So if the widely accepted belief that Plato invented Atlantis then why is it referenced by Herodotus, the Egyptian book of the dead, the Hindu Sanskrit writings and many other sources before Plato? Herodotus; a people called, "Atlantes" living nearby the Atlas mountains. https://fathersergio.wordpress.com/2009/08/05/pre-platonic-ancient-writings-pertinent-to-atlantis/ I have yet to see one compelling piece of evidence rebuking Atlantis in the Richat structure in the then, Tamenrasett river.

Today, as it tends to happen every year, the historical discipline continues to face challenges when exploring these particular issues. Over 300 years of conquest & subjugation by European powers such as Spain, Portugal, England & France left a pillaged & forever changed land, in what had been a continent previously inhabited by tens of millions of people from thousands of different civilisations, from Bering to Tierra del Fuego, from the Nez Perce of the Plateau all the way down to my ancestors, the Gününa-Këna (Puelches) & the Aonikenk (Tehuelches) of Mendoza. Today, both History & every humanity have to contend with the advent of many perspectives that would frame any mention of this day as other than “Columbus Day” as negatively revisionist, disrespectful of Italian-American identity, & even as forgetful of the supposedly magnificent & mutually beneficial cultural exchange that occurred from the point when Colombo “discovered” América as a continent. So let’s talk a bit about those things, shall we? I’m mainly interested in the latter point, but first, let me draw some interesting points my esteemed colleague & fellow native descendant /u/Snapshot52 proposed some years ago:

A Word on Revisionism

Historical revisionism simply refers to a revising or re-interpreting of a narrative, not some nefarious attempt to interject presentism or lies into the past.

The idea that revisions of historical accounts is somehow a bad thing indicates a view of singularity, or that there is only one true account of how something happened and that there are rigid, discernible facts that reveal this one true account. Unfortunately, this just isn't the case. The accounts we take for granted as being "just the facts" are, at times, inaccurate, misleading, false, or even fabricated. Different perspectives will yield different results.

As for the idea of changing the way in which we perceive this day, from “Columbus Day” to Indigenous Peoples Day, being disrespectful to the memory of Colombo & therefore to the collective memory of the Italian-American population of the United States, I’ll let my colleague tell us about it

The recognition of Columbus by giving him a day acknowledges his accomplishments is a result of collective memory, for it symbolically frames his supposed discovery of the New World. So where is the issue? Surely we are all aware of the atrocities committed by and under Columbus. But if those atrocities are not being framed into the collective memory of this day, why do they matter?

Even though these symbols, these manifestations of history, purposely ignore historical context to achieve a certain meaning, they are not completely void of such context. And as noted, this collective memory forms and influences the collective identity of the communities consenting and approving of said symbols. This includes the historical context regardless if it is intended or not with the original symbol. This is because context, not necessarily of the all encompassing past, but of the contemporary meaning of when said symbols were recognised is carried with the symbol as a sort of meta-context.

What we know is that expansion was on the minds of Americans for centuries. They began to foster an identity built on The Doctrine of Discovery and the man who initiated the flood waves of Europeans coming to the Americas for the purpose of God, gold, and glory, AKA: colonisation. The ideas of expansionism, imperialism, colonialism, racism, and sexism, are all chained along, as if part of a necklace, and flow from the neck of Columbus. These very items are intrinsically linked to his character and were the ideas of those who decided to recognise him as a symbol for so called American values. While collective memory would like to separate the historical context, the truth is that it cannot be separated.

For a more detailed exploration of Colombo’s role & image in US history, I recommend this post by /u/Georgy_K_Zhukov

Now, for a less US-Centric perspective

In my time contributing to r/AskHistorians, even before I became a moderator, I made it a point to express that I have no connection to the United States; if you’ve read something of mine, chances are you’ve noticed that I use the terms “América” & “America” as two very distinct things: the former refers to the entire continent, whereas the latter is what the US tends to be referred as. Why do I use this distinction? Because, linguistics aside, I’m every bit an American as a person from the US. See, in Spanish, we don’t speak about “the Americas”, we call the entire thing América. We don’t call Americans “americanos”, we call them Estadounidenses, because we understand the continent to be a larger entity than the sum of North, Central & South areas. I’ve spoken about this earlier here.

I’m from Argentina. I was born in a land that had a very different conquest process than that of North América, because the Spanish conquistadores were here earlier, they had more time to ravage every culture they came across, from Hernán Cortés subjugating the Aztlans & later betraying the tribes that had allied themselves with him, to Francisco Pizarro taking advantage of the political instability of the Inca empire to destroy the Tahuantinsuyo. However, before the conquistadores came to the area where my ancestors lived, they already knew the meaning of conquest, genocide & cultural erasure, as did many other peoples in the rest of the continent. See, these practices aren’t exclusively an endemic problem brought to our shores by Europeans, because we know & understand that much like the Aztlans & Incas subjugated & conquered hundreds of cultures & civilisations in their expansionism, the Mapuches of Chile & Argentina spent decades systematically conquering, displacing & forcefully integrating many tribes into their dominion, chiefly my ancestors, the Aoninek & the Gününa-Küne, who were displaced & conquered by the Mapuches, who forced them to pay tribute to them, while having to change their culture, their religion, their way of life & even their tribal names, because the Mapuches replaced them with the names Chewel Che & Pwelche (Tehuelche & Puelchue in Spanish), which in Mapundungún, the Mapuche language, mean Vicious People & People of the East, respectively.

So, as you can see, most of us historians aren’t trying to destroy anyone’s heritage, because we recognise that atrocities & cultural erasure practices were very much a thing among native civilisations & cultures. However, it would be disingenuous and plain wrong to try & deny that the conquerors applied systemic policies of extermination in their search for wealth & conquest in América. Even if we concede that a cultural exchange was indeed established from October 12 1492 onward, we need to be extremely aware of the fact that this exchange was always forcefully imposed by the conquerors over the conquered. Last year, we had a fascinating panel discussing the colonisation of the continent with several of our contributors, I highly recommend you check it out here. There, I spoke briefly about what made this cultural exchange forceful to begin with: El Requerimiento, The Spanish Requirement, a legal document issued by the Spanish crown that, from 1513 onward, every time the conquistadores encountered a native settlement, were supposed to read out loud.

To summarize it, it states that, under the authority of the Catholic Monarchs Fernando & Isabel, whose power emanated from the Pope, who had ceded every land they were to conquer to them & only them, & who did so because, as Pope, had been given power & authority directly from God through the Holy Church "Lady & Superior of the World Universe", the native indios had two choices.

First, to accept the rule of the Spanish Empire. If they accepted it, they were to be treated with respect, allowed to maintain their freedoms & lands, just under Spanish government.

If they were to reject the terms of el Requerimiento, the conquistadores promised to take their lands, their properties, their women & children by force & by holy war, as it was their divine right.

So, they gave them two choices. The problem?

The natives couldn’t understand Spanish. The conquistadores read this Requirement to people who didn't & couldn't understand the language. The Requirement was only issued as a poor attempt of justification for the atrocities they knew were going to commit. While in later decades they developed translations as they went further inland, the fact remains that the Spanish had absolutely no regard for cultural diversity or for respecting anyone’s sovereignty in their newfound colonies. I made a translation of the full text here.

Speaking of Cultural Diversity

Prior to 2010, Argentina called this day “Race Day”. Sounds pretty atrocious, huh? Still, it was widely accepted, in a country where, even if tens of thousands of Italian immigrants arrived over the centuries, there is no such thing as an “Italian-Argentinian” collective memory, at least not in the sense it exists in the US. However, when the government decided it was time to change the horrific name this day had traditionally had, there was a lot of pushback. Why? For the same reasons exposed earlier about “Columbus Day” in the US. While most Latin Américan former colonies gained their independence from Spain in the early 19C, we still speak the language they forced the natives to learn, many people still practice the religion they imposed on every civilisation they encountered, & most people ignore, consciously or otherwise, that roughly half of the continent can trace their ancestry to some native people or other. I just happen to be closer, generationally wise, & I just happen to be a historian. So, today, here in Argentina we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the law that changed the name of a dreadfully positivist & violent “Race Day” to Respect for Cultural Diversity Day.

Am I happy with this change? Somewhat. The sentiment comes from the right place, & many natives & experts of the humanities were consulted when thinking of an appropriate name. But there’s still a lot we have to do for the name to actually mean anything, reparations have to be made, for the memory of my now almost extinct people, & for those who are still alive, well, & fighting for their independence & freedom, including my people’s former conquerors, the Mapuches, who remain locked in a constant struggle against erasure & repression from the governments of both Chile & Argentina. There are instances in which history needs to be revised. This is one of those pivotal points in the construction of collective memory, where voices like mine join with the millions of native Indians who still live, some surviving, some striving to thrive, some nearly forgotten. We the subaltern are still here, & , at risk of going overboard with the self-centred ideas, I’m just a simple indio, who learned about their history from their great grandmother, who’s proud of their ancestry, & who will continue to do thorough, mindful scholarship to avoid centuries of history to be permanently deleted from the world.