Mayor Eric Adams moves to have 2 Christopher Columbus statues landmarked. Here's the response from some mayoral candidat

[Polybius]

Source: CBS News

New York City Mayor Eric Adams may be almost 5,000 miles away in Albania, but he was at the center of the mayor's race on Wednesday due to his recent campaign to landmark statues of Christopher Columbus in Manhattan and Queens.

Adams is asking the Landmarks Preservation Commission to hold a public hearing on a request filed by the former head of the Columbus Citizens Foundation to make the two statues public landmarks, which would mean they can't be torn down.

Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro, who was speaking for the mayor while he is overseas, said the statues mean a lot to the Italian-American community. "These are symbols of something important to them, and we should respect that part of the Italian community's cultural heritage," Mastro said.

Mastro also admitted it was an attempt by Adams to thwart any efforts by Queens Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, should he win the election, to try to accomplish what de Blasio was unable to do -- have the statues torn down.

Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/christopher-columbus-statues-nyc-eric-adams-zohran-mamdani-andrew-cuomo/

---

Here's the old Zohran Tweet that's still up:

Link to tweet

[Coldwater]

1. Back in 2020

The statue of Christopher Columbus in Boston was decapitated during the George Floyd protests.

It remains in storage to this day.

[DBoon]

2. if you want to honor Italian-Americans, why Columbus?

Why not someone like Enrico Fermi? or Amadeo Giannini (Bank of America)? or even Candido Jacuzzi?

[BidenRocks]

3. They weren't famous yet.

Main article: Columbus Monument (New York City)

Columbus Monument on Columbus Circle in September 2006
The Columbus Monument, a 76-foot (23 m) column installed at the center of Columbus Circle, consists of a 14-foot (4.3 m) marble statue of Columbus atop a 27.5-foot (8.4 m) granite rostral column on a four-stepped granite pedestal. Created by Italian sculptor Gaetano Russo, the monument was installed at the center of the circle in 1892. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Wikipedia

[yardwork]

10. Times change.

Confederate monuments are coming down because people are admitting that there's nothing very honorable about enslaving, raping and torturing people or starting wars to defend the same.

[BidenRocks]

14. Meanwhile, chump..

[Polybius]

5. Who?

Never heard of them.

[yardwork]

7. You never heard of Enrico Fermi?

Really?

[Polybius]

20. I'm sure I learned about him in school, but I forgot

The 80's was so long ago.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. Fermi has an element and a class of subatomic particles named after him

and, jointly, the way the particles behave (fermium, fermions and Fermi-Dirac statistics). He fled the fascists in Italy, and back in the day when the USA gave asylum to refugees (but I understand you may not like that), came to the USA. And then constructed the world's first nuclear pile.

He's one of the giants of physics.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enrico_Fermi

Maybe if they put up a statue of him in New York, you'd pay attention?

[Polybius]

22. I would have supported asylum for Italians fleeing fascism in the 30's and 40's

I don't support it from places with jihadism unless they are an opposition religion fleeing it.

[ForgoTheConsequence]

6. Because what better way to honor Italian Americans

Then a statue to a Castilian who would have hated Sicilians.

[yardwork]

9. Anthony Fauci.

[Polybius]

21. It would have to be someone that the left and right BOTH love

Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Galileo Galilei are all good choices. For modern hero's, Enzo Ferrari, Mario Andretti, or my dad's hero, Joe DiMaggio all work.

[Javaman]

4. An African-American supports a know slave trader. nt

[yardwork]

8. A blatantly political effort to win over Italian-American voters.

It's not clear where Columbus was born. What's certain is that he was a mercenary for the newly created Spanish empire. He did what he was paid to do - established Spanish conquest of new territories, kicked off the transatlantic slave trade, committed genocide in the name of Spain and brought fatal diseases to the New World.

All in all, not somebody I admire.

[Prairie Gates]

11. The corrupt mayor desperately trying to create wedge issues on Trump's behalf

Pathetic and predictable.

Cuomo's going to come out pretending to speak Italian like most of the NYC Italians who haven't long since moved to Long Island or Dirty Jerz.



Once again, embarrassing for everybody BUT Mamdani.

And I mean everyone.

[jgmiller]

12. I will probably get roasted for this

Honestly statues of Columbus don't bother me like statues of confederate generals. Maybe I'm wrong but it seems to me that the confederate statues became festishized by white nationalists and that makes them wrong. Also they were the losers in the war and I just don't think losers in wars deserve places of honor.

Columbus is like other explorers, kings, priests they are symbols of a long gone age where the world was entirely different and they acted the way they did because of that world. Maybe some were truly evil, maybe some were good but just were products of their time. They are all history and we shouldn't destroy history because it makes us uncomfortable, we should learn from history. The Vatican was built by some truly horrible people; does that mean we should burn it to the ground? The pyramids were built by slaves, should they be blown up?

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. Columbus was pretty awful - the king and queen of Spain thought he went too far

One man caught stealing corn had his nose and ears cut off, was placed in shackles and was then auctioned off as a slave. A woman who dared to suggest that Columbus was of lowly birth was punished by his brother Bartolomé, who had also travelled to the Caribbean. She was stripped naked and paraded around the colony on the back of a mule.

"Bartolomé ordered that her tongue be cut out," said Ms Varela. "Christopher congratulated him for defending the family."

The evidence has been found in a previously lost report drawn up at the time for the Spanish monarchs as they became worried by growing rumours of Columbus' barbarity and avarice. The document was written by a member of an order of religious knights, the Order of Calatrava, who had been asked to investigate the allegations against Columbus by Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand, who ruled Spain together at the time.
...
Columbus and his brothers were forced to travel back to Spain. Columbus was in chains but, although he never recovered his titles, he was set free and allowed to sail back to the Caribbean.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/aug/07/books.spain

When he returned from his third voyage with hundreds of slaves, Isabella was furious. “Who is this Columbus who dares to give out my vassals as slaves?” she said (Resendez, 24-28). She ordered that all of them be returned home and some of them were. But it was already too late for others. They died of disease and cold (Downey, 287).

Columbus wanted to be the only man in charge out there in the West, but Isabella was rapidly losing confidence in him, so she also sent out other explorers, and together they charted thousands of miles of coastline. Even so, Columbus ultimately led four expeditions. He didn’t get any better at following instructions. Her investigation into his handling of justice led to him getting sent home in irons where Isabella left him in jail for six weeks (Downey, 294).

https://herhalfofhistory.com/2025/01/16/14-4-isabella-i-sponsor-of-columbus/

[jgmiller]

17. Notice Isabella's reaction wasn't about slavery being bad but that she felt cheated by Columbus taking them.

Let's face it lots (most) people in power back then were just different levels of bad from "kind of bad" all the way up to "spawn of satan bad".

[fujiyamasan]

18. Yes, and the confederates were traitors

They literally seceded from the union because they wanted the right to keep people of one race under bondage.

Columbus was a terrible person, and ideally he wouldn’t be honored, but his misdeeds were also before the country was formed. For better or worse, our nation’s capital is named after him. Yes, it’s a silly myth that he “discovered” America, but it is what it is.

When it comes to picking your battles, this one isn’t worth it. People should be educated about who Columbus really was and what he represented, but I’m not interested in renaming places and things named after him, Washington, or other presidents.

Confederate generals on the other hand? Fuck ‘em.

[BidenRocks]

15. Just put up a statue of

Chef BoyRDee.!

He's about 100.

[GJGCA]

19. (Irrelevant aside) Ignorant me never knew...

.. that both Jacuzzi and Boyardee were actual people. Always something to learn...


Ettore Boiardi (October 22, 1897 – June 21, 1985), also known as Hector Boyardee, was an Italian-American chef and entrepreneur, famous for his eponymous brand of food products, named Chef Boyardee. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ettore_Boiardi

The company was founded in 1915 by seven Italian immigrant brothers from the Jacuzzi family in Berkeley, California. It developed a variety of products including pumps for agricultural use. In 1948, Jacuzzi created water pumps to treat a family member's rheumatoid arthritis. The water pumps were a niche medical product until they were integrated into a recreational hot tub in 1968. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacuzzi