History Main / KillThePoor

* ''Film/{{Circle}}'': The [[NoNameGiven Rich Banker]] suggests picking off people based on their "societal contribution", which just ends up painting a target on his own back. [[spoiler:He survives several ties, but is finally eliminated when he tries to get the Little Girl killed.]]

* Zigzagged with Tempest, the villainous organization of wealthy individuals from the first season of ''Series/{{Arrow}}''. Their plans to level the Glades, the low-income/ghettoized area of Star City, seem to be classic KillThePoor behavior... but, towards the season's end, their motivations are revealed to stem from disgust (often due to personal tragedy) at the Glades' large population of criminals and ApatheticCitizens even despite more conventional philanthropic efforts at helping the residents. So, they still want to KillThePoor, but it's because they believe the Glades form a WretchedHive sub-region of the city rather than just for being poor.

-->'''Cleese:''' Well I think they should attack the lower classes, first with bombs and rockets to destroy their homes, and then when they run helplessly into the streets, mowing them down with machine-guns. And then, of course, releasing the vultures. I know these views aren't popular, but I have never courted popularity.

* Creator/MarquisDeSade had some of his characters muse on doing this, including possibly the first modern proposal of bioterrorism, since one says they should deliberately spread plague in poor areas. Others propose burning poorhouses and charity hospitals, along with using the poor in lethal medical experimentation. At least [[https://www.academia.edu/37697403/An_Unblinking_Gaze_On_the_Philosophy_of_the_Marquis_de_Sade_PhD_thesis_in_philosophy_ one author]] has seen a parallel with the later acts and philosophy of the Nazis, as his characters justify this in similar ways (although there were differences as well). The people whom they abduct, rape, torture, and then kill are also usually poor ([[WouldHurtAChild often children]]) because that they're more vulnerable.

** Cersei has more than a touch of this going on: from going after both Robert's bastards and their mothers whenever possible (which means the smallfolk first, because they're an easy target -- Edric Storm and his mother not-so-much since they've got Houses Florent ''and'' Baratheon in their corner) to disappearing the easily disappeared into the Black Cells when they start getting... inconvenient to her. That she considers fallen-on-hard-times lords and ladies to be as disposable as any landless knight, WanderingMinstrel or prostitute should be a warning. [[spoiler: And, that's not including the open season she has declared on anybody who happens to 1) be vaguely male and 2) a dwarf (or similar). Apparently, any and all the collateral damage on two continents is well worth eventually getting her brother killed.]]

[[folder:Tabletop Roleplaying Games]]

* Vlad Tepes ([-AKA-] Vlad [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast the Impaler]] -- the man who {{Dracula}} was very loosely modeled after), allegedly held a banquet for all the poor people in his land (or all the beggars, depending on the version), at which time he locked them in and set the room on fire.[[note]]More charitable interpretations of this event take the view that the "beggars" were actually thieves.[[/note]]
** The reason normally given for hosting the banquet before killing them? It would be inhumane to kill them on an empty stomach...

* The titular event in ''Film/ThePurge'' is explicitly encouraged as a means of killing off homeless people and other "leeches of society" types. In the prequels and sequels, [[spoiler:not enough people were dying, so the New Founding Fathers hired ''death squads'' to massacre poor people just to pretend it was working, and put a hit on the Presidential candidate running on a platform to stop it]].

* In ''Count Cain'', [[spoiler:Lord Gladstone]], the high priest of the organisation Delilah, [[VillainWithGoodPublicity presents himself as a philanthropist]] but [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain secretly hates the poor]], and orchestrates a large-scale bombing of the public opening of the Crimone Gardens, resulting in a huge death toll. While the deed is intended as a mass HumanSacrifice, he seems particularly happy that most of the victims were working-class.

* While killing poor people isn't exactly their goal, in ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'', Team Flare's ultimate plan is to [[ApocalypseHow/Class4 kill everyone that's not a member of Team Flare]]. Their membership fee is about 5 million [[FictionalCurrency Pokédollars]], which as a stand-in for yen is around $50,000 USD.

* While killing poor people isn't exactly their goal, in ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'', Team Flare's ultimate plan is to [[ApocalypseHow/Class4 kill everyone that's not a member of Team Flare]]. Their membership fee is about 5 million [[FictionalCurrency Pokédollars]], which is around $50,000 USD.

* One adventure in the ''TabletopGame/{{Zeitgeist}}'' adventure path has a final boss who runs on this. [[spoiler: A symposium of world leaders ends up forming a psychic gestalt called a "Godmind" which is obsessed with eliminating those with little or nothing to contribute economically. Left to its own devices, it will flatten all but the richest parts of the city with [[EnergyWeapon Frickin' Laser Beams]], culminating in [[KicktheDog smashing an orphanage]].]]

* One adventure in the ''TabletopGame/{{Zeitgeist}}'' adventure path has a final boss who runs on this. [[spoiler: A symposium of world leaders ends up forming a psychic gestalt called a "Godmind" which is obsessed with eliminating those with little or nothing to contribute economically. Left to its own devices, it will flatten all but the richest parts of the city with FrickinLaserBeams, culminating in [[KicktheDog smashing an orphanage]].]]

Less lethal alternatives may involve social leaders suggesting to make poverty illegal and see to it that all poor people are treated as criminals under the eyes of the law; this may involve the poor being forced into slave labor or a similar venture so that they can be put to "better use". To varying extents [[TruthInTelevision this has actually happened]], and becomes more common the further back in history you look.[[note]]For example, the history of England (dating back to the Tudor era) shows how "Poor Laws" transitioned over the centuries from outlawing poverty to providing government aid to the poor as the former system was no longer considered socially acceptable.[[/note]]

Less lethal alternatives may involve social leaders suggesting to make poverty illegal and see to it that all poor people are treated as criminals under the eyes of the law; this may involve the poor being forced into slave labor or a similar venture so that they can be put to "better use".

* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40K'':

* An indirect version in ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40K'': The Imperial Guard often performs shanghai-ing on a vast scale by descending on a hive and forcibly recruiting the denizens of the Underhive, simultaneously giving themselves a few million combat-ready warm bodies and lessening the hive's population problems. And done in direct fashion during the old ''Rogue Trader'' edition of 40K, one of the blurbs mentioned that Hive Cities often get population explosions beyond their already teeming masses so culls are done on the hivers.

* An indirect version in ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40K'': The Imperial Guard often performs shanghai-ing on a vast scale by descending on a hive and forcibly recruiting the denizens of the Underhive, simultaneously giving themselves a few million combat-ready warm bodies and lessening the hive's population problems.

* Although he doesn't advocate outright killing the poor, in Creator/CharlesDickens' ''Literature/AChristmasCarol'' Ebenezer Scrooge ''does'' advocate the poor offing ''themselves'', which [[IronicEcho later comes back to bite him]] during the Christmas Present sequence.

* A flashback in ''Manga/OnePiece'' shows Luffy's home island is [[UrbanSegregation half palaces of the rich]], [[DownInTheDumps half dumping ground where everyone else live]]. In an effort to "clean things up" before a visit of the [[AristocratsAreEvil World Nobles]], the local nobles set their other half on fire.

* In ''Manga/BlackClover'', Asta, Magna and Noelle happen upon Heath Grice and his associates covering the village of Sosshi in an impenetrable (except for Asta's AntiMagic sword) dome of mist, just saving the entire village from being crushed by his ice. When questioned why he tried killing them, Heath explains how he considers anyone who lives in the Foresaken region are nothing more than "filthy beasts" inferior to those of the higher classes and that they deserved extermination.

* In ''Film/AmericanPsycho'', sadistic SerialKiller Patrick Bateman feels nothing but ill will and contempt for the lower classes. After he sends many mixed signals to one homeless man he meets--from pulling out his wallet and flipping through the money he has to berating him to get a job--Patrick stabs the homeless man to death after he praised Patrick for being "so kind." In his confession to his lawyer over the phone, Bateman claims to have killed "maybe five or ten" homeless people altogether.

* In ''Film/TheThinning'', the United Nations passes a PopulationControl law on the world, with obviously brutal results, and America's purge consists of killing anyone who doesn't do well in school. Seeing as how wealth enables rich kids to hire private tutors, this doesn't target genuinely stupid people nearly as much as it does the poor. [[spoiler: To make things worse, the purge secretly ignores intelligence and targets people with a rebellious streak, or those who pissed the high class off, and instead of killing the children, they're forced into secret slave labor.]]

** Cersei has more than a touch of this going on: from going after the both Robert's bastards and their mothers whenever possible (which means the smallfolk first, because they're an easy target -- Edric Storm and his mother not-so-much, since they've got Houses Florent ''and'' Baratheon in their corner) to disappearing the easily disappeared into the Black Cells when they start getting... inconvenient to her. That she considers fallen-on-hard-times lords and ladies to be as disposable as any landless knight, WanderingMinstrel or prostitute should be a warning. [[spoiler: And, that's not including the open season she has declared on anybody who happens to 1) be vaguely male and 2) a dwarf (or similar). Apparently, any and all the collateral damage on two continents is well worth eventually getting her brother killed.]]

* [[Creator/StephenKing Richard Bachman]]'s ''Literature/TheRunningMan''. Well, it sure ain't rich people trying out for ''Swim the Crocodiles'' or ''Treadmill to Bucks.'' It's poor and desperate people like Ben Richards. And the Games themselves serve to distract the lower class from the fact that they're dying of emphysema and lung cancer as a result of air pollution, while the upper class get fancy nose filters as protection from it.
* Creator/MarquisDeSade had some of his characters muse on doing this, including possibly the first modern proposal of bioterrorism, since one says they should deliberately spread plague in poor areas. Others propose burning poorhouses and charity hospitals, along with using the poor in lethal medical experimentation. At least [[https://www.academia.edu/37697403/An_Unblinking_Gaze_On_the_Philosophy_of_the_Marquis_de_Sade_PhD_thesis_in_philosophy_ one author]] has seen a parallel with the later acts and philosophy of the Nazis, as his characters justify this in similar ways (although there were differences as well). The people whom they abduct, rape torture and then kill are also usually poor ([[WouldHurtAChild often children]]) because that they're more vulnerable.

** Colbert wants the Occupy Wall Street "pity party" to end so that Wall Street can get back to their own party--snorting the ground up bones of the poor.

-->'''Cleese:''' Well I think they should attack the lower classes, first with bombs and rockets to destroy their homes, and then when they run helpless into the streets, mowing them down with machine-guns. And then, of course, releasing the vultures. I know these views aren't popular, but I have never courted popularity.

** The rich and completely insane killer in the episode "Legacy" believed he was doing the world a favor by exterminating street people, who he viewed as completely subhuman garbage, tainting everything they touch. When the detective who watches over the part of the city the killer gets his victims from is actually rewarded due to the lower crime rate, despite the detective trying to bring attention to the fact that all these people are missing, the killer is insulted, and sends him a letter saying he should be ashamed for stealing the credit for other people's work. In the end, when the killer is surrounded by the police just as he is about to murder someone else, he actually screams "Let me do my job!" before being shot.

* The actions taken by the British government in ''Series/TorchwoodChildrenOfEarth'' verge on this. [[spoiler: When aliens require 10% of the children of the world, the government eventually decides to take those 10% from the most impoverished sections of society. One politician in particular implies that, given the world's overpopulation in general, this may not be a bad thing at all in the long run.]]

* In ''VideoGame/DeusEx'', this is part of the plot by the Majestic 12. Using a nanite chimera virus [[SyntheticPlague "Grey Death"]] to infect the world's population, but only providing a treatment to the rich and powerful.

* One ''Webcomic/FilthyLies'' sees ComedicSociopath Damian preparing to volunteer at the soup kitchen, because "the homeless problem won't solve itself." Joel is at first impressed that Damian is doing something selfless for a change, but then notices that he's bringing an awful lot of rat poison...

* A pretty [[LighterAndSofter child-friendly]] example pops up in ''Disney/TheGreatMouseDetective''. Professor Ratigan, who has just claimed supreme power over all mousedom, proposes a heavy tax on all social parasites, particularly the elderly, the infirm, and little children.

** "[[Recap/SouthParkS11E7NightOfTheLivingHomeless Night of the Living Homeless]]" parodies ZombieApocalypse tropes. Hordes of homeless beggars arrive in South Park, and the adult residents wind up besieged on a rooftop, shooting any homeless who come near them and even a neighbor whose house was foreclosed on. To be fair, there was literally something WRONG with those people - they refused to eat (or purchase food) and gained psychic sustenance from the act of receiving money. That could just be the prejudiced Homeless Division manager's opinion, but everyone afflicted would beg for change even if they were staring at a shotgun barrel.