I enjoyed my day off yesterday. In the interest of full disclosure, I actually wrote this yesterday.
We all like a nice long weekend don’t we? Gives us time to catch up on some TV, do some yard work or for me, stay up and actually watch the Sunday night football game. This weekend’s holiday has been the source of controversy in recent years.
Historically, the 2nd Monday has been called Columbus Day. It was first proposed by FDR in 1934 and became a National Holiday in 1971. For decades it was fine.
These days, we take a more critical look at history. Which is the right thing to do. When you peel back the first layer of who Columbus Day is named after, he really was a horrendous person. He treated the people he came in contact with in the new world like garbage. Just so we know, so did almost everyone back then. We all can agree Christopher Colunbus didn’t “discover” the Americas. It’s impossible to discover a place where people are already living. That takes away the whole idea of the holiday to be completely honest. If that isn’t enough for you, this may do it. Columbus never stepped foot on the land that would later be called the United States.
There has been a push to rename this holiday “Indiginous People’s Day.” A little wordy for my taste, but sure. I get wanting to honor the people who were already living here when Europeans came and unceremoniously took it from them. A little bit of guilt there, but I’m all for it. Looking at it objectively, does it really matter what we call it?
Personally, I don’t care what we call it. Call it Columbus Day, Indiginous People’s Day, or hell, call it Second Monday in October That We All Get Off From Work Day. Can’t we all just enjoy a day off? Both sides of this argument get disgruntled whenever it comes around. They need to use this day like all long weekends are supposed to be used for, and just relax a bit. They’re all just arguing semantics at this point.
Call it whatever you want, all I know is I’m not going to work on the 2nd Monday in October, and don’t bother me with your over political correctness or your “the world is too PC” crap. You’re ruining my day off.