When the Europeans arrived in North America, many changes came into the lives of indigenous peoples. These changes included things such as new weapons and horses, which made hunting easier, but Europeans also killed indigenous people, treated them as though they were less than human, and took their lands. These immoral things happened because of European desire for riches and glory. Because of this, the European impact on Native Americans should be seen as a moral question.
Upon their arrival, Europeans saw indigenous people as heathens because of their religions and their difference in culture. The Europeans believed that it was their job to convert the indigenous peoples to Christianity. They decided that the way to do this was to force them
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With the first wave of Spanish colonization of the New World, many indigenous peoples were killed and their lands were seized and their way of life was destroyed
(Tindall 26-27). When the Spanish showed up, they greatly overpowered indigenous peoples.
They had iron, seafaring vessels, firearms, explosives, and swords, with indigenous peoples had copper, dugout canoes, arrows, and tomahawks (Tindall 27). This is immoral because the indigenous peoples would have no chance against the Spanish, and killing the indigenous people was senseless since they couldn’t fight back well anyway. When indigenous people were threatened by people in a village Columbus left behind, they attacked, killing ten people, only to lead to a retaliation that decimated their numbers (Tindall 21).
As you can see, many immoral acts were committed against the indigenous peoples of the New
World, from taking their lands to killing them, and even not seeing them as actual people. When talking about this situation in history, it should be spoken about as a moral question because we don’t want those same things to happen again. Thinking about the morality or immorality surrounding these events will help keep people from committing these acts again in the