Big 10 Students Push to Rename Columbus Day

Monday the 14th is Columbus Day, which we all probably realize less because we care about the holiday and more because of the annual controversy it stirs up. 2019 is proving to be no different, as the student-led Association of Big Ten Schools has issued a resolution “in Support of the Declaration of Indigenous Peoples’ Day.”

This rhetoric is nothing new– we’ve all heard that Columbus was a tyrant, an agent of genocide, a sh*te navigator, etc. Pretty much all of that is true. It’s frankly very weird and unnecessary to have a national holiday for the dude at all, and it came into being through a lot of romanticized historical accounts and bad information. Personally, I think it’s a stupid holiday and shouldn’t exist.

But while my disapproval of Columbus Day stems from my stubborn insistence on factual accuracy, the ABTS resolution is about feelings. It reads in part,

“All Native students… merit their recognition: of their higher education accomplishments, of their existence as students, of their presence at predominantly white institutions, of their value as students, of their acknowledgment of being more than an asterisk.”

It then goes on to add, “The utmost solidarity and support is fundamental for the success of Native American students.”

Let me stop you right there. It’s not. Just like everyone else in the world, Native Americans deserve and receive recognition based on their individual accomplishments. I went to school with two Native American kids, and everyone recognized them as crazy smart with musical talent off the charts. Do you know why? Because they were crazy smart with musical talent off the charts. They didn’t need a nationally recognized holiday and “utmost solidarity” to be successful. This resolution completely misses the point, and its doddering and sloppy do-goodedness infuriates me.

I agree that native people and native history should be respected and appreciated. I think the government has a lot to answer for, not regarding the historical treatment of Native Americans, but for the state of federally run Indian reservations here and now. They are dogged by poverty, alcoholism, and high drop-out rates because of how the government is running them. Is an Indigenous Peoples’ Day going to solve that? I hope I don’t have to answer that for you.