Here, here, here and here. It's barely mentioned now. In fact, here in Buckeye land, this is the time when different outlets point out the effort by some to change the name of our state's capital. One network - our local CBS affiliate - now refers to the city and city news as 'C-Bus.' In fact its morning news magazine that was Wake up Columbus is now Wake Up C-Bus. That's long been an informal nickname in these parts, but usually not for official use.
Today Columbus is all but gone, and increasingly if the day is mentioned at all, it's Indigenous Peoples Day, or similar. Of course now we're seeing challenges against everything from Washington and Jefferson, to the Constitution itself (earlier editorial from the New Yorker).
Things are happening fast. Vichy Conservatives have long hidden behind the idea that bellyaching about such trivial things is just sissy stuff. They'll wait until the gulags or the gas chambers are in full swing, then they'll start to worry. Never a great strategy. And looking at where things are and where they are going, and how quickly they are getting there, should be all the evidence you need for that appraisal.
As for the Left venerating cultures who did what Columbus is accused of doing or worse? Need I prattle on about that? I think by now the reasons for that strange hypocrisy should be clear.
(Tom New Poster)
ReplyDeleteHope you can stand your ground in Ohio. Our largely Filipino parish still says "Columbus Day", in part because we have an active KC chapter.
We try. I've been on the State GOP because in 2020/2021 when the mayor of Columbus led the charge to remove Columbus statues, and other local venues followed the his lead, the GOP said they would step in and get those statues and put them up for all to see in a safe space. Four years later and they are nowhere to be seen. I'm concluding that Christians/Conservatives have been wrong headed for thinking the GOP will be that army of knights in shining armor to hold back the barbarian hordes.
DeleteI'm ashamed to admit that I only came to the understanding somewhat recently that it was really the fall of Constantinople that precipitated the necessity for European nations to find an alternative route to the East Indies. The Ottoman Turks cut off their safe passage ways. Why this is never talked about in history classes is kind of baffling to me on one level, but on the other, I understand why it probably is. Though I can't quite understand the pass that Islam so frequently gets regarding their own colonialism, imperialist, and military ambitions. I mean, are they going to give back the Hagia Sophia anytime soon? Probably not.
ReplyDeleteAs a general rule, we typically learned history from a Western perspective, and that was OK. We knew there was more to the world than the West, and there were plenty of classes to focus on those other areas. But the point now is the destruction of the West by convincing a growing number of Europeans and Americans that the West was the worst ever, and this seizes upon the fact that many haven't learned about things like the Ottoman or Byzantine Empires, except in passing. Interestingly enough, those years I sojourned with the Orthodox, I was stunned at how differently they see things - such as the fall of the Byzantine Empire, which looms large in their memories since many Orthodox today live as a direct result of that rather large event. But again, it was no biggie in the past when we didn't focus on such things, but today we had better, since much of what we are being pushed toward relies heavily on people not knowing the full story. Not that knowing helps, and many who do know better choose to downplay or ignore such things because they don't help the Left's cause (I'm thinking of Greydanus, who completely embraces the 'Whites in the West Worst than Anyone' template).
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DeleteDave, you might be old enough to remember an ancient cartoon called "Tooter Turtle", who used to beg his mentor Mr. Lizard the Wizard to send him back to some earlier era or different place. After a series of mishaps, he'd beg to comeback. Love to whisk some of these leftist smarties back to times they thought the West was behaving badly, only to the "other side". My first beam-down would be the Islamo-apologists on the Squad to 12th century Cordoba, to witness how women and non-Muslims were really treated, or maybe 16th century Constantinople. Then I'd send our racial "activists" to modern Africa to see what happens in real race or tribal wars. I'm sure you'd have your favorite travel spots. Where would we send Greydanus or Mark Shea?
For some strange reason, I remember that! I must not have watched it, but it brought back memories of at least seeing it. Funny that you should mention Cordoba. That was always a 'Muslims were awesome' goto in the pop culture defense of Islam, especially in the post-9/11 days. Probably because of that quote from Lawrence of Arabia. But I think we're past appealing to the facts of the past (or any facts for that matter). When I sparred with Greydanus over this sort of thing, he held firmly to that important progressive template that any bad thing in the world that we can find, we find it worse in the West. At this point even if we can force people to look at things like the lives of women or non-Muslims in Cordoba, the reflexive answer will be that they got that bad behavior from Christian civilization (had a professor in OSU who used to follow that thinking), or it was simply worse in Europe and/or America. Remember, BLM rose only after we reelected our first black president, and one of its premises is that we have made virtually no progress in terms of treating African Americans. And that claim has been embraced like gospel truth despite the obvious. So I fear we're long past appealing to facts, common sense, reality or truth claims unless they confirm was the modern Left has already claimed.
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