- reoload vom 12.10.2010
BodeständiX ist immer dabei, wenn es gilt, Feste zu feiern. So möchte er erstmals in seinem Leben den heutigen
Columbus Day feierlich begehen.
Wir EuropäerInnen können nämlich diesem ehrwürdigen Mann, der den Atlantik nach Westen besegelt hat, um den Seeweg nach „Indien“, d.h. Südostasien zu erschliessen, nicht genug Dankeschön sagen. Ohne seine grossartige Entdeckung - im Oktober 1492 stiess Columbus bekanntlich auf die Insel Guanahani (Bahamas), dann auf Kuba und Haiti - wären wir EuropäerInnen wohl nie zu solch' erstaunlicher Grösse aufgestiegen.
Bedanken möchte ich mich auch beim damaligen Papst Alexander VI., welcher mit seiner unendlichen Güte und dank Weisungskraft seiner
Päpstlichen Bulle Inter ceterae, 1493, damit das grösste Seelen-Heimholungswerk der menschlichen Geschichte ermöglichte:
"50,000 Native People... died within months of the establishment of the first Spanish colony on the island of Espanola. The soldiers held contests to see who could cut the most heads off with one blow. Women's breasts were cut off for sport while their babies were fed to the Mastiffs; The 24 million people perished at the hands of the Conquistadors in Central Mexico... [the Conquistadors] held contests to see whose dogs could tear apart the most people. Babies were thrown into the air for the dogs to fight over; The 95% of the People in Western and Central Honduras who perished in less than 50 years; In Western Nicaragua the population fell from more than a million to less than 10,000 in only 60 years; In Peru, Chile and Brazil the population decreased from 14 million to 500,000 in less than a century. The soldiers, it was written, kept "the quarters of Indians hanging on porches to feed to the dogs." While many of the deaths were from diseases spread from the filth which permeated the "Old World" many of our People were simply worked to death. It was cheaper to work the slaves until they died than to feed them. There were always more slaves to be had. These are but a few of the atrocities that led to the development of The New World...."
Susan Bates, Hill and Holler column, October 2006
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