Columbus Day has Lost its Luster, Let’s Radically Reclaim It

Hello Meltingpot Readers,

Today is Columbus Day, but all three of my kids have school today. (And they go to public schools.). Here at Temple University, classes are in session. Even my bank is open for business today. So, what gives? It seems like just yesterday Columbus Day meant a lot of people, including all school children, had the day off. But I was so unaware that today was Columbus Day, that when a friend from New York called me yesterday to see what my kids were doing with their day off today, I panicked. I was like, “How did I miss this on the school calendar?” But I didn’t miss anything. Apparently, the city of Philadelphia stopped giving kids the day off for Columbus Day in 2016. The official reason is because the school district wanted kids in school for more days and Columbus Day seemed like the perfect holiday to be ignored.

But I’d like to think the City of Brotherly Love is thinking about more than testing and learning. I’d like to think my adopted city is taking a stand against celebrating one man’s navigational ignorance and the subsequent massacre of millions of people.

It turns out that Columbus Day isn’t really a big deal for a lot of people anymore. Even better, many cities – like Los Angeles, Detroit, and Austin – choose to not only ignore Columbus Day, they’ve reclaimed and renamed the second Monday in October as Indigenous Peoples Day and given the glory to the people who deserve it. If my research is correct, the only two states that have actually made the change statewide are Alaska and South Dakota. In South Dakota, today is Native Americans Day.

I have two things to say about this: One, I think it speaks to the power of marginalized voices being heard that what was once a popular federal holiday – complete with songs, parades and used car sales – is now an easily ignored relic of yesteryear. And two, because November is Native American Heritage Month, which is much better than a single day of celebration for such a diverse people, I think the focus of Former Columbus Day should be about truth telling. It should be about correcting the whitewashed myth that celebrates Columbus’ legacy. Like Memorial Day, where we commemorate the lives of the men and women who died in the United States armed forces, we should use this day as a day of remembrance for all the Native people who died at the hands of European colonizers. Any of us who call ourselves Americans are living on stolen land and we should never forget that.

Peace!