Columbus was a man of his time his actions though abhorrent to us would have been normal in his day (centuries later European Americans were hardly treating their Black slaves any better).
Really?
Columbus apologists saying "judge him by the standards of his time." Ok, lets do that. Of all people on earth, Isabella of Castille was so horrified by his behavior that she had him dragged back to Spain in shackles and stripped of all titles and assets.
...
this isn't me praising Isabella, she was an absolutely horrible person. I'm just pointing out that one of the most genocidal villains in European history considered Columbus monstrous enough to strip him of all his wealth and prestige.
More:
In 1500 A.D., Christopher Columbus was arrested and placed in jail due the brutal treatment of the indigenous population, the denial or rights to those of Spanish descent, and the tyrannical manner in which he ruled over the island of Hispaniola; which is now known as the Dominican Republic and Haiti. After many complaints were made by religious leaders and wealthy colonists, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella sent a royal commissioner, Admiral Don Francisco de Bobadilla, to investigate. Columbus was summarily arrested and placed in jail during the investigation. Bobadilla then sent him back to Spain, where he was tried by the King and Queen.
So no, Columbus was a total monster even by the standards of his time.
Here is a question, Mark:
is there ANY monstrosity or crime against humanity that you won't excuse? Because that seems to be your modus operandi --
apologia for evil. Whether with putin's genocide (where you claim that we can't criticize it because America also did bad things) or Columbus's crimes (where you claim it was just the norm of the time), what you do time and time again is
excuse utter evil.
When I saw you do it for the first time, you did it with putin's genocide, twice in two different ways -- once "it's not bad enough to be called genocide", and then when showed you that it is, you came back with "but we also did bad things". And now Columbus.
Initially I just wrote it off to partisan delusion. But you've done it again, on a different topic, and now we have a pattern forming.
Three different apologiae for genocide.