Pros And Cons Of Christopher Columbus

Though the main problem was the King and Queen of Spain, we cannot blame them entirely as well. In this case, it may not have been a human that caused the crime. It is true that Columbus’s men did the killing, and the King and Queen of Spain did give out the orders that forced Columbus to get more gold, but what caused them to think like this, what caused them to go on a plunder for gold and not worry about being the Tainos. The system of empire is to blame for all this. The European society of that time told them that mankind had to have property in order to feel secure and dominant. The more property someone owned, the more powerful the person. In order to get more wealth, Columbus’s men forced the Tainos into slavery, and justifying themselves

Spanish Monarchs, who were funding the voyages, were told of the mistreatment of Spanish colonists in Hispaniola. Columbus held floggings and executions without trial, let his crew rape innocent natives. He oversaw the killings of some Natives, he beat some natives, he was a slaver, capitalist, and a murder. He was charged with oppression, racism, slavery, rape, theft, vandalism, extermination of a tribe, and ecological desolation. When confronted by the King and Queen he accepted the charges and was stripped of his titles, wealth, and power (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/425389/christopher-columbus-hero-or-villain)

When Columbus saw the people on this land, he assumed they were people from the West Indies, therefore he called them  “Indians”. In Columbus’ letter to Lord Sanchez, he described the people as “savages, [who are] naturally timid and full of fear” (document 13).  In document 2, his letter to Santangel, he goes so far as to say that when he tried to establish trading relationships with the Indians they acted primitive and uncivilized. Columbus also states in document 2 that he hopes they will become fond of the Spanish and establish trade relationships as had been requested. Obviously this would be a difficult feat because of the lack of coherence between cultures. Columbus worked very hard to ensure the development of trade relations.  As seen in document 9, Columbus writes many letters back to the King and Queen of Spain reporting on the status of his mission and updates on the relations with the people. One key detail from this document is Columbus’ opening line where he includes the statement “in obedience to your Highness's’ commands.”  This is significant because it shows that Columbus is working under the King and Queen's commands and that he is not entirely to blame for his actions. Columbus should not be held responsible due to the fact that he was abiding the orders of the King and

Columbus may not have been committing the wrongdoings himself, but it was his example they followed, and his expeditions that started the flood of injustice. “The cruel policy initiated by Columbus and pursued by his successors resulted in complete genocide” explains Bartolome de las Casas. Columbus started a wave of abuse that rippled throughout the Americas by means of the Spaniards that followed in his footsteps. The ceaseless suffering the Native Americans went through lead to mass deaths on top of the cold-blooded murders. Las Casas illustrated the extent of the issue in saying the Spaniards “thought nothing of knifing Indians by the tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades.” This type of pointless torment is unjustifiable by any standards and was entirely unnecessary for the colonization of the land. It is hard to call someone a hero if they are responsible for such inhumane acts. Being responsible for such inhumane acts makes it hard to call Christopher Columbus a hero. Columbus’s successors brought his personal actions to a grand scale that ultimately outweigh his

When Christopher Columbus arrived in the Americas, he has little regard to their way of life. He showed no remorse for taking the indigenous population and killing, and enslaving them. Christopher Columbus writes, “With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want” (Doc. 2). Christopher Columbus and his men enslaved the natives and made them do the tedious works they did not want to do. We also see the side of a historian who writes, “But our work was to exasperate, ravage, kill, mangle and destroy” (Doc.7).The men deliberately went there to kill the population that already existed.

Many people try to bury facts with other, perhaps more important facts (Zinn 8). In America, people celebrate a national holiday known as Columbus day. It is a day in which Christopher Columbus is honored, for the discovery of the Americas. Most students all across the country have the day off from school because of this holiday. All of these people take this day off to celebrate Christopher Columbus and his work, but they do not actually know what it is that he did after he founded America and the natives. People are not told or aware of everything that Columbus did, in most schools people do not show the bad side of his work which leaves them under the wrong impression of him. Christopher Columbus created one of the most substantial genocides

Ladies and Gentleman of the court, today we are here to present to you our case of the genocide of our people, the Tainos. Christopher Columbus sailed to Hispaniola and slaughtered all our people until only 200 remained. Due to differing cultures, we did not understand Columbus’s intentions and therefore were unable to fight back. Even if we had further defended ourselves, Columbus and his men had advanced weapons and techniques that would defeat any undeveloped and timid tribe. Thus, we had no chance of survival against the highly established Spaniards. Frankly, there is no argument in which we could be proven guilty simply based on the events that occurred in which our people were taken control of, forced to work as slaves, and murdered.

The Spanish were the first European settlers in the Americas when Christopher Columbus in October 12, 1492 while searching for a new route to Asian Indies, discovered new land. Columbus wrote to the king of Spain telling him that the Americas was kind of heaven, full of thousand of different kind trees, with prosperous land. This letter has helped understand the motives of the Spaniards for colonizing the Americas, the virgin continent, untouched lands, full of gold and precious metals as Columbus described in his letter. Columbus also told King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella that the natives we simple, timid people who went about naked and lived simple lives in an environment like that of the Garden of Eden, and that they can also be made Christians. The monarchs saw this as an opportunity to impose their modes of civilization upon this vast population, justifying the colonization of the New World as the white man’s duty. Motivating and accelerating the occupation to the Americas. Since in fact the Spaniard kingdom initial motives to venture out into the oceans were richness and to acquire goods that were rarely available. The Monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella were also wanted to establish missionaries to purify and reform.

The people on the island had no clue what a sword was so they would cut themselves when they would touch the blade. Christopher Columbus thought it was going to be easy if needed to fight with them. They had no way of protecting themselves. He and his men ended up killing these poor people little by little. Even when they tried to help them out by directing them to find gold or help them when they got hurt. On his trip when he arrived in Hispaniola the Taino people living on the island welcomed and were gentle with him and his men. When Columbus left the island he left forty of his men and those men raped and fought the Tainos after they helped them out.2 On his second trip Columbus set up a permanent colony and again his men raped, stole gold ornaments and food that provoked war with the Tainos. The Spanish killed tens of thousands out of population and the ones who did survive the Spanish ended up chopping off their hands if they did not provide their allotment.3 At the end the Spanish wiped out the islands either by killing the people or they left to surrounding countries.

Columbus, the first Spanish explorer to reach America, initially thought that the he had landed in the East Indies, which had been his ultimate goal. “His sea wanderings would have been written off as an expensive failure, once it was realized that he had not found the illusive water route to India, had it not been for the discovery of gold on Hispaniola in 1493”(Nash, 18). Once it became known that there were gold and other precious metals on this continent, people from Spain began to journey to America in hopes of gaining immense wealth. The Spanish claimed Panama, Mexico, parts of South America, and southern areas of what is now North America and these expeditions were typically led by military figures. The Spanish viewed America as land to be conquered and they viewed Native Americans

Christopher Columbus was an Italian who worked on behalf of, King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I. The Spanish monarchs’ ultimate goals were to find a trade routine to India, Asia and to spread the Catholic religion to others. They financed Columbus with the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria to find a western route to India. Thinking that it was India, Columbus found land. In his journal, Columbus described his first account of the natives as “they were very friendly to us, and perceived that they could be much more easily converted to our holy faith by gentle means than by force” (“Fordham University”). Also, he plans for them to be great servants so they “may learn our language” (“Fordham University”). He says

Christopher Columbus set out on his expedition with the hopes of discovering a shorter and faster route to Asia in order to make the trade of silk, spice, and porcelain more efficient. In addition to this, he sailed in order to colonize new territories and spread Catholicism. The first document regarding Christopher Columbus’s travels states, “ … determine to send me, Christopher Columbus … to learn their disposition and the proper method of converting them to our holy faith”. With conversion and Catholicism being high on Christopher’s list of priorities, it seemed to impact the way he saw and treated the indigenous people in which he encountered. Later on in the document, the text described Christopher’s first encounter with native people. Christopher

Christopher Columbus abused and slaughtered the Natives and their very own children. In the Article, Smithsonianmag, it states,”Or, as Mr. Bergreen puts it in describing the aftermath of an Indian slaughter of Columbus' men at La Navidad on what is now the island of Haiti: "A leader who valued gold above the security of his men could be counted on to aspire to great accomplishments at great cost." It states that Columbus slaughtered Indian men and forced his own men to kill them. He will do anything for gold. As far as killing innocent people. In the same article it also states,”Forced hard labor,The amputation of limbs if slaves were not producing ‘enough’,Labelled as hostile savages if not in complete compliance with their oppressors,Buried alive or burnt alive if you were resistant to the conquerors demands,were resistant to the conquerors demands,Offering cash rewards for

Columbus viewed the culture of the native people of the islands as inferior to his own which resulted in a belief that he and his men have the right to harm and treat them harshly. ‘…On my arrival, I had taken some Indians by force from the first island that I came…’ By enslaving some of the Indians, Columbus showed that he believed that he had the right to enslave them because they were inferior to him in some way. ‘…to bear witness that he before all others took possession of that island for the King and Queen…’ With this statement, Columbus stated the belief that the Island did not even belong to the native people to begin

Koing states, “I am not going to assert that this was all Columbus’ fault. Although there was no systematic slavery within Europe at that time, enslavement of darker races had been considered a matter of course from the first contact with them… Spaniards from that time on become more cruel than any of the