Christopher Columbus Day should be renamed "Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment Day"

Tuskegee syphilis experiment test subjects

National Archives and Records Administration Photo

I'm sick of folks celebrating Christopher Columbus (CC) Day since he was a  murdering, syphilis-carrying idiot as proven by historians and journalists.

I was misinformed by the Knights of Christopher Columbus organization which awarded me a pen and pencil set in sixth grade for writing about their hero.

"Christopher Columbus, sitting on the dock with his red beard blowing in the wind, was waiting for his ship to come in," was the first line of my essay which I don't have a copy of since it was written before Xerox machines.

Growing up, though, I read the books which chronicled CC's slaughtering of whole Indian tribes. Plus, he never set foot in North America. Amazing how we put the wrong people on pedestals.

Christopher Columbus is no hero, with his three ships and rowdy band of men. I will not be going out to buy anything today in his honor. What he did was all a horrible fantasy which has driven customers mad one day a year.

Instead of celebrating this man who probably had neurosyphilis, we should think about the families who were harmed in the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment. This Day should be renamed Remember Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment Day! Let's uplift the survivor's families instead of CC and learn their stories. Fact is more important than fiction. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment