Hardly matters given they flew four times on the same day did they not? IIRC, all the claims for earlier flights than the Wright brothers were strictly one offs.
On another note most ancient European DNA (pre-Roman Empire) seems to come from three distinct waves of migration. The first were the hunter gatherers who had relatively dark skin but blue eyes (this group is the one which I terbred with neanderthals and where we get our neanderthal dna). The second were farmers from the near east who replaced most of the hunter gatherers but who also did a far bit of interred ding with them. While the third came from Northern Eurasia and we're a mixture of fair skinned, fair haired people and a group related to native americans. So that was the genetic mix of people's in Europe until the historic records began. They are saying the evolution of fair skin was brought about by low light conditions in the north which made it hard to get enough vitamin D in the diet if you had dark skin (closer to the equator you need dark skin to prevent sun burn and getting too much vitamin D. You also get the same changing of skin tones in Asian populations (compare ethnic manchurians to Thais).
I have relatively dark skin with blue eyes. Though it could be possible that it is largely just a permanent farmers tan
Columbus might have been an immoral piece of shit buy he got me a day off of work and I am ok with that.
Actually John Cabot and Henry Hudson had a lot more to do with it, but they were hired by the British, and we couldn't have a holiday named after them, could we? Sorry, but wandering into the Bahamas by accident doesn't overcome all the evil he did, which includes evil done to his own people.
It wasn't really "evil" by the standards of that day and age. A person deserves to be judged by the era they lived in.
I'm not on board the "cultural relativism" train, so yes, what he did was evil. And while they might not have given much of a shit about what he did to the Natives, the Spanish thought what he did to their own people was evil enough to imprison him for a while.
I always felt his imprisonment had more to do with political reasons at home rather than actions abroad. And I do believe in making value judgements appropriate to the era. I don't slam Thomas Jefferson or George Washington for owning slaves or Abraham Lincoln for referring to black people as niggers. I don't slam FDR for rounding up Japanese-Americans in World War Two. In two hundred years when all abortions are banned because artificial wombs are a common medical reality, I hope those people will give people today the same consideration.
For Christ's sake people, it's a day off. WTF do you have to nitpick over it. You're going to end up ruining it for everyone someday. And seriously, "Indigenous Peoples' Day?" That won't even fit on the fucking calendar. Grow a pair and man up. Stop being offended over everything. You all remind me of this goon for those who remember-
I do. I do. I especially slam him and the rest of his government for doing that. What a Brave New fantasy World you've imagined there.
You think it won't be medically possible? We can already save premature babies well before full term that wouldn't have had any kind of chance just a few decades ago.
There were almost certainly people in the world at that time who wouldn't have agreed with the actions of Columbus. By your standards, should someone who represses women in a Middle Eastern country today not be judged if their country is filled with other people also doing it?
Really. They were the one who "rediscovered" the New World? Or was it that they went on their voyages in the wake of Columbus' discoveries, by accident or not? His was the first link in that chain of events; that is what he is remembered for.
This isn't about political correctness and enforcing kind speech. It's about whether we care to honor someone who was actually a brutal, murderous tyrant--even by the standards of his contemporaries--under whom innocent people actually suffered by the thousands. We can still have a holiday. And I wouldn't mind calling it "Redskins Day" if you want it shorter.
Why would you change it? Instead of honouring the man, the day could and should be seen as a reminder of an important point in history and the bad and eventual good that came with it.
Not that I would want to send black people back to africa, but I thought couldn't we do both on the same day? OK, we are getting rid of all the black people, but none of you bigots are going to get to enjoy it because we are burning you at noon.
Perhaps our days of celebration should not be linked to past bafoonery. We could just put the celebrtion of america into the fourth and then we just have history class and floating vacation days.
