It’s finally official, Oct. 8 is now Indigenous People’s Day in the city of Los Angeles.

California is one step closer to becoming a state that undoubtedly supports diversity.

And those bitching (and moaning) about how we have lost a sense of pride by voting out Columbus Day, there is nothing at all patriotic about celebrating a holiday which offends the nation’s indigenous people.

Independence Day, Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day were especially set aside to celebrate the nation and be patriotic.

Why single out those who died because of this country as well?

Nothing is patriotic about celebrating a day in which a man committed acts of atrocity unto to a group of people — it’s sadistic and utterly wrong.

It takes a hell of a lot of strength and determination in order to take down a statue.

Not many people are willing to exert so much effort over nothing.

So why is it that people in various states of this country are willing to make that effort, and have made that effort, in order to demolish those statues themselves?

Columbus is not the symbol of a new world, he is the symbol of a lost one.

One cannot discover anything if it already exists.

Columbus brought disease, death and essentially misery to a group of people, nearly wiping out their race.

If the United States is such a melting pot of cultures then why has this nation been trying to rub out a particular culture for centuries?

No rational person would ever celebrate a holiday set aside for rapists and mass murderers, but somehow the United States has been doing so since 1937.

For 80 years, we have been allowed to take the day off from work and education in order to pay tribute to a person whose actions would fall under the Geneva Convention’s definition of a war crime.

The indigenous people of this country are one step closer to receiving the myriad of respect and condolences that they deserve.

Because of Columbus, others found it acceptable to continue the destruction he started, and even though the murdering of Native Americans has long since ceased, they still, to this day, face harassment, insensitive stereotypes and discrimination.

It is appalling that it took the city council this long to finally dismiss Columbus Day and make the appropriate, long overdue switch to Indigenous People’s Day.

Columbus day should have never been a possibility in the first place, however, ignorance has always been a constant affliction of this nation.

The only path Columbus paved was the way to allow more Native Americans to be wrongfully mistreated, to be slaughtered, to be stereotyped as savages and continued to have more of their land stolen from them.

Indigenous People’s Day is proof that this nation, as painstakingly slow as it might be, is finally starting to overcome its affliction.

And we, especially minorities, must never stop fighting to instill a difference in the wrong ways of our nation.