The town of Wellesley, Massachusetts recently made the disgraceful and unjust decision to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Even more disgraceful than the decision itself are the comments made on social media by Kisha James, an anti-diversity activist who advocated for the holiday change, and her mindless sycophants.
Here I will rebut the statements made by James and her sycophants one by one. Warning: so many disgusting and reprehensible statements were made that this blog post is going to be pretty long.
First of all, James and her allies treat the debate about whether or not Columbus should be honored as a joke. Their primary way of addressing an issue is to ridicule those who think differently than they do. Instead of expressing their views in a respectful manner, they personally attack and ridicule their opponents. I don’t understand what her comment about saying something “with your whole chest” even means, but it is clearly an attempt to ridicule her opponent’s statement. This is what bullies do. Also, “lmao”? I am not sure what James finds humorous about this situation. A beautiful, courageous, and brilliant man is being brutally obliterated from the world. As someone on the autism spectrum who loves history, the destruction of historical statues, place names, and holidays that has taken place over the past year has been nothing short of heartbreaking. Because history is my passion, history-related things such as Christopher Columbus statues and Confederate statues make my life worth living. James and those who think like her have deliberately destroyed the things that make my life worth living. Therefore, most days I am filled with rage, grief, and despair, unsure if it even makes sense to go on living. Maybe I’m just a debbie downer with no sense of humor, but I don’t find this particularly funny.
It is incomprehensible that someone would consider it a victory, or something to be pleased about, that a beautiful, courageous, and brilliant man is being obliterated and replaced by conformity and nothingness, and it’s sickening to see the gloating, congratulating, and shout-outs to the “amazing” (bigoted and intolerant are more appropriate adjectives) people who made this disgraceful decision happen. Even more problematically, James accuses the Italian-American Defense League, and one of its members named Lucia, of being racist. This is false. If one reads the comments by Lucia and the IADL that are shown in the tweet, one will see that nothing racist is contained within. Falsely accusing people and organizations of being racist is despicable, particularly when one states the false accusation as if it is an obvious fact, as James does. To warn readers that the screenshots of Lucia and the IADL’s posts contain “genocide denial” and “racism against Indigenous people” is preposterous. It is correct to deny genocide in this case, because no genocide happened, and as I just explained, the posts contain no racism against indigenous people. Ironically, the fact that James considers it racist to defend Italian-American heritage and an Italian-American hero demonstrates that James is actually racist. Another problem with this tweet is that, like the one above, it ridicules people with opposing views and makes light of an unjust and heartbreaking situation that is not the least bit funny. Why does James put quotes around the name of the IADL? It’s as if she either doubts that it is actually the name of the organization, or considers it ridiculous that an organization dedicated to defending Italian-Americans exists. This is further proof that she is racist. Finally, the idea that “there’s still a lot of work to do” is disturbing. The number of beautiful things in the world that have been destroyed over the past year is psychologically shattering to me, and makes me feel like my heart is being ripped out of my chest. And James has the gall to suggest that this is not enough? That the last few remaining things in the world that give me happiness need to be destroyed too? This is beyond reprehensible.
I’m not sure why James would tell Lucia to “just say you hate Indigenous people and go,” given that nothing Lucia has written indicates that she hates indigenous people.
I’m also not sure why user “LAND BACK, PROTECT THE SACRED, PUNCH NAZIS, ACAB” made the decision to ridicule Lucia for being angry. The decision to obliterate Columbus Day was despicable; therefore Lucia is 100% correct to be angry about it, as am I. These anti-Columbus bigots are deliberately inflicting pain on other people and then ridiculing those people for being in pain. The fact that this is despicable does not even need to be stated. I’m also not sure why this user ridiculed Lucia for her point about camels, horses, and saber-tooth tigers; I actually thought Lucia’s point made sense. Furthermore, it is despicable to advocate violence against those with dissenting views in one’s username, as this individual does.
The user who goes by julia seems to be alleging, in a flippant and classless manner, that Lucia “sucks,” which is false. Lucia is actually correct and does not suck at all. It is James, julia, and all the other mindless sycophants commenting on James’s post who truly suck.
Here again is the claim that the IADL is an “anti-Indigenous org,” which it is not.
The user who goes by “freelance menace” (and who apparently has an aversion to proper capitalization) sycophantically congratulates James for her role in obliterating a beautiful, courageous, and brilliant man and replacing him with a symbol of conformity and nothingness (the fact that anyone would put work into achieving such a thing is sickening). She also refers to the “wellesley italians” as “infuriating,” which is incomprehensible. As I have previously stated, James and those who think like her are making the world a worse place by obliterating a beautiful, courageous, and brilliant man and replacing him with a symbol of conformity and nothingness. That is infuriating, not the brave people who are fighting back against it. Additionally, the claim that Italians are infuriating is also racist.
So to sum up, the decision in Wellesley to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples’ Day was morally wrong. This decision, in combination with the hundreds of similar actions that have taken place with regards to statues and monuments, has inflicted indescribable and unbearable pain on people such as me who love history and admire Columbus. Adding insult to injury and compounding their wrongdoing, the people who inflicted this indescribable and unbearable pain are now ridiculing their victims for being in pain. They are also calling the people they harmed “racist,” when in actuality, they themselves are racist. As a result of the actions of James and those who think the way she does, I will be in pain for the rest of my life. But they react to this situation with phrases such as “lmaoooo” and “lololol.” Sorry, but I don’t find the infliction of indescribable and unbearable pain to be funny. I condemn Kisha James, and all those who expressed agreement with her, in the harshest possible terms.