Joseph Stalin was right. “One death,” the dictator is reported to have said, “is a tragedy; one million is a statistic.”
While Stalin is interpreted as providing justification for mass murder, his sentiment regardless rings true during all times of great tragedy, most recently seen in the aftermath of the cataclysmic earthquake that ravaged the impoverished nation of Haiti.
At the time of this writing, the official death toll in Haiti is approximately fifty-thousand. Estimates predict the number climbing into the hundreds of thousands.
When I hear such things, I feel virtually nothing, save for a distant sense of unease and great sadness.
This is in no part due to a lack of compassion for my fellow man; it is entirely due to my inability to comprehend such massive numbers.
In the same way that I am unable to grasp a sense of scale when thinking of our planet in relation to its gargantuan celestial neighbors, my brain is unable to discern the true depth of the devastation in Haiti.
When ruin reaches such heights, the figure changes from a heartfelt connection to an overwhelmed people to merely math.
It is only in individual, personal narrative is my mind able to even begin to grasp the enormity of the situation.
Reading various news stories, I have come across individual accounts, stories of victims pulled from the rubble, or of selfless doctors rushing to the aid of the devastated nation or of survivors tasked with the grim work of clearing ruined buildings of the dead.
When shown these small glimpses into the horror that has unfolded, I am able to begin to see the whole picture, if only in small, fleeting glances.
More importantly, these individual accounts allow me to feel tiny, comparatively imperceptible amounts of what is happening at the epicenter of the disaster.
I form a brief, but powerful, connection with the individuals featured in the news stories, allowing me a measure of empathy and raw emotion that dispassionate numbers and indifferent aggregates do not provide.
It’s difficult to grasp the enormity of a tragedy such as this, and it is the personal details that shake me.
If we are to comprehend the magnitude of such an event, it is of the utmost importance to touch on the personal and the human, lest we lose perspective and Haiti becomes another cold statistic.
Max Roberts can be reached at mrroberts@ut.edu.