Opinion
It's almost that hated day when some Americans celebrate the myth of Columbus discovering an already populated continent.
In 1492, the big island of Hispaniola was one of the most densely populated areas of the known world. Unfortunately, the three million people on the island were native, non-European and pagans to boot! Within 49 years they had been reduced by their new Christian neighbors to 200. That's half of Hitler's body count. So today, we're going to recount the heroic history of Christopher Columbus – and here we go!
It is 1492. The Taino Indians saved Columbus and his men from starvation – and Columbus wrote in his journals, "I saw that they were very friendly to us ... They are all of a good size and stature, and handsomely formed, their eyes were large and very beautiful ... Weapons they have none, nor are acquainted with them. They are good to be Ordered about, to be made to Work, Plant, and do whatever is wanted, to build towns and be taught to go Clothed and accept our Customs. The air is as soft as April in Seville. Our Lord in his goodness guide me that I may find this gold.”
It is 1493. In January, 39 men are left behind to guard the fort at La Navidad in the "New World" while a triumphant Columbus sails back to Spain with parrots, gold, Indians. In November, Columbus returns, this time with a fleet of 17 ships and 1,500 men, as well as horses, dogs, armor and cannons. The 39 men who had been left to guard the fort are found dead ... the official Chronicler of the Indies, Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo, writes that the "natives could not endure the excesses, for the Spaniards took their women and used them as they wished and committed other violences and offenses ... " Sounds a bit like Andrew Kelsey, doesn't it?
The honeymoon of the "discovery" is over.
It is 1494. Columbus and company gather green wood to place under the feet of the same Tainos that saved him. The conquistadors string them up in groups of 13, representing Jesus and the 12 apostles. The burning is slow, methodical, torturous. "The weather is like April in Andalusia," Columbus notes in his journal ...
Columbus “discovers” the island now called Jamaica. Terrified Indians flee from soldiers and their crossbows. Dogs pursue the Indians. In the Old World they are trained to hunt wild game. In the "New World" they learn to savor human flesh. Columbus writes, "... So many vultures flocked there to scavenge on the bodies that they darkened the sky."
It is 1496. After only four years, half the native population of Hispaniola is dead. In 1498 Columbus wrote, "From here one might send, in the name of the Holy Trinity, as many as 4,000 slaves to be sold." The "New World," once the mother of countless peaceful and happy native peoples has been literally transformed into the Christian hell. Eleven years after Columbus pronounced the Indians as beautiful, loving, pliant and without knowledge of weapons or violence … he now described them as unfriendly, cruel, and hostile savage savages. I wonder why.
In 1542, Bartolome De Las Casas, champion of native peoples in the Americas, wrote: “The Indies were discovered in the year one thousand four hundred and ninety-two. In the following year a great many Spaniards went there with the intention of settling the land. And all the land so far discovered is a beehive of people ... there came some Spaniards who immediately behaved like ravening wild beasts that had been starved for many days. And Spaniards have behaved in no other way during the past forty years, down to the present time, for they are still acting like ravening beasts, killing, terrorizing, afflicting, torturing, and destroying the native peoples … Their reason for killing and destroying such an infinite number of souls is that the Christians have an ultimate aim, which is to acquire gold, and to swell themselves with riches in a very brief time and thus rise to a high estate disproportionate to their merits. It should be kept in mind that their insatiable greed and ambition, the greatest ever seen in the world, is the cause of their villainies."
When Taino Indians saved Christopher Columbus from certain death on Oct. 12, 1492, what occurred next was neither beautiful nor heroic. His diaries indicated he was greeted with the most generous hospitality he had ever known, yet he immediately began the encomienda system tying Indian slaves to their stolen lands, and was personally responsible for their slaughter.
Despite his murderous nature, his discovery came to symbolize certain civilized truths. Manifest Destiny justified theft. Assimilation or genocide was a reasonable choice for pagans. A successful violent campaign to destroy nations validated the superiority of European values and institutions.
You can not "discover" a hemisphere inhabited by 100 million people, yet Columbus Day, which this year falls on Oct. 8, perpetuates the myth that the "New World" was a wilderness with a few savages awaiting the blessings of civilization. Hardly mentioned is the fact that the Western Hemisphere was a virtual paradise of ecology and health, that Indians provided the model for U.S. constitutional government, that native agricultural advances currently provide 60 percent of the world's daily diet, and hundreds of medical and medicinal techniques are still used.
Today, in North and South America, Native people remain at the bottom of every socioeconomic indicator, are under continuing physical and economic attack, and are afforded the least access to political or legal redress. Despite this we refuse to ride off into a romantic sunset.
Europeans in the New World have always been afflicted with a long-term memory dysfunction. Now that we know what kind of man Columbus really was, let’s take these myths of the past and update them to reflect the truth. Rename Columbus Day to celebrate something we can all be proud of.
Officially proclaimed in 1971, this divisive holiday should be replaced by a celebration that is more reflective of the rich heritage of the Americas. How about Bartolome De Las Casas Day?
Until then, Indians of North America (including Mexica and descendant Africans), should be reminded that the wicked heart of Manifest Destiny still beats around the world. Natives still die daily at the hands of those, who in their quest for personal power and wealth, keep greed the one true lasting Institution of Progress.
Happy No-One-Discovered-Us Day!
James BlueWolf is a artist and author. He lives in Nice.
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- Written by: James BlueWolf
I am also a 30-year Lake County resident, and 35-year Lake County property owner. I have owned and operated a business within the City of Clearlake for 19 years.
I write the below comments based in large part upon my familiarity with the area in general and the school district in particular. My comments are not the official comments of the Konocti Unified School District. The school district shall submit its own comments at a later time.
The report states that the impact to school facilities is a “less than cumulatively considerable effect.” This conclusion is false and does not reflect the reality currently existing in Konocti Unified School District. The report predicts optimistically that approximately 30 percent of the 720 proposed units of the project will be households without school age children and the remaining 70 percent will have only one school age child.
These estimates are no more than wishful thinking and offer no assurances to the school district and the community of their accuracy. It is entirely feasible that the project may generate more than twice the numbers of students projected. Even in the unlikely event that the projected numbers prove to be close to accurate, a sudden increase of more than 500 students could prove disastrous for the school district.
Even accepting the optimistic projections of the report, there will be a 54 percent increase in the population of students attending Lower Lake Elementary School. This school year (2007-08) Lower Lake Elementary School was unable to accommodate approximately 10 students who attempted to enroll there in grades K-2, and was forced to send these students to attend other schools within Konocti District.
The projected additional students who will attempt to enroll at their neighborhood school cannot be accommodated by the addition of “portable classrooms” as the report suggests. Firstly, there is not a place to put additional portable classrooms at the Lower Lake Elementary School without encroaching on the play areas and other outdoor space that is already in use. What’s more the project does not take into account the school’s common use areas such as the cafeteria, playground, library and physical education facilities.
Also not accounted for are the office facilities and services such as school nurse, pre-school and other adjunct functions. Nor is there any mention in the report of facilities for any additional teachers that will need to be hired.
Students are not evenly distributed by age group and grade level. Therefore, although some grade levels may have available space for some additional students, others are overcrowded and cannot accommodate any. The report does not consider this and treats the numbers as generic. If a large number of new students all fall within the same grade level, a change in the entire makeup of the district's boundaries and student placement will likely result, causing hardship to numerous families and to the district itself.
Two Konocti District schools are currently designated as Program Improvement schools under Federal Guidelines for No Child Left Behind. Federal law gives parents the right to place their children in non-program improvement schools and to have them transported at district expense. The report assumes that the district will have the option to place elementary school students in any of the district’s four elementary schools. However, parents may refuse to have their children placed in one of the district’s Program Improvement schools meaning that the options for shuffling students around in order to find space for new students are limited.
Transfer rights also extend to parents who wish to opt out of program improvement schools and place their children in schools in other districts. In these cases as well, the home district is responsible for transporting the students.
Students sent to other districts under these provisions of federal law will therefore also need to be transported at the district’s expense.
The report makes reference to Konocti District’s construction bond and its facilities plan. All of the money from the sale of bonds is part of a pre-established budget for construction, improvement and maintenance. All these funds have already been allocated for specific projects. These projects include the repair and upgrading of existing buildings and infrastructure as well some new facilities such as libraries and a high school gymnasium.
The listed projects are being overseen by a Bond Oversight Committee as required by law and do not include construction to accommodate the addition of new students from the Provensalia project. Nor were the voters who passed the bond measure voting to subsidize this project by paying to mitigate its impact on the school district.
It is not unlikely that a new school will have to be built as a result of the influx of students from this project. The current costs of building a school are prohibitive and the district will not be able to pass another bond with the current bond debt still outstanding. The cost of construction of a new school and the supporting infrastructure is currently estimated at $25 million, which is well beyond the district’s financial reach. Neither developer fees, average daily attendance monies, local property taxes nor other funding mechanisms will be even close to adequate for this purpose.
California law places the responsibility on school districts to educate all students living within their boundaries without exception. The overcrowding of our schools will place an unfair burden not only on the district and its staff who are already under tremendous pressure due to increased educational expectations at the state and federal levels, but also on each and every student in the district. The quality of all our students’ education will be compromised if the district is forced to spread its already overtaxed resources amongst hundreds of additional students.
Also not covered in the report is the issue of congestion and traffic safety on Lake Street as regards our schools located there. The issue of students walking to school is mentioned briefly in the report’s traffic section, however the report does not seriously address the issue of added traffic during school pick up and drop off times. There are several distinct aspects to this issue.
Although the revised project plan proposes the construction of a new route to Provensalia which bypasses Dam Road and Lake Streets, the addition of 250 students at Lower Lake Elementary School, and an additional 100 Students at Lower Lake High School (again very likely low estimates) will have a serious impact on Lake Street traffic at drop off and pick up times.
At 8 a.m. when children are dropped off for school at Lower Lake Elementary School, as well as when they are dismissed from school at 2 p.m., there is already a serious congestion issue. School buses now numbering six or more (not including additional buses to accommodate special education students) can barely fit in the small area in front of the school. Additionally, approximately 100 cars drop off students in front of the school each morning and the same number picks students up at 2 p.m. daily.
A significant number of students also walk to school along Lake Street, which has no sidewalks. The resulting traffic situation at these times is already chaotic. Cars and school buses collect on Lake Street daily. Some parent drivers pull over to the side and quickly discharge students wherever they are able to stop and students must make their way through this maze of cars, buses and other students to get to school.
The small parking lot which serves both Lower Lake Elementary School and Richard Lewis School (a small alternative program) is located across Lake Street from the school. It is already filled to capacity and beyond each day at drop off and pick up times. The overflow cars from the parking lot now park on the street in front of Lower Lake Cemetery which is just north of the school, across the street for approximately a half mile along Lake Street and illegally in the red zone along the curb that stretches from the school entrance south down to Lower Lake High School.
The California Highway Patrol has already acknowledged that this is a dangerous condition and had previously been patrolling the area and issuing tickets to cars parked in the red zone. However, they have ceased doing so after acknowledging that there is not adequate legal parking available. A 50 percent increase in traffic would likely exacerbate the situation to the point of becoming unworkable and dangerous.
Lower Lake High School, which the report estimates will receive an additional 100 students and which is located next door to Lower Lake Elementary School, will also experience similar problems on a lesser scale. The compound effect of the two schools’ traffic and congestion problems will further cause danger and hardship to both schools and their students and staff.
Similarly, Oak Hill Middle school will be subject to similar problems due to the projected increase in student population that the report predicts will result from the project.
Also, despite the construction of the new access road to the project, some of the drivers may still opt to travel along Lake Street as an alternative route during busy commute hours.
Other district schools’ traffic and parking problems may increase when these schools are forced to accept Lower Lake Elementary School’s overflow. The nature and severity of the impact on these other schools in terms of parking and traffic is difficult to predict.
In conclusion, the report’s conclusion that Provensalia will not have a significant impact upon Konocti Unified School District is seriously flawed and disregards important facts.
Herb Gura lives in Clearlake Oaks.
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- Written by: Herb Gura
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