Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Should Christopher Columbus be charged for "Crimes against Humanity?"

Definition for "Crimes against Humanity" is when murderexterminationenslavementdeportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war, or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated"


Note: Must provide some evidence( primary or secondary source).

9 comments:

Dbriggs said...

Yes Christpher Columbus should be tried for humanity because he commited all of those listed above! He murdered plenty of Native Americans on a day to day basis. For example quoted from his own personal journal . He has definitely enslaved the Native Americans and their islands the moment he seen them. “And there I found very many islands filled with people innumerable, and of them all I have taken possession for their Highnesses.…”He has also exterminated them by exposing them to diseases and killing them for fun. For example " the Indians agree that beefore the arrival of the Christians, and before smallpox broke out among them{caused by blankets laced with smallpox which were given to Indians as gifts to keep them warm. They wwere ten times as numerus as they are now...9/10 of them had died.}" For this reason none of them were able to survive in the Americas and either died or relocated themselves. The Spanish also forced them to convert to Christianity. This occured before any war so that is most definitely unethical. Therefore he should most deifnitely be tried for "crimes against humanity."

yaritza fanini said...

Yes Christopher Columbus should be charged for "crimes against humanity." For instance, Columbus murdered many just for the heck of it, exterminated almost the whole population of the Native Americans, used the Native Americans as servants and much more. Christopher Columbus himself stated in his journal "they would make fine servants" the same day he arrived to the Caribbean island. He saw they were very peaceful and innocent but didn't take that into consideration. Columbus violated all of the Native Americans Human rights in every possible way. Columbus should be charged for "crimes against humanity."

sonya_n said...

Christopher Columbus who is said to be deciteful, greedy, and arrogant. A person with those characteristic should atomatically be found guilty for murder and extermination becuase all the arowaks he killed, tortured, abused, and raped during his stay in the discovered land wasn't neccassary. As the reading explained in class by Howard zinn, he cut off all the young boys hands who didnt bring back gold and let them bleed to death.He definitly should be prosecuted for enslavement and deprotation due to commanding his men to get as many Indians by force so he could transport them as slaves to Spain to replace the gold he promised te king and queen; as i read on http://apamericanblogmendon.blogspot.com/2007/10/christopher-columbus-hero-or-villain.html. Inhuman acts because he lied to his sailors about giving the first person who spotted land a lot of money, but he never kept his word so you know that person had faced emotional distress.

solanyi said...

yes ,I believe that Christopher Columbus should be charged for"crimes against humanity" because he killed many native Americans,used them as slaves, and forced them to look for gold using there lives as a guarantee that they would look for the gold he wanted.He mostly killed this people for fun because he didn't have a valid reason to commit this crimes.And he wrote on his journal "that they would be fine servants" like he didn't really care and as if native Americans were human less.He wiped out basically most of the Indians civilization for nothing like if he was their owner.Christopher Columbus had to be punished for such atrocities.

F.Pearson said...

To me ,in my eyes , Christopher Colombus should be tried or should have been tried for his crimes against humanity. As soon as Christopher Colombus found the Americas & seen the native americans , the first thing he wanted to do was enslave them. He knew they were fit kind , and would make great servants , as that being said in his first journal.. He had power over them. He forced people on his boat in which some died because of long cold nights, exposed them to many diseases, give them smallpox disease intentionally , & even beheaded or just kill them for no reason at all, maybe just to have fun. Majority of people couldnt survive through the times when Colombus saw a new land , because he didnt find it. He should be charge for everthing he did.

Junior said...

Columbus founder of the Americas or everyone thinks should be tried even when most of us know that he didnt do anything but move the native americans. We celebrate him in October but he did not go onto the americas (United States) until his third voyage in 1498. He also was not the earliest European explorer to reach the Americas,thier was people before him. He enslaved the Native Americans,Columbus murdered just to show how superior he was.He even lied to his onl people (sailors) about giving them the coat off his on bak if they 1st spotted land.Under his order natives were killed, raped & tortured if they didn't find enough gold. That alone is enough to show how much of a man he is.

Jhunior G. said...

what i think is that everyone have being patronizing others in a way or another. people just want to cover up what have being done many times before and now. christopher is death already. what we need to do is learn from his mistakes, not said that he is a villain or even a hero. he those not fall to neither of those category. you cannot speak of others if you have not experience what they had.

shawn ray said...

Yes Christopher columbus and his people did such cruelty to the native americans...a person can not be allowed to kill that many human beings and bring disease to the native americans just to expect that people wont think that was completely evil. then he hs the nerve to kill people if they dont bring gold. also bringing them back to be used as slaves is just wrong.

Nohelys Sanchez said...

The definition says it all. A crime against humanity is, when an individual kills, enslaves, exterminates , and poses other INHUMANE acts against a group of people. Christopher Columbus as we all know did all of the above. Now, should he be charged for "Crimes against Humanity"? Yes, of course, definitely, if this was a big issue back in the 1400's than he should have been put to death IMMEDIATELY. Columbus killed for fun, because kids didn't find gold and just to show off. He had NO right to do what he did but there was nobody to stop him. Christopher Columbus should suffer the way the Native Americans did so he can see that what he was doing was inhumane and unnecessary.