Day in Celebration of Christopher Columbus should not be a Federal Holiday

On Oct. 14, McLean High School was closed due to the Columbus Day Holiday. Columbus Day has been a federal holiday since 1937, and public school students in Fairfax County get the day off.

On the contrary, school will still be in session on Veterans Day, a day to honor the service of our country’s military. This seems like a misinformed decision by the federal government.

Christopher Columbus was hardly a hero, in fact he brought great disease and suffering to the native population of North America. The entirety of the holiday is a farce, with incorrect facts spouted at the nation’s youth every year. Learning a dance dedicated to Columbus or the false accusation that the rest of the world thought the earth was flat warrants a reevaluation of the state’s standards.

Sophomore Rebecca Deitch said, “We should celebrate the veterans and all that they have dedicated to our country, whereas Christopher Columbus is one guy who ‘discovered’ America and killed a lot of people.”

The country should not be taking time off to celebrate a madman. Instead the men and women who serve to protect us should be honored and to do that we need a federal holiday. When compared to the effort our military puts into defending the country and promoting peace worldwide, it becomes clear that Columbus Day would more aptly be called Invasion Day, and its existence as a holiday needs to come to a close.