Columbus did not discover any new worlds. Columbus discovered territories unknown to him and the Spanish, but these lands and their inhabitants did not need to be discovered, because they were never hidden or lost. As Edmundo O’Gorman says, America simply could not have been discovered because America did not exist, it was invented. In 1492, there was not a meeting of two worlds, but an invasion that led to colonization, pillage and genocide. Columbus could have limited himself to indicating the place of what he called America on the world map and leaving the inhabitants of these lands in peace. But no, he had other plans more typical of a pirate than a browser.
The discovery of America is an invention, a story. It is the story of the victors and the vanquished. The triumphalist version of the conquerors which silences the stories of exploitation, subjugation and murder of indigenous men and women who lost their culture, were stripped of the riches of their lands and expelled from their homes, from their place in the world. The stranger was interpreted by the Spanish as being available to do with these people whatever they wanted. The so-called discovery of America constitutes one of the great stages of dehumanization. These indigenous peoples were neither beasts nor animals, but they were treated as such and, even worse, as strange and inferior beings who only deserved to live if they were baptized, dominated and Christianized.
