The Social Darwinist: Difference between revisions

{{quote|''"It's really simple. You bring two sides together. They fight. [[A Million Is a Statistic|A lot of them die]]. But those who survive are stronger, faster and better."''|'''Justin''', ''[[Babylon 5]]''}}

[[The '''Social Darwinist/Laconic|The Social Darwinist]]''' is someone who believes that the Darwinist theory of evolution -- ievolution—i.e. "survival of the fittest" to grossly oversimplify it -- appliesit—applies to people, and sometimes entire societies or nations. To the Social Darwinist, all life is a struggle for survival in which the strongest naturally prosper at the expense of the weak -- andweak—and it is ''[[Might Makes Right|right]]'', and ''natural'' that they should do so, because that's just the way things are, and/or natural law is [[Above Good and Evil]].

If they do talk about evolution, they are very likely to talk about [[Evolutionary Levels]] and [[Goal-Oriented Evolution]] rather than Darwin's actual theory.

Fictional [[Social Darwinist|Social Darwinists]]s generally come in four major flavors:

# The second type is the [[Evilutionary Biologist]] or anyone who has [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|mistaken ideas]] about how evolution works "[[Utopia Justifies the Means|for the good of the species]]," and in order to help it out or not "get in its way," anyone with a birth defect or who is in any other way "weak" in this villain's eyes [[Kill the Poor|deserves to die]] to keep the gene pool strong. The hope to create the [[Transhuman]] [[Ultimate Lifeform]]--to—to which, of course, [[A God Am I|the character him- or herself will belong]]--is—is likely.

# The third type is a racist or [[Fantastic Racism|speciesist]] who believes that their race is a [[Master Race]], and by extension, the only one fit to live and thrive in this world, and uses this belief as a justification for subjugating, enslaving or just plain getting rid of those that they consider "inferior" (as the [[Real Life]] [[Nazi|Nazis]]s did). [[Scary Dogmatic Aliens]] are very likely to have this mindset, as is any society [[A Nazi by Any Other Name|modeled upon the Nazis]]. Occasionally also held by [[What Measure Is a Non Super|superheroes]].

If [['''The Social Darwinist]]''' doesn't suffer a [[Karmic Death]], the heroes "disprove" his might-makes-right philosophy by demonstrating the [[The Power of Friendship]]:<ref>In fact, actual evolutionary scientists posit [[The Power of Friendship]] and general co-operation as the best survival strategy for most people most of the time, and human civilization in general.</ref>: either by ganging up and beating the crap out of him and his cronies, or by the leader of the group (often [[The Messiah]]) doing it himself while repeatedly driving home that he's fighting for his friends. A particularly profound way to 'disprove' Social Darwinism is to have the [[Big Bad]] beaten by a character who has glaring [[Disability Superpower|physical or mental handicaps]].

Compare [[Evilutionary Biologist]], [[Evil Evolves]], and [[Kill the Poor]]. SometimesFictional overlapsworks sometimes portray this attitude as overlapping with [[Ayn Rand|Objectivism]] and the "[[Friedrich Nietzsche|Übermensch]]" concept, although whether this is a correct portrayal is debated.

* Emperor Charles zi Britannia in ''[[Code Geass]]'' has this philosophy -- thoughphilosophy—though it applies at its most ruthless to his children, as if any are weak, they deserve to die. The protagonist, a deposed prince of the empire, directly opposes this attitude as it's what cost him his mother and crippled his little sister -- whilesister—while Charles did nothing. {{spoiler|Subverted, as this was all a facade by the emperor himself.}}

* In ''[[Darker Thanthan Black]]'', Amber's organization "Evening Primrose" is sort of the Contractor [[La Résistance|Resistance movement]], and while it's not clear to what extent Amber herself has this viewpoint, her [[Yandere|obsessive]] follower Maki definitely does, and in one scene, he actually refers to Contractors as something like a [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|"master race"]]. The [[Interquel]] villain Harvest is also an insane social darwinist, and has several lines about "the next stage in evolution".

{{quote| "Don't you get it? My men aren't going to come and rescue me. Because if I die here, I'm not worthy to lead them anyway."}}

* The philosophy of ''[[Rurouni Kenshin]]'s'' [[Big Bad]] Makoto Shishio is that "the flesh of the weak is the food of the strong" -- and—and he drives his point home by [[I'm a Humanitarian|literally taking a bite out of the hero]]. He is inevitably defeated, but afterwards, Kenshin observes that his victory has not truly proven anything -- andanything—and that, if the one in the right is merely the strongest warrior, then Shishio was correct all along...

* Kiria from ''[[Rosario to+ Vampire]]''. He's shocked when Kurumu decides to save Moka's life instead of leaving her to die, as they are both rivals for Tsukune's heart.

* [[Took a Level Inin Jerkass|After taking a level in jerkass]] and pursuing apostles on his [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge|quest for revenge]], Guts in ''[[Berserk]]'' pretty much adopts this as his philosophy, saying that people who are to weak to survive in the [[Crapsack World]] that they live in deserve to die.

* Rudolf von Goldenbaum from ''[[Legend of Galactic Heroes]]'' firmly believes in this trope. One of the most infamous laws he passed after he established the Galactic Empire was the so-called "Inferior Genes Exclusion Law", which essentially involved the killing of people deemed to possess "inferior genes".

* There are several such characters in the ''[[X-Men (Comic Book)|X-Men]]'' works:

** Magneto has some moments of social darwinism, calling mutants ''Homo sapiens superior'' (or the even less accurate ''Homo superior'', implying mutants are a separate species entirely).

** Apocalypse goes farther; besides vaunting the superiority of mutants, he believes in encouraging conflict to weed out the weak. Meanwhile, he isn't concerned for his own safety, assuming that he is the [[Evolutionary Levels|pinnacle of evolution]]. There are times, both in the main [[Marvel Universe]] and alternate timelines, when Apocalypse gets defeated and he's asked what makes ''him'' fit to survive. Sometimes, he seems entirely willing to die due to having been proved "unfit" under his own philosophy. [[Status Quo Is God|It never lasts, of course, because he's one of the X-Men's iconic villains so he has to come back to face them again]].

** Professor Xavier in ''X-Men Noir'' is an actual psychiatrist, and as such his spin on this is unique: he believes sociopaths are the next stage in human behavioral evolution. Chief of Detectives Eric Magnus, meanwhile, believes the criminal element is hereditary and genetic -- andgenetic—and has to be contained or eliminated for the good of society. Emma Frost, an old student of Xavier's, combines the two ideas as warden at Genosha Bay, but also feels sociopathy is communicable.

* [[Captain America (comics)|The Red Skull]] abandoned Nazism, but he still believes in this.

* The Norwegian cult comic ''The Great Four: When the Dead Awaken'' features a social darwinist [[Big Bad]] who is planning to start a new world war using [[Steampunk]] gasoline technology. When the heroes arrive to stop him, he offers them an ultimatum: If he defeats them, [[Defeat Means Friendship|they will join him in his conquest]]. If they defeat him, he has a self-destruct ready to destroy his [[Supervillain Lair]] and will let them pull the switch, because if he was weak enough to be defeated his works weren't worth anything anyway. {{spoiler|He actually seems content with losing until the heroes decide to leave the lair intact so his [[It Makes Sense in Context|gasoline-driven undead minions]] can continue to 'live'.}}

== FanfictionFan Works ==

* In a contrasting portrayal when [[GaiasGaia's RevengeVengeance|compared to the usual]], in the ''[[Avatar (film)|Avatar]]'' fanfic, ''[httphttps://web.archive.org/web/20200328053146/https://www.fanfiction.net/s/6049921/1/ Children of Gaia]'', '''Earth''' is portrayed as one, plus [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]], always working the evolution to benefit the strongest and don't even mind people mining her (a rather interesting subversion of [[Gaia's Lament]]). So, she gets really offended when she learns about how Eywa rules the Na'vi and actually agrees with humans on their policy over them.

* ''[[Ponies Make War (Fanfic)|Ponies Make War]]'' has both [[Big Bad|Titan]] and his [[The Dragon|Dragon]], General Esteem, who both believe that power is the only thing that matters, and that only those with power have the right to rule.

{{quote| '''Rourke''': Come on, you've read Charles Darwin. It's called Survival of the Fittest. We're just helping to speed it to its logical conclusion.}}

{{quote| '''Aladar''': (''Concerning the elders in the back'') But the others in the back! They'll never make it!<br />

'''Kron''': Then they'll slow down the predators!<br />

{{quote| "There is no room in this whole world for imperfection. What a pity my father didn't live to see me become strong, to see me dispose of the weak and imperfect of the world, whom he detested. He would have admired me for what I am going to do."}}

* This is [[Star Wars|the Sith]] in a nutshell.

* In Marion Zimmer Bradley's ''[[Darkover|Darkover Landfall]]'', humans arrive on Darkover as the survivors of a crashed starship -- fortunatelystarship—fortunately a colony ship, unfortunately meant for another world altogether with existing infrastructure. Fewer than 70 women survived who might be capable of childbearing. The medical practitioners deliberately decided not to make any special effort to save any woman who looked like dying in childbirth, on the grounds that their gene pool wasn't large enough to include the weak. Definitely an example of the Type 2 fictional Social Darwinist -- andDarwinist—and this was presented as an [[I Did What I Had to Do]] situation. An especially bad example because [[You Fail Biology Forever|70 females is nowhere near enough genetic diversity to sustain a population]].

* ''[[The Ship Who...]] Searched'' has a minor character (Haakon-Fritz) who fits this. He actually belongs to an organization called the Neo-Darwinists. When the archaeological team he's on is attacked by a pack of what are basically alien wolves, his response is to bolt for the nearest building and lock the door, leaving the rest of the team out.

** In ''[[Discworld/Wyrd Sisters|Wyrd Sisters]]'', Lady Felmett repeatedly describes those not as ruthless and tyrannical as her as "weak".

** In ''[[Discworld/Interesting Times|Interesting Times]]'', the Agatean Empire's entire ruling class is more or less like this.

** ''[[Discworld/Carpe Jugulum|Carpe Jugulum]]'' has Count Magpyr and his family, who through most of the book speak condescendingly of just about every other species on the Discworld, view humans only as prey for vampires, and even look down on ''other'' vampires who haven't overcome traditional vampire weaknesses like they have. Appropriately, it's revealed that the "weaknesses" of traditional vampires are actually survival mechanisms that keep the vampires safe from their main predator: hordes of angry peasants.

** ''[[Discworld/The Fifth Elephant|The Fifth Elephant]]'' introduces Sergeant Angua's werewolf-supremacist brother Wolfgang, who leads a Nazi-esque gang of like-minded young werewolves.

{{quote| '''Hrsh-Hgn''': Intelligence is humanity's prime survival trait, therefore it is as well that those who don't show it be weeded out.}}

* ''[[Mortal Engines]]'' has ''Municipal'' Darwinism, a system by which the inhabitants of mobile cities justify eating smaller mobile cities, stripping them down for spares, and selling their inhabitants into slavery. Large cities eat small cities, cities eat towns, towns eat suburbs (all of the above are gigantic and mechanized). Everyone picks on "static" settlements, which form the Anti-Traction League and fight back with hordes of airships and suicide bombers. This is not a sustainable "ecology" since there isn't much in the way of outside resources coming into the system. The real ecosystem takes energy from the sun via plants, the cities don't do much of that.

* The Mesan Alignment in the ''[[Honor Harrington]]'' stories believe that their superior genetics mean that they should be running the galaxy.

* Almost all Nietzscheans in ''[[Andromeda]]'' -- even—even the non-villainous ones, who are generally "good guys" only in that they exist in a state of permanent [[Enemy Mine]].

* The ''[[Doctor Who]]'' serial ''Survival'' brutally deconstructs this trope / worldview in several ways, most notably by turning the Master into an essentially Social Darwinist villain -- allvillain—all the other characters are exploited for his own survival. He manipulates [[The Dragon]], Midge, by playing on Social Darwinist beliefs -- abeliefs—a specific comment on [[Margaret Thatcher|Thatcherism]] in Eighties Britain. There's also a bullet-headed Territorial Army type who's a determined believer in this type of philosophy, only to completely fall apart when he finds himself actually thrown into an environment where he has to actually practice it. It doesn't end well for him. {{spoiler|Ultimately, the 'weaker' characters who work together and are able to overcome their purely individualistic / survivalist instincts do okay, the 'stronger' ones who can't and fall into this trope die.}}

{{quote| '''Denise''': And now the time has come to choose [the children which are to be given over to the 456] and if we can't identify the lowest-achieving 10 per cent of this country's children, then what are the league tables for?}}

* The drow in ''[[Dungeons and& Dragons]]'' are a [[Planet of Hats]] of [[Always ChaoticExclusively Evil]] Social Darwinists, due to a spectacularly poor choice in patron deity (a demonic spider-goddess) and living in underworld caves whose native fauna make them nearly a [[Death World]]. This does ensure that drow who survive are more dangerous, particularly to each other. Realistic natural selection might well have either wiped them out altogether or forced them to cooperate in a more rational manner. Lolth, their patron deity, tells them to knock it off whenever they fall below a certain point in population. And yes, this makes the drow a race that officially survives on Deus Ex Machina.

* Also in ''[[Dungeons and& Dragons]]'', the now-dead god Iyachtu Xvim used to be a [[Social Darwinist]], and didn't like helping the weak like some of the more goody-two-shoes gods, believing that they were directly responsible for their situations and didn't deserve help.

* Both the [[A Nazi by Any Other Name|Imperium]] and the Eldar in ''[[Warhammer 4000040,000]]'' view all other races and each other as less evolved and inferior. The Orks also do this with their culture based on [[Proud Warrior Race Guy|warfare]] and [[Might Makes Right|toughness]].

* Andrew Ryan from ''[[BioshockBioShock (series)]]'' has been ([[Did Not Do the Research|inaccurately]]) accused of being this, what with his version of [[Atlas Shrugged|Ayn Rand's Objectivism]]. He even builds an underwater utopia so that the weak do not keep the strong down. Of course, someone still has to scrub the toilets in Rapture; even if Ryan brought down only the best and the brightest people that fit in with his ideology, people who were once captains of industry back on land were no better than average there, and were disgruntled when they had to work menial jobs that someone's gotta do. On the other hand, Andrew Ryan had a pretty broad view of "strong." For example, he met one of his best friends, Bill McDonough, when the man was installing the plumbing in Ryan's apartment. Ryan had only paid for tin pipes, but McDonough was using copper ones (paying the difference out of his own pocket), because "no one bails water out of privies made by Bill McDonough." The next day, Ryan hired him as his general contractor, and made sure to bring him down to Rapture when the city was built.

* In ''[[Final Fantasy VII]] [[Dirge of Cerberus]]'', Weiss the Immaculate announces that he will be slaughtering about half the population to "cleanse the world."

* The ''[[City of Heroes]]''' main bad guy, Lord Recluse, has founded his entire evil organization on Social Darwinism... to the point where he actively encourages every faction to fight against every other faction and backstab each other freely. It's a wonder his plans for world conquest go anywhere when all the bad guys are busy killing ''each other'' off instead of fighting the ''heroes''.<ref>This may have been inspired by the Nazis, who recommended [[Klingon Promotion|Klingon Promotions]]s and frequently assigned the same task to two or more officials to see who got it done first, promoting infighting. This did not help in making [[The Trains Run On Time]].</ref> This does explain why the majority of your enemies in ''City of Villains'' are not, in fact, heroes. It should be noted that that while Recluse adheres to Survival of the Fittest, he doesn't let it consume his organization. Anarchy and insubordination are stamped out pretty quickly if they interfere with his plans -- hellplans—hell, one of the few things Villains in his city can't do without restraint is attack civilians. Who else is going to pay Recluse his taxes?

* Kane from ''[[Command and& Conquer]]'' infuses humans with Tiberium to make them evolve. This is actually more evolutionarily-literate than most examples, as he's trying to make it so they can adapt to Tiberium to allow them to survive on Tiberium-covered worlds instead of just making them tougher or smarter. The tougher part happens but it's more a side effect.

** At the end of ''[[Deus Ex: Human Revolution|Deus Ex Human Revolution]]'', Sarif talks about "survival of the fittest" and how "some people will be left behind". This characterization, however, is complicated by the fact his company manages to invent a method that makes augmentation substantially cheaper and thus much more accessible than it currently is, which is the opposite course of action to that which one would expect of a social Darwinist.

{{quote| '''Ashnard:''' You? Cut me down? Heee... Good. If you possess the strength to do so, then so be it.}}

* Wesker is nudged to one of these in ''[[Resident Evil]] 5''. He'll give long speeches about his beliefs during boss fights, but -- hilariously -- yourbut—hilariously—your character will start getting annoyed with how he drones on.

** Chiaki, a rich-brat-turned-demon-queen of ''[[Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne]]'' leads a faction of Darwinists under the reason of Yosuga. The main character even has the option of joining them and creating a true Social Darwinist world (as soon as you help her kill all the human-like slave race for being too weak). Unique among all the faction leaders, she is the only one to fight you even if you choose her Reason, as there can be only one ruler in the new world.<br /><br />It should be noted that the world Chiaki is trying to create is logically impossible. Even if she succeeds and the world of Yosuga is created, there would still be some individuals who aren't as strong as others. By Chiaki's logic, these individuals would be unnecessary. Thus, her vision of a world without unnecessary things cannot be made into a reality.

* ''[[Knights of the Old Republic]]'' demonstrates how Sith work like this when you enter the academy on Korriban. One does wonder how the hell their system of backstabbery and "every man for himself" philosophy manages to outnumber and overwhelm the Jedi, who co-operate towards a common cause and don't kill half of ''their own people''. It ''is'' mentioned that the Sith will always fail sooner or later because of this, but it's never actually shown in the game. The sequel revisits the academy and shows what happens when you have a bunch of [[Drunk on the Dark Side]] [[Complete Monster|Complete Monsters]]s without any strong leadership to guide them: a ''very'' empty academy.

* General Gismor of ''[[Drakengard]] 2'', who hides it behind a facade of [[Knight Templar|Knight Templarism]]ism.

* Khamal Rex from ''[[Universe At War]]'' feels that if any species couldn't keep themselves from getting wiped out by the Hierarchy, then they didn't deserve to live in the first place.

* Vulpes Inculta of ''[[Fallout: New Vegas]]'' claims that the reason main reason he butchered or enslaved nearly the entire town of [[Wretched Hive|Nipton]] is because they were too weak to prevent it, and therefore deserved it. If you decide to kill him, and establish that he was weak as well, his allies will send assassins after you. Guess that "Survival of the Fittest" argument only is applicable when it's convenient to them.<br /><br />Legate Lanius, [[The Dragon]] of Caesar, is this to a much more brutal extent. If he rules the Legion and wins the Battle of Hoover Dam, he makes Vegas into a twisted [[Warrior Heaven]] where he puts the world to the sword. In his mind, violence will set the world free, breaking the weak and letting the strong truly thrive.

** Warlord Okeer from ''[[Mass Effect 2]]'' also has elements of this. He's a [[Proud Warrior Race Guy|krogan]] scientist, a member of a species that's been subjected to a genetic weapon that makes only one in every thousand births viable. He thinks ''this is still too many'', as every krogan baby is then "coddled" and viewed as precious when they should be testing their mettle as warriors.

{{quote| "If you swim with sharks, you may not get bitten, but don't act like it was an unforeseen tragedy when you do."}}

* The three chairmen in ''[[Strange Little Band]]'' fit this trope. This influences the way they run Triptych.

* The communities of any form of [[Serious Business|professional games]] (as well as [[GIFT|anything online.]]) are pretty much this. They all try to form an elite social class and try to separate themselves from the common rabble. When they can't and are forced to interact with the common rabble, they either delight in beating them, or try to outright kick them to keep an "inferior being" called a "noob" from tainting their games. If they can't, they try to encourage that newbie to [[Rage Quit]] by constantly belittling and insulting them. This is [[Mo BA|worse in some genres (*cough*[[MOBA]]*cough*).

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