Indigenous People's Day Vs Columbus Day

Recently, the Los Angeles City Council voted to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous People’s Day. The national holiday, which was proclaimed a national holiday in 1937, has been under debate a lot recently. Many cities are debating to follow L.A.’s decision by changing it to Indigenous People’s Day. Here, I will explain why Columbus Day should no longer be recognized as a national holiday, and instead recognize that day as Indigenous People’s Day. Many people see Columbus as the hero who first set foot on America, the man who started culture and civilization in America. However, this is just not true. Native people to America have lived there for thousands of years before Europeans made it there. Very little good came out of Columbus reaching America. European diseases wiped out almost 90% of the native population, Europeans used natives as slaves, and missionaries attempted to convert them. With native people’s lives becoming complete hell, Europeans began to colonize America and gave no regard for their lives. Many more were killed in battles and
When Native Californians were first colonized, there were 350,000 people living there. Sixty years later, 80,000 were baptized, and 60,000 were killed. Many Native Californians still live in Southern California, so changing Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day was a good idea. Ever since 1992 people have began to step back from celebrating Columbus Day, and in 2015, the Pope “Asked for forgiveness on behalf of the Catholic Church for crimes committed against the native peoples during the so-called conquest of America.” People are beginning the realize how notorious Columbus is, and Los Angeles was the first city to officially replace the holiday with something more