Hi, Frank--

The forum, which attracted about one thousand people from scores of countries, began with an inaugural address by Paul Nehru Tennassee of the World Confederation of Labor, who denounced Christopher Columbus as someone who "invaded, destroyed and pillaged" the Inca civilization in Mexico.

The placement of the quotation marks makes me curious. Who doesn't know his history: Tennassee or the reporter? The reporter includes an egregious error in his own text, without comment or correction.

It's fashionable to blame Columbus for the degradation, decimation and enslavement of the Native peoples because Columbus blazed the trail for the Europeans (who, we must all admit, were sometimes responsible for grasping and bestial behavior towards the Natives), and because he was involved in a little unpleasantness when he and his brother Diego governed the little colony of La Isabella on Hispaniola. I quote from this document:

Relations began to deteriorate between the Spaniards and the natives of Hispaniola. Instead of searching for provisions while Columbus was off exploring other islands, the men left behind raided native villages in search of riches. With little hope for anything more than poverty and unhappiness, disgruntled settlers began returning home. Many of the men were sick, many died, most were unhappy with the lack of opportunity, and no one wanted to work in the fields planting crops. Leaving his brother Diego behind as governor of La Isabella contributed to Columbus’ problems with the settlers. Diego was not an administrator, there were repeated demonstrations against his ineffective rule, and besides he was resented for being a foreigner, an Italian.

Columbus is not, in my opinion, a very appropriate symbol for the genuine evil that was done to the indigenous peoples. He was a very good sailor but a bumbling governor. Surely we can find genuine racists and practicers of genocide to point to without demonizing a man who didn't even know what he had found. He thought Hispaniola was Japan. I have wondered what the samurai would have made of him. Mincemeat, probably.

Columbus never set foot in Mexico. Neither did the Incas, an Andean civilization.

Regards--
Mary Anne