Where I live, today is still, unfortunately, celebrated as Columbus Day, a holiday intended to honor Italian-American heritage, but instead honoring colonization and the dehumanization of the Indigenous peoples of North America. As an Italian-American, it pains me that my people celebrate the wrong ancestor. I long for a celebration of the vibrant culture of my people that is not also a celebration of white supremacy. -Michael Tino, CLF
How do you celebrate your ethnic and cultural heritage?
Dear Michael,
You are soo spot on with this comment! Celebrating my ethnic and cultural heritage is difficult. On my father’s side, I am a direct descendant of the Mayflower people (John Alden to be exact). Those who took land from and brought disease to the Indigenous peoples of the Eastern shores of the U.S. and my mother’s side, a WASP family residing in the Hawaiian Islands, and a distant relation to the Henry Walker Family of AmFac. Those who bought, stole, appropriated the sacred lands of the native Hawaiians to grow sugar cane, pineapple and so on. While importing “slave” labor from the Philippines and many other poor countries!! White supremacy exerting it’s ultimate power😔