People say, What is the meaning of life?, but they never say, What is the <em>meaninglessness</em> of life? We don't search for absence (of value or purpose), only its presence.
I submit that if we did seek meaninglessness, however, we might very well find meaning. And perhaps that is something to think about.
If Cortez hadn't gone to war with the Mesoamericans, guess what? At least two-thirds would have died anyway thanks to the plague-bearing contagions these Europeans brought with them. And history would still have written him in a poor light simply because, in the face of this inexplicable destruction wrought by his arrival the native population would have most certainly either worshipped him as a god, crucified him as a devil, or gone to war with him as an enemy.
So don't fill me with politically correct "Cortez the killer" diatribe. Cortez would have been a killer had he wanted to or not.