.gif

Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

Endless testimonies...prove the mild and pacific temperament of the natives....But our work was to exasperate, ravage, kill, mangle and destroy; small wonder, then, if they tried to kill one of us now and then....The admiral, it is true, was blind as those who came after him, and he was so anxious to please the King that he committed irreparable crimes against the Indians....



Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

Thus husbands and wives were together only once every eight or ten months and when they met they were so exhausted and depressed on both sides....they ceased to procreate. As for the newly born, they died early because their mothers, overworked and famished, had no milk to nurse them, and for this reason, while I was in Cuba, 7000 children died in three months. Some mothers even drowned their babies from sheer desperation....In this way, husbands died in the mines, wives died at work, and children died from lack of milk...and in a short time this land which was so great, so powerful and fertile...was depopulated....My eyes have seen these acts so foreign to human nature, and now I tremble as I write....



Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

Once the Indians were in the woods, the next step was to form squadrons and pursue them, and whenever the Spaniards found them, they pitilessly slaughtered everyone like sheep in a corral. It was a general rule among Spaniards to be cruel; not just cruel, but extraordinarily cruel so that harsh and bitter treatment would prevent Indians from daring to think of themselves as human beings or having a minute to think at all. So they would cut an Indian's hands and leave them dangling by a shred of skin and they would send him on saying "Go now, spread the news to your chiefs." They would test their swords and their manly strength on captured Indians and place bets on the slicing off of heads or the cutting of bodies in half with one blow. They burned or hanged captured chiefs



Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

With the same determination Columbus had shown in organizing his troops' previously disorganized and indiscriminate killings, the Admiral then set about the task of systematizing their haphazard enslavement of the natives. Gold was all that they were seeking, so every Indian on the island who was not a child was ordered to deliver to the Spanish a certain amount of the precious ore every three months. When the gold was delivered the individual was presented with a token to wear around his or her neck as proof that the tribute had been paid. Anyone found without the appropriate number of tokens had his hands cut off.



On one famous occasion in Cuba a troop of a hundred or more Spaniards stopped by the banks of a dry river and sharpened their swords on the whetstones in its bed. Eager to compare the sharpness of their blades, reported an eyewitness to the events, they drew their weapons and…
Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

began to rip open the bellies, to cut and kill those lambs-men, women, children and old fold, all of whom were seated, off guard and frightened, watching the mares and the Spaniards. And within two credos, not a man of all of them there remains alive. The Spaniards enter the large house nearby, for this was happening at its door, and in the same way, with cuts and stabs, begin to kill as many as they found there, so that a stream of blood was running, as if a great number of cows had perished....To see the wounds which covered the bodies of the dead and dying was a spectacle of horror and dread.



Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

Some Christians encounter an Indian woman, who was carrying in her arms a child at suck; and since the dog they had with them was hungry, they tore the child from the mother's arms and flung it still living to the dog, who proceeded to devour it before the mother's eyes...When there were among the prisoners some women who had recently given birth, if the new-born babes happened to cry, they seized them by the legs and hurled them against the rocks, or flung them into the jungle so that they would be certain to die there.



Bartolomé de las Casas, History of the Indies

The Spaniards found pleasure in inventing all kinds of odd cruelties, the more cruel the better, with which to spill human blood. They built a long gibbet, low enough for the toes to touch the ground and prevent strangling, and hanged thirteen [natives] at a time in honor of Christ Our Saviour and the twelve Apostles. When the Indians were thus still alive and hanging, the Spaniards tested their strength and their blades against them, ripping chests open with one blow and exposing entrails, and there were those who did worse. Then, straw was wrapped around their torn bodies and they were burned alive. One man caught two children about two years old, pierced their throats with a dagger, then hurled them down a precipice.



Columbus was not a heroic visionary who set out to enrich human knowledge. Existing transcripts of his debate within the Royal Academy, his conversations with the Spanish royalty, eye-witness accounts and indeed his own journals and logs reveal quite clearly that his motivations were economic only.

He foolishly set sail to establish a trade route with the east, motivated purely by profit and luckily discovered a new land unknown to Europe. When the vast profits he dreamed of did not materialize he set about murdering, raping and brutalizing anyone who stood between him and his goal, namely, to line his own pockets with gold.

That is the historical reality and the image of him as a heroic 'scientist navigator' is the revisionist history, not the other way around.

And yes, the complete annihilation of the Arawat at the hands of Columbus does constitute genocide.

[Ed]

Read some relevant history and then come back.


Originally posted by Malachi151


This is pure BS. Many people try to make this argument, but its a crock. Basically you are saying that torture, rape, and slaughter were okay back then.

#1 The victems sure as hell didn't think so
#2 We have writings of server observers who expressed extreme revoltion and horror at the events
#3 We have writings of people that expressed outrage and opposition to the events
#4 People know that ramming a wooden spike up an man's butt until it comes out his throught, burning him alivem chopping off people's heads slowly, stretching people to death, etc is not "acceptable" behavior, they did it because they didn't care about human life and were in a state of anarchy and power. he crews of Columbus' ships were largely prisoners and thugs in the first place and people who had been abused by thier own system back home, but Columbus was not such a person and he did permit it to go one and called for the enslavement of the people because he wanted gold.

The idea of excusing people from morality because they lived in the past is idiotic.

People knew what they were doing.

People often try to excuse American treatment of the Indians for the same reasons. The US military and private citizens were butchering Natives in America up until the 1890s, killing women and children, dumping them in mass graves, mutulating people, cutting off the genetals of males while they were still alive, scalping them, slicing open the stomachs of pregnant Native women and leaving them to die, etc. Well... people say, times were different then.... But at Red Terror in the 1920s, but that was only 20 to 40 years after the very same things that we say were "acceptable" in America because it was a "different time".

Yeah right.

[rikzilla]

Well BM,

Interesting stuff...I'll have a read and tell you what I think. But upon first glance it would seem that you are overusing one source. You also mis-characterized this source as an "eye-witness"...he was not. His father sailed with Columbus, and was not a priest, but a soldier.

Las Casas was born at Seville in 1474. His father, of humble origin, could accurately be described as a nouveau riche. A common soldier under Columbus in his first voyage to the New World, he acquired enough wealth in the Indies to send his son to the prestigious University of Salamanca. For one who attained such prominence as a cleric, Bartolomé was rather tardy in taking religious orders. Though he studied both divinity and law, he took only a law degree when he completed his studies in 1498. In 1502 he accompanied the conquistador Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo to the New World in what was then the greatest armada ever sent out from Spain.

The Link (http://www.mexconnect.com/mex_/history/jtuck/jtbartolome.html)

Also mentioned in this short internet biography is the fact that he did indeed witness attrocities...but these attrocities were not comitted by Columbus at all.

-z

[Blue Monk]

You are right, my mistake.

It was his father that actually sailed with Columbus.

The quotes, however, were all, to the best of my knowledge concerning Columbus specifically and he does mention Columbus in at least one quote though I am not as sure as I was in that designation.

Clearly I was wrong in stating that these were eye-witness accounts as that is clearly not the case and at most accounts recounted to las Casas.

I have read Columbus's journal as transcribed by las Casas but I cannot find any online version yet (nor do I have any hard copy available). It's been 25 years at least since I've read it so I dare not quote from memory (memory is the first to go) The journal in Columbus's own words make it clear that these are not fabrications.

I'll try to provide some more solid information. Just give me a little time to research, hehe.

[Iamme]

Idea: Why don't they change the history books to read that no one particular person can be credited with 'discovering' the New World. But Christopher Columbus has been given credit, by virtue of the trips he made here and the timing thereof, to have spawned interest in the colonization of this New World, by the Europeans. (Something like that). That we we could celebrate Columbus Day (with or without pay:D ) for that relevant reason.

[Nikk]

Perhaps the U.S. should celebrate John Cabot day. Like Columbus he was born in Genoa and he set out to discover Asia by the shorter northern route on behalf of the English crown. He landed in Newfoundland, or possibly Nova Scotia, in 1497 and seems to have been the first European to reach North America since Lief Erikson.

Cabot's contacts with the locals were limited to finding the ashes of a campfire and a painted stick so there is no nasty mass murder and enslavement asociated with him.

Altogether much more PC.

The four ships of his second expedition were lost in 1498 so he never had a chance to show how he would have treated or mistreated the natives.

[rikzilla]

Originally posted by Blue Monk
You are right, my mistake.

It was his father that actually sailed with Columbus.

The quotes, however, were all, to the best of my knowledge concerning Columbus specifically and he does mention Columbus in at least one quote though I am not as sure as I was in that designation.

Clearly I was wrong in stating that these were eye-witness accounts as that is clearly not the case and at most accounts recounted to las Casas.

I have read Columbus's journal as transcribed by las Casas but I cannot find any online version yet (nor do I have any hard copy available). It's been 25 years at least since I've read it so I dare not quote from memory (memory is the first to go) The journal in Columbus's own words make it clear that these are not fabrications.

I'll try to provide some more solid information. Just give me a little time to research, hehe.

BM,

I have no wish to gloat over your mistake, I have made enough of them myself. It's an honest man who admits when he's wrong and as such you have earned my deep respect.

I have at home a coffee table book Columbus and the age of discovery (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0688085458/qid%3D1066052665/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/102-4149411-0204922) , it was a companion book to the PBS documentary back in 1992.

I cracked it this weekend for the first time in a long time. One of the more interesting comments in the book was that there came to be known what was called "The Black Myth" of Spanish conquest in the Americas. Las Casas's book was translated into English at the behest of Queen Elizabeth's government, and it's tales of attrocities were used to incite the English against the Spanish near the time of the Armada. The book also mentions that the "Black Myth" was used by the United States to hype the Spanish-American war. Isn't it possible that the English made it even more lurid than Las Casas originally wrote? Therein lies the problem of relying on a single source. But then again, sometimes that's all we get.

There was also mentioned a "White Myth" ...which tells how the Spanish brought Christianity to America, and says lots of nice stuff about progress, etc...etc... Somehow I think the truth is somewhere in between.

I have no illusions that Columbus was a great humanitarian, but I also don't believe that all the attrocities of the conqistadores should be laid at his feet. The world changed, there was an inevitable clash of cultures. That the Caribs, Tainos and almost all other Arawaks disappeared cannot be ignored....but it is also true that disease killed them off far more than evil Spaniards did.

Personally I feel an keen sadness that these cultures were lost. But at the same time I try not to idealize them. I doubt they lived a "Utopian" existance. There were tribes on Hispanola that were fierce and cannibalistic as well. The lost garrison of Natividad is witness to that.

Columbus is an icon of the age of discovery...to call him an evil guy is to basically say that the voyages of discovery should never have been allowed to happen in the first place. But without progress and evolution what would humanity be? Mired in an unchanging past I guess. But would that be better? Honestly, I don't think so. How would you like to still be living in the dark ages?

-z

[Michael Redman]

Columbus did "discover" the new world. He discovered the people living there, too. Europe did not know of the new world, and the people there, so for them this was indeed a discovery. It is perfectly proper to claim he discovered the new world. The natives of the new world can also claim to have discovered the Europeans at the same time, as the Europeans were new to them. If we were to find intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, that would be a "discovery". There is no requirement that a thing discovered can not be self aware, and there can me multiple, independent discoveries of the same thing.

Columbus represents, and was instrumental in, the most significant change in the world to occur in recorded history. Whether the net effect was positive, negative, or neutral, he and his achievements certainly need to be acknowledged. Arguably not with celebration, but a holiday can remember a somber occasion as well as a happy one.

[DaChew]

If we are to use our 21st century morality to judge the actions of the past. Who do we side with in the conflict between the Spanish and the Aztecs?

[LFTKBS]

We shouldn't be "siding" with anybody. Rikzilla is correct in saying that certain tribes on Hispaniola were fierce and cannabalistic and I don't doubt that, if given the advantages that the Europeans had, they would have happily sailed to Europe for conquest and plunder.

It's not good for humanity - and by extension, of course, me - to accept atrocities, war, and destruction as viable alternatives to peace. I am glad that we do not live in small tribes anymore, because history shows that larger tribes are generally not as destructive. There's no possible utopia when we are fragmented. But there is also no possible utopia when, in the name of God or peace or freedom, we do nothing but destroy.

[DaChew]

If neither side is morally superior from our current standpoint then, I guess, we should be thankful for the accomplishments of Columbus. It was his discovery of this "New World" that allowed us to progress to the point where we now find certain past actions of both cultures morally repugnant. That the native cultures were undergoing no such enlightenment in the thousands of years of their occupation of this land mass is apparent. It was the Old World conquest of the New World that led us to this point that we now debate the morality of actions removed from us by 500 years.

[Malachi151]

Originally posted by DaChew
If we are to use our 21st century morality to judge the actions of the past. Who do we side with in the conflict between the Spanish and the Aztecs?

Its the old two wrong don't make a right argument.

Aztecs = bad

Spanish also - bad

Bad people killing bad people for bad reasons does not make good :p

The Spanish decieved the local natives who wanted help to overthrow the Aztecs. The Spanish used thier help to defeat the Aztecs, then turned on them as well.

Most of history is just murders and theives killing and stealing from each other. To praise one thief for stealing from another is idiocy.

The Spanish and Columbus had no good or noble intentions, their motivating factor as greed. THe Arawaks were a very peaceful and honest people. The Carribs were head hunters. The Spanish enslaved and killed them both without favor or care.

Using the fact that Carribs were btural to justify Spanish brutality is quite lame, by that standard everything is the world is acceptable as long as its not as bad as the worste thing that has ever been done.

The day that I can go into court and plead innocent to raping a 6 year old girl because I walked in on someone else that was already raping her is the day that I will believe that the actions of Columbus and his crew were acceptable.