Columbus and Western Culture
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Berliner achieves a record in cheer-leading gush when he hoses Columbus with politically correct praises.
His is the politically correct double-standard that puts down indigenous cultures while pumping up the one Chris bore. He wraps up in self-righteous cliche how people were living here when Columbus arrived: “With rare exception, life was nasty, brutish and short.”
How was life in Europe 500 years ago? Columbus’ Europe was a place in which most people were less than cattle, and ignorance, slaughter, pestilence and torture were almost universal. Why did so many Europeans flood into the New World? Why would any right-thinking person choose to flee “Western civilization” as practiced across the waters?
There are things to respect and learn from in all persons. There are also everywhere things to reject and avoid. Be Westernly civilized all you want if it comforts your sense of identity. For those of us clear about who we are, there is pleasure and instruction in seeking to understand the world’s variety. And where better than in America?
GALAL J. KERNAHAN
Laguna Hills
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