Todorov reflection

Columbus or Cortes? Tricky question. Some chose Columbus for the ignorance is bliss angle. Doing what you felt was right as opposed to doing something you knew was wrong. But couldn't Cortes have felt he was right? I can't remember there being a point in the text where Cortes admits he knew he was wrong. How can someone cause the death of 24 million people (according to Todorov's estimate p133) and not know it was wrong? And for this reason, people chose to be Columbus because he'd be able to sleep better at night. I would choose to be Cortes a) so I wouldn't be crazy like Columbus and b) to understand the Aztecs better (though that didn't stop him from conquering them). All this talk of killing "a great many" reminds me of Eddie Izzard, a stand-up comedian who said:

"You killed a hundred thousand people? You must get up very early in the
morning! I can't even get down the gym. Your diary must look odd: 'Get
up in the morning, Death, Death, Death, Death, Death, Death, Lunch,
Death, Death, Death, Afternoon Tea, Death, Death, Death, Quick shower…'"

I'm sure if Cortes kept a diary it would look like this. Even here, death is seen as an ordinary task like lunch or a shower, not something causing many sleepless nights. My point: I don't think Cortes regretted what he did because he didn't see it as wrong. Setting up the memorial at the Aztec temple on 109 wasn't an act of regret for Cortes. As Todorov says he saw the Aztecs as curiosities.

In his post, Mike brings up why there is no such thing as a Cortes day, but we celebrate Columbus day (as a federal holiday). I looked Columbus day up quickly on Wikipedia and found that Latin America has similar holidays like Día de la Raza (Day of the Race), Día de las Culturas (Day of the Cultures), Discovery Day, Día de la Hispanidad, and Día de la Resistencia Indígena (Day of Indigenous Resistance). Also did you know that Hawaii doesn't celebrate Columbus day but Discoverers' Day (which commemmorates Columbus and Cook)? It's interesting how the United States celebrates the day in the name of Columbus while other countries mention race, culture, and the indigenous people.

Also in class, Mike's example of the mugger in NYC reminded me of the Jesuits on Rakhat inviting Suupari to dinner after he nearly killed Sandoz.

I leave with another Eddie Izzard quote:

We stole countries with the cunning use of flags. Just sail around the
world and stick a flag in. "I claim India for Britain!" And they're
going "You can't claim us, we live here! There's five hundred million of
us!" -"Do you have a flag?" -"We don't need a bloody flag, this is our
country, you bastard!" -"No flag, no country. You can't have one That's
the rule, that... I've just made up."

This is similar to Columbus naming the islands. Are there rules for taking over other civilizations? Todorov showed us how the Spaniards conquered using signs and language. They probably had a flag too.