A Million Is a Statistic/Quotes

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


"Kill one person, that's murder; you go to prison. You kill ten people, they send you to Texas and they hit you with a brick; that's what they do. Twenty people, you go to a hospital, they look at you through a small window...forever. And over that, we can't deal with that, you know. You kill 100,000 people we're almost going... 'Well done! Well done. You killed 100,000 people? You must get up very early in the morning. I can't even get down to the gym.'"
"I know this sounds strange, but in the world of humans, if a person kills one man, he is a murderer. But if he kills 100 people, then he is praised as a hero."
King Magrid, Soul Blazer
He took no delight in the fact that the destruction of the bacta would cause the deaths of millions, even billions. As odd as it seemed, even to him, their lives meant nothing. Since he did not know them, they were numbers, and Kirtan Loor had never been one to be terribly emotional about numbers.
You know... You know what I've noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang-banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all "part of the plan." But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds!
A cyclone struck Bangladesh in November 1970 and killed 225,000 people. (And it sometimes seems, when writing about Bangladesh, that I could put any number in that last sentence and people would believe me. I could say a million people died in a Bangladeshi train wreck, and readers would scrunch their brows and shake their heads in little mimes of concern, then wonder if Ortho-Novum can't be sprayed from planes.)
P.J. O'Rourke, All the Trouble in the World
Granted, destroying the entire world would be the single greatest act of dickery he's performed yet, but somehow the slaughter of six billion anonymous people seems to lack that personal touch we get when he kills Lois or ruins Jimmy's life.
"I’ve noticed that about your people, Doctor- You find it easier to understand the death of one than the death of a million. You speak about the objective hardness of the Vulcan heart, yet how little room there seems to be in yours."
"Killing the orc horde by drowning them all at once is heroic. Killing them by drowning them one at a time is an alignment check."
"If we stop killing people by the millions they will start to get ideas"
Yezhov (One of Stalin's henchman) This quote is from an A level history text book, I cant find it anywhere else, but it sounds cool and is of slight relevance

Karolina: We have a saying on Earth: "One death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic."

Xavin: That's idiotic! A million deaths is a million times more tragic than one! It's simple arithmetic!

All planet 824 facilities and defensive vessels destroyed. Total losses since initiation of hostilities with Galactic Empire: 21 planets, 856 vessels. 163.24 billion Borg. Redirect all available vessels to attack on Imperial power base. All other priorities rescinded. Assimilate Imperial forces. Priority level 10.00.
...

Cumulative losses to Imperial forces: 745 planets, 12 trillion drones, primary unicomplex, 29000 ships. Species 3387, Species 1242, Species 6211, and 35 other species have now allied themselves with Imperial forces and launched attacks on Borg planets since destruction of Unicomplex.