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< many people are convinced today that the (smallpox and other) epidemics introduced to north america by european settlers were real.

Out of curiosity, why do you word it this way? I'm curious because I have a coworker that thinks the smallpox story is some evil liberal conspiracy of some sort, and never happened. Yet I see only evidence for, not against.

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Mass death from disease clearly happened. I think there is some room to question how much of it was intentional. Clearly some of it was intentional, but if diseases unthinkingly carried over on the first voyages are responsible for a large number of the deaths, we should take note of that.

i tried to word it neutral with regard to intentionality. after what i read it was considered more of a tragedy then anything else, but i think there are new interpretations, which are also mentioned in comments above.

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