newbie - questions about "rm"

Hi,

I've read that 'xargs' should be used with 'rm' when using a list of
files too large for 'rm' to process.

I'm wondering why 'rm' doesn't just accept a list of files as a command
line argument,

Also, if the output is redirected from another command, is there a lot
of overhead using a program like xargs, since it is calling the program
multiple times? Is this considered to be efficient way of processing
arguments, or is there a better way?

Thank you

.

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