Early explorers did things that wouldn't fit into our view of acceptable behavior. You are hoping to replace Columbus with multiple Columbuses each with the same track record as the one you hope to replace.<p>Personally, I like Columbus day, I like the discussion, and the critical thinking it brings.<p>Its important to note that many celebrated foundations of our civilization would be despicable in modern standards. For example, the Romans were the original fascists despite the cultural hegemony they imposed upon Europe.
This will never happen for a variety of reasons -- but I have always lobbied to remove Columbus Day as a holiday and replace it with Election Day, hopefully encouraging a larger number of people to vote.
But Columbus is an legend precisely because he didn't just explore, he created a beachhead which is more important historically than plain exploration.
I think it's a fantastic idea for a variety of reasons:
1) It's a great political compromise.
2) It makes the day a celebration of the best part of our past.
3) It makes the day aspirational by encouraging exploration in the future.
Sure. If you apply our standards, though, you might want to decry many of your founding fathers as well: Washington, Madison, Jefferson ("All men are created equal"), John Hancock, Benjamin Franklin - they all held slaves at some point.<p>So, should you rename the capital, the state, and all the avenues and parks that are named after these people?
I don't really care about the actual issue, but the objections raised to Columbus Day are absurd to me.<p>Why is euro-centrism bad? I am not of European descent, but historically speaking, contributions made by Europeans are undeniably tremendous. I don't think there's anything controversial about acknowledging that Europeans had a pretty remarkable run in recent centuries. Does euro-centrism have a bad name because of colonialism?