Columbus Day or Exploration Day, Same Thing

So another Columbus Day has come and gone and still we celebrate a brutal conqueror why cut people's hand's off when they failed to deliver enough gold. A man who started a 530 year course of genocide that is still going on in the America's.

Given this problamatic history there is a move afoot to change the title of the holiday to National Explores Day. Initially I thought this was a good idea and singed the petition. On reflection though I think this is every bit as problematic as Columbus Day.

The history of European exploration has been one of exploration as a prelude to conquest or at the least attempted conquest. From the Viking explorers like Eric the Red and Leif the Lucky to 18th century explores like James Cook and David Livinstone the explorer either was the conqueror was closely followed the conqueror. That the conquest sometimes involved several waves until successful like the 300 plus years European attempts to subjugate Africa or even failed as they did in Japan is immaterial, they always came.

All in all I think it might be better to rename Columbus Day to Indigenous Resistance Day or maybe just Resistance Day. I'm sick of the attempts to celebrate conquest and genocide.