Why are we still even celebrating Columbus Day

Today was the "celebration" of Columbus Day, the supposed day the nation we now know as the United States was "discovered", or as my own resident hilarious historian, Earl, puts it  "Columbus Day is the day that most Native peoples on this side of the Atlantic wished this motherfu*cker never showed up."

To be honest, if the post office wasn't closed, I would not have realized today was a government observed holiday. A holiday that, to me, a Brown person with a measure of historical understanding, is utter BS.

Let's just go ahead and say it; Columbus didn't discover a DAMN thing.

This fool got lost on his journey to India and ended up in what we now call the Caribbean, specifically landing on the island of Haiti/ Dominican Republic. His arrival marked the beginning of the end for the not only the inhabitants of that island but for the Native populations of the entire hemisphere.

I refuse to believe that with the access we have to historical accounts and evidence, that any of those educators, administrators, professors, or half of the students even believe for one second that Christopher Lost-In-The-Sauce Columbus and his murderous, rapey band of swashbuckling people bandits ever discovered a damn thing, let alone the United States.

He landed in the Caribbean...the CARIBBEAN, y'all. Not Plymouth Rock. The Caribbean. So there's that.

I discovered that my sentiments aligned historical facts from an article on History.com.

"Historians have uncovered extensive evidence of the damage wreaked by Columbus and his teams, leading to an outcry overemphasis placed upon studying and celebrating him in schools and public celebrations."

"In an era in which the international slave trade was starting to grow, Columbus and his men enslaved many native inhabitants of the West Indies and subjected them to extreme violence and brutality. On his famous first voyage in 1492, Columbus landed on an unknown Caribbean island after an arduous three-month journey." 

"On his first day in the New World, he ordered six of the natives to be seized, writing in his journal that he believed they would be good servants. Throughout his years in the New World, Columbus enacted policies of forced labor in which natives were put to work for the sake of profits. Later, Columbus sent thousands of peaceful Taino “Indians” from the island of Hispaniola to Spain to be sold. Many died en route."

So the question remains:

Why are we still even celebrating Columbus Day?

We are living in an amazing time where Confederate flags are being outlawed, Civil War monuments that glorify slavery are being toppled with the hands of descendants of slaves and slave owners, and even the "National Anthem" which abdicates violence against Black people, is being reexamined.

I think next on the chopping block should be this a day honoring murderous bastard. In its place, let's continue to honor the legacy of the First Peoples of this place we now call the United States.