The Legacy of Colonialism

“From colonial expansion to systemic modern marginalization, we recognize that our Indigenous people have too often been denied practical access to the resources and benefits of our society. In recognition of that stark history, I call upon all of us to reassess geographic place names, statues and monuments to fully reflect our state's inclusive values… to embark upon the difficult journey of truth seeking, in hope of finding healing and reconciliation together; and to squarely face the complete history of our indigenous peoples” (Mayor Parisi, October 11, 2021).

November will mark the beginning of Native American History Month, but the commemoration really begins on the second Monday in October, federally recognized as Columbus Day. However, at several state and local levels, it's Indigenous People’s Day, a counter celebration to Columbus.

Columbus was a forerunner of Western Civilization to the Americas and that included him starting the transatlantic slave trade. This was all the while that his “civilized” patrons, the King and Queen of Spain, were expelling Jews from their kingdom. Later, they expelled Muslims as well.
We can remember Christopher Columbus, but the genocide of the Native Americans is not a minor detail to gloss over. The only way to a more complete truth is to expose the Western bias, supremacy and racism thru which we see history, and I say that as a light skinned person myself.

Within a few decades, the native Taino population from present day Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, the Dominican Republic, and the Virgin Islands were nearly wiped out. Their resistance to European settlers were outmatched by the colonizers' weaponry, brutal tactics (including dogs to terrorize and kill), and disease. Death by disease was used as a weapon of war, not a natural outcome. We have first hand accounts from the journals of the Priest Bartolomé de Las Casas, Columbus' contemporary, who witnessed the colonization and foretold of the genocide to come:

“I saw here cruelty on a scale no living being has ever seen or expects to see” (Bartolomé de Las Casas).

Criticizing Columbus as a person is not an attack on an entire culture. I beseech people to consider those Italian heroes who challenged the status quo, from Renaissance figures, to those participating in the Civil Rights movement, and the many who resisted fascists and Nazis during WWII. Rather than regurgitate a sanitized history of one man, let's bring to the fore the stories of the thousands, if not millions of people.

Furthermore, for centuries after, most transactions with Native Americans, including with the Lenni Lenape around West Orange, were done under duress, ie, with the threat of violent dispossession, terrorism, and/or murder, ever looming. The US empire was built on exploitation of the people in the territories it acquired. We can draw a line thru history and see the impact of this colonialism on indigenous people, to this day.

Fortunately, the indigenous of the Americas were not completely erased, no thanks to successive US Presidents. Many people trace their ancestry to Native Americans and there are tribes very much alive today. And, as long as we continue to learn and teach the stories of the oppressed, they will never die.