Idea of Discoverers' Day insults native Americans

By Mary Adamski, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 13 October 1998

Columbus Day, or Discoverers' Day as it's called in Hawaii, is offensive to the indigenous people who inhabited lands that European explorers found, said speakers at a contra-celebration.

The term discovery meant to rob us, the idea is we discover something and its ours, said native American Hank Raymond. Don't continue to teach your children the lie that ‘discovery’ is.

Raymond, who is of the Okanogan and San Poil tribes of Washington state, spoke at a Fort Street Mall gathering last night to oppose the holiday timed to mark the anniversary of Christopher Columbus' 1492 arrival in the New World. In Hawaii, the holiday also marks the arrival here by English Capt. James Cook.

The demonstration by about 40 people was held outside the offices of the Roman Catholic diocese. The group burned copies of papal bulls, 505-year-old documents in which the Pope sanctioned Spanish and Portuguese dominion over lands in Africa and the Americas and called those countries to convert the native people to Christianity.

The theme of subjugation of one culture over another still sets the tone for the United States in its dealings with native people, said Tony Castanha, of Caribe [Taino] ancestry. It has been the basis of laws, of court decisions ... the same Christian-heathen relation- ship is used to deny rights.

Castanha called for modern Catholics to persuade Pope John Paul II to revoke the bull of May 4, 1493. He and other participants read descriptions of Spanish atrocities against the native Americans they conquered.

Hawaiian activist Kaleo Patterson said at the least we are here to remove that brainwashing that has taken place.

Ralph Summy, director of the Matsunaga Institute for Peace at the University of Hawaii, said anytime you have one people chosen over another, there is going to be violence. That applies not just to cultures, he said, but to men assuming superiority over women, and heterosexuals, over homosexuals, then you have homophobia and gay bashing.

It's tough to be a Christian, with the things that have been done to native people in the name of Christianity, Lynette Cruz said.