"Westerners are in aggregate were just better at running civilization"
If being good at running a civilisation means being good at making war and enslaving, then we objectivly were better, as we conquered and they lost.
But if civilized means being in higher spirit and have a more happy population, then the proof needs to be different.
The middle eastern cultures where better at that and that wasnt enough. Its in the ability to peoduce institutions which then produce a tech/power gradient that allows exploitation. Keeping cultures artificially alive that can not do that is artificially prolonging inevitable change.
The reason the entire concept of 'Westerners' exist, is because empires who became dominant in the aforementioned dimensions conquered, subjugated other peoples on the continent, or others were forced to adapt to their standards to avoid the same fate.
In a couple hundred years these populations in many ways were quite indistinguishable from their conquerors, as they adopted their customs and ways of running society.
Many of these conqured peoples while becoming Westernized culturally, didn't escape the yoke of their conquerors until much later.
This process was repeated in Latin America.
I know there are a lot of politically motivated people are interested in simple stories of the virtuous locals versus the evil West, but the same story played out pretty much everywhere over different continents and timeframes.
I'm not sure if Romes conquest of the Gauls was any less brutal than the Spanish conquest of Mexico.