Although European exploration lead to the findings of many natural resources, the treatment of the Native people living in the New World was horrible and does not justify it. Exploration began around1492, when Christopher Columbus “discovered” North America. His discovery, however, is not one of true meaning due to the fact that there were already 40 to 50 million natives living there already. Along with Columbus were many other European explorers that set out to find things such as god, gold, and glory. These macho explorers were greedy and ruthless. Their treatment of the native people is something that cannot be overlooked, no matter how beneficial exploration was. The New World was not a great place to be when the start of exploration began. The Native people living there in the late 1400s and 1500s were more mistreated by European explorers than most people care to know. As Christopher Columbus mentions in his letter to the treasurer of the King of Spain, the Natives were ready to be converted to Christianity. Although Columbus’s perspective is a positive one, converting the natives is considered mistreatment because of the fact that they were converted by force. These poor people had to work the land in exchange for their original religion to be ripped from them. Bartolome de las Casas also brings up that the evil …show more content…
In a description of the Japanese seeing their first firearm, the foreign explorers were shown in a positive light (Doc 3). However, that is a very rare case in comparison to all the horrible events conflicted on the Natives. Forcefully converting to a religion, murder, trickery, slavery, and poor conditions are extremely disheartening ways the European explorers mistreated the Natives living in the New World. Because of this, the negative effects of exploration are much greater than the