No matter how you celebrate it, Columbus Day is a holiday for humanists. By “humanist,” I’m referring to “the concern with the needs, well-being, and interests of people.” Non-humans be damned, this holiday is a celebration of and for “people.”
Some who don’t like the moniker “Columbus Day,” (because of the implication that Columbus “discovered” the Americas and consequently set off the chain of events that led to the demise of the “native” Americans) want to see the name of the day changed to “Explorer’s Day,” or some such. The problem to us biocentrists is that any branching out and exploring of new territory by human beings, arguably the most destructive of all species ever unleashed on the planet, bar none—including the unwieldy dinosaurs—has resulted in the extinction or damn-near eradication of untold other incredible species.
Others want the name changed to “Native American Day,” conveniently ignoring the fact that the first Homo sapiens to make it over here (in their case, across the Bering Land Bridge), were big game hunters who followed their migratory prey species and laid waste to all the isolated, uncorrupted animals they could train a spear on. Animals like horses, camels, ground sloth and mastodon were victims of the “American Blitzkrieg,” the first stage of our ongoing anthropogenic mass extinction event.
No, to those of us who delight in the diversity of life on Earth and pine for the good old days, before the noxious spread of humanity, any day celebrating discovery for the species is a day of grief and sorrow, not festivity.
Exposing the Big Game 
This country has too many holidays that are pointless and stupid, which they changed to Mondays so the imbeciles who run the country, get a three day weekend with pay !!!
Haaa! Haaa! Nancy, I love you. 🙂
Hi, I’m a regular reader although I’ve fallen a bit behind. I’ll have to come back to read this post when I’m not falling asleep. But I wanted to make sure you’d seen this: http://www.ammoland.com/2013/10/rhino-permit-to-be-auctioned-at-dallas-safari-club-convention/#axzz2hl76zbK1
Thought you could write some interesting commentary about it. Thanks. Thanks for exposing the insanity of hunting with such depth and insight.
Susan
Thanks for reading, Susan. And thanks for the important link (maddening and depressing as the subject is). It really shows Ammoland and the Safari Club’s true stripes.
just looked at ammoland…what a nightmare of violence and gratuity of killing
A Rhino …really boys?
Infants.
Exactly… thanks Jim.
Anja
You’re welcome, my pleasure Anja
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Urgh. Don’t even get me started on this so-called ‘holiday.’ To be quite blunt, if you’re supporting Columbus day, you may as well be celebrating the enslavement and genocide of Native American peoples. There was absolutely no justification for what white European settlers did to indigenous tribes.
Reblogged this on Klacier The Vegetarian Snow Leopard.
Reblogged this on Exposing the Big Game.
This piece is beyond excellent …thank you !
Thank you!