Word: lafontante
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But Ehrl D. LaFontant, a city activist who sits on the board of the Haiti Communications Project, sees no reason to celebrate the quincentennial next Monday. The traditional version of the Columbus story is a dangerous distortion of the truth, he says.
"Far from discovering America and bringing it civilization and culture," LaFontant says, "Columbus in fact destroyed the civilizations and cultures that existed in this part of the world. Ninety million indigenous people have been wiped out."
Columbus Day should be used, LaFontant believes, not to exalt the man who "discovered" the New World, but rather to reflect on what his voyage meant for the people already on this continent and those who followed him across the ocean, both as free immigrants and as slaves.
With that goal in mind, the Haiti Communications Project has joined with two organizations, the 500 Years is Enough Coalition, and the Committee of 500 Years of Resistance, to "demystify...[and] bring out the truth about Christopher Columbus' voyage," LaFontant says. The groups will bring speakers and performers to Jamaica...
"The landlords get them to sign things in English that they don't even know they're signing," says LaFontant. "[The landlords] practice blackmail."