A Modest Columbus Day Proposal — Replace It With ‘A-Holes Day’
Some places celebrate Indigenous Peoples' Day instead of Columbus Day. And by "celebrate" I mean, "pay it no attention at all and you don't get mail that day." I get why people don't like Columbus. Dude could be kind of a dick. But here's the thing: back in olden times EVERYBODY was kind of a dick. Leave out Jesus and Buddha and who you're left with is a bunch of people who would behave in a way that is wholly inconsistent with what we think is appropriate here in 2017.
Columbus: Total A-hole. But so were some of the indigenous people. The Aztecs regularly did human sacrifice, sometimes with children, that involved removing the heart with an obsidian blade while the victim was still alive! A-holes! History is replete with big, smelly A-holes. In fact, if you weren't an A-hole on some level you were probably more likely to be the victim ... of some A-hole!
So, my point is that anybody who was admired for anything in the past was probably kind of an A-hole by modern standards. We should observe A-hole day for every historical personage that did something notable while at the same time being a giant douche-lord. Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence but he also had slaves that he enjoyed having sex with. Happy A-hole Day! Martin Luther called out the corruption of the Catholic church and founded Protestantism....buuuuuut, he was a huge anti-Semite. Happy A-hole Day, good sir! Hey, all you folks who go on and on about how we have to remember the soldiers who fought on the losing side in the Civil War: how about we give them all their own day of remembrance? Happy A-hole Day.
And, if you're thinking to yourself, "Well, we don't tolerate that kind of A-holishness anymore", just remember that's only because you're judging by present day standards. In 300 years, we're all probably going to look like the worst kind of prolapsed A-holes. And, we'll have our very own day of remembrance.