Wisdom Quarterly: American Buddhist Journal: Replace Columbus w/ Indigenous Peoples Day?

Host Larry Mantle (AirTalk, scpr.org, Aug. 30, 2017) edited by Wisdom Quarterly

Worshipping false idols: A 76-foot statue of exploiter Christopher Columbus stands in Columbus Circle on August 23, 2017 in New York City (Spencer Platt/Getty Images).

The controversy over replacing Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day

Tongva leader Toypurina would be glad.

The Los Angeles City Council will vote today on whether to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day.

As reported by City News Service, the move was proposed by Councilmember Mitch O’Farrell in November 2015. O’Farrell said that “recognizing the contributions, history, and sacrifices made by the original inhabitants of the Los Angeles area is long overdue.”

He also highlighted the historical struggles of Native Americans including “enslavement and brutality [such as rape, murder, quick ethnic cleansing, slow genocide]” as reasons for the change.

Los Angeles Indigenous Peoples Day

Councilmember Joe Buscaino, who is Italian-American, opposed O’Farrell’s motion calling it "divisive."

Buscaino said in October that he would support creating an Indigenous Peoples Day [on August 9th], but not at the expense of another [imperialist, white supremacist mercenary and the Italian] culture [he supposedly represents].

[There was one Italian woman -- not the only pro-Columbus person in the audience -- repeatedly kvetching, griping, and disrupting council procedures every chance she got. There were hundreds of pro-Indigenous Peoples Day advocates also. Finally an LAPD cop assigned to City Hall told her the control herself or be thrown out].

Now let's divest from Wells Fargo, Israel, and the military-industrial complex!

But observing a second holiday would cost the city $2 million in overtime [not to mention insult Native Americans and, in essence, replace a provocative "Black Lives Matter" sign with a meaningless "All Lives Matter"].

What do Angelenos [in particular the native Gabrielenos/Tongva/Kizh] think of changing Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day? More + AUDIO

GUEST: Stephen Aron, history professor and department chair at UCLA, whose research focuses on the American West and frontiers in North America.

If you want a pro-Native American version of history, you would have had to have been listening yesterday morning to Take Two, when Austin Cross and Libby Denkmann were sitting in for regular host A Martinez. They had UCLA Associate Professor Benjamin Madley, who is the author of An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe.