they weren’t unique during their own time period, at their very worst. Politics/race/culture/region all play big roles here as to the difference. The historically literate know this is what people have always done, unfortunately.

Also, part of why we’ve “never heard of it” is similar to why the deaths on the Eastern Front are overlooked and “unknown” — it’s not us. 20+ million dead Russians (alongside the 20+ million dead Chinese), meh...many more movies have been made about an event with 2500 American deaths. Because that’s us.