Catholic Scientist writes:
Is he actually implying that the missionaries caused the deaths or just noting the correlation?
Whether or not the mortality rate was direct from murder and enslavement, or indirect through destruction of culture and disease, it is the contact that caused the vast majority of deaths.
California has always had periods of drought, the effects of which are greatly magnified through the recent population explosion. Are you suggesting that periods of drought, affecting a much smaller amount of people, is the sole or even major cause of the decline in the Indian population?
The idea of the sacred is quite simply one of the most conservative notions in any culture, because it seeks to turn other ideas - uncertainty, progress, change - into crimes.
Salman Rushdie
This rudderless world is not shaped by vague metaphysical forces. It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It’s us. Only us. - the character Rorschach in Watchmen