That's a new one on me: as a history minor I learned that the reason that a handful of Spaniards were able to topple the mighty Aztec Empire wasn't because Whites are the master race, but because the Spaniards had plently of local help from the tribes that didn't care to be sacrificed.

And that with the earlier Mayan Empire city-states warred against each other to capture human sacrifices, making agriculture too dangerous and resulting in an eventual apocalypto.

But apparently admitting to that, and admitting that the natives didn't have to be forced to leave a religion based on torture and human sacrifice for Christianity, is politically-incorrect these days. So we have to pretend that one mighty white man is the equal of hundreds of Indigos. (Incidently, Indigo is Spanish for "Indigene" or native, which we translated "Indian".)

And while I'm at it, the historical Pocohantas was happy to leave the Algonquin religion of ritual torture and human sacrifice for the Anglicanism of the Metaphysical Poets. (Read C.S. Lewis' The Discarded Image, or E.M. Tallyrand's [sp.?] The Elizabethan World View.)

For your information, indigo is a color. Indigena is the word you are looking for. If you're going to try to convince us of your authority on the subject, at least use the correct term.

There were many factors contributing to the success of European colonization. Mere simplifications based on your religious judgment of the Mayan, Aztec, and Algonquin civilizations will never suffice as explanations. The religion of these civilizations may indeed have been a factor, but ignoring the technological superiority of European weapons, for example, or casting the INDIGENAS as mere savages desperate for "salvation" from the "pious" Christians is ridiculous. Is enslaving entire tribes of people for economic gain truly Christian? Or perhaps pushing them out of their lands into the desert is? I hope your coursework for your history minor covered those aspects of European colonization in the U.S., and particularly in Latin America, since you speak so authoritatively about the region.

Indigenous people suffered a lot at the hands of their own leaders, it is true, but they suffered much at the hands of the Europeans as well.

It isn't just a matter of political correctness to object to Gibson's portrayal of the Maya. The issue is that it focuses solely on the gruesome aspects of a civilization that was very scientifically advanced. It's as unfair as stating that the United States has done no good for the world at all because it is only interested in bombing the hell out of Middle Eastern nations with oil reserves.

Every nation, tribe, etc. is far more complex (and its interactions with other nations, tribes, etc. even more so) than the short-sighted, one-dimensional models everyone tries so desperately to push. I don't think I should have to be telling a history minor that.