Biography
The Social Darwinist is someone who believes that the Darwinian theory of evolution — i.e. "survival of the fittest" to oversimplify it — should be applied to people, and sometimes entire societies or nations. Or they may just advocate ideas that are associated with this, though not invoking evolution (Darwinian or not) itself. To the Social Darwinist, all life is a struggle for survival in which the strongest naturally prosper at the expense of the weak — and it is 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. Such characters rarely concede that their chances for survival may have started higher than others due to reasons such as inherited wealth or social prestige. They typically state that We Have Become Complacent and stupid, and want to remove "weakness" and "stupidity" from society. It may seem to some that because humans aren't currently having wars/disaster and humans aren't endangered as a species, evolution in humans has ceased altogether.
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 (which was more of a pass-fail concept).
Fictional Social Darwinists generally come in six major flavors:
The Straw Meritocrat: Basically a Straw Nihilist or Hollywood Atheist without the overt craziness. This first type believes that the scientific absolutism of natural selection puts them in zero accountability to God, the State, or any other moral code. People who rise to the top in the human environment aka society, by whatever means, can consider themselves superior to others — even going so far as to praise the evils of over-ambitiousness and condemn kind behavior. Frequently, this will be held even in settings where the people in charge are clearly getting there through nepotism, or otherwise as a result of luck and privilege. Despite it being nothing more than a Theme Park Version, this philosophy is still frequently held by both fictional characters and quite a few Real Life "successful" people. This is often coupled with the "logic" that since they are in charge they must necessarily deserve to be there. A position often associated with, or held by, Straw Capitalists.
The Nazi by Any Other Name: The second type is a racist or speciesist who believes that their race is a Master Race or Superior Species, and by extension, the only one fit to live and reproduce in the world/galaxy/universe, 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 Nazis did). Scary Dogmatic Aliens are very likely to have this mindset, as is any society modeled upon the Nazis. Occasionally also held by super-people.
The Evilutionary Biologist: The third type is an evolutionary biologist or anyone else who has mistaken ideas about how evolution works "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 deserves to die to keep the gene pool strong. Many such characters hope to create the Transhuman Ultimate Life Form. This type is also what Those Wacky Nazis had in mind with Aktion T-4, the Lebensborn program, and their wider eugenics policies.
The Jerk Justifier: The fourth type is simply selfish and uses Social Darwinism as just a justification for sociopathic behavior. This character may not actually believe it and may not even care, but finds Social Darwinism to be a convenient justification or excuse for the way they were going to behave anyway. Often overlaps with Straw Hypocrite, especially if he's a coward who will immediately resort to "un-Darwinist" cheating if he's ever exposed as inferior himself.
The Struggler: The fifth type believes that competition, suffering, and struggle make the individual, and possibly society as a whole, superior. They tend to believe in Evil Virtues like cunning, ruthlessness, opportunism, and the ability to endure and survive by any means necessary, and tend to have a cynical view of the world as a hard, harsh place and that Hobbes Was Right; they may also/instead suffer from Evil Cannot Comprehend Good and thus undervalue non-Social Darwinist virtues like kindness or pacifism. A Real Man Is a Killer logic often falls into this category, as does War Is Glorious. Those Wacky Nazis held to this view as well. Differs from the first in that they don't necessarily believe that those at the top always deserve it; they tend to take a Might Makes Right view of things, and the most sincere of this kind do not believe the struggle ever ends and are never hypocrites; if they end up on the losing side, they will accept their fate with dignity (though usually not quietly).
The Weakness Punisher: The sixth type deliberately seeks out weak people to ruin their lives. They usually use a lot of manipulation to let these people embarrass themselves, often enough online, and bully their victims or let other people do the bullying for them. If female, they always use their sexuality to exploit their victim's wish for having a purpose in life. In the end, they usually encourage their victims to commit suicide so that their weakness will never again be a burden to anybody and show their Last Disrespects.
In general, the fictional Social Darwinist is a narcissist who mostly just tries to justify his own superiority over everyone else. If the Social Darwinist doesn't suffer a Karmic Death, the heroes "disprove" his might makes right philosophy by demonstrating The Power of Friendshipnote : either by ganging up and beating the crap out of him and his cronies or by the leader of the group (often the All-Loving Hero) doing it himself while repeatedly driving home that he's fighting for his friends. A particularly profound way for this to happen is to have the character beaten by a character who is either a visible minority the Social Darwinist considers inferior or has glaring physical or mental disabilities.
Less often, a sincere Social Darwinist will often begin to respect the heroes after their defeat; they may turn into a Worthy Opponent or even become a Noble Bigot as they struggle with their beliefs and begrudgingly admit that a group they had considered inferior does in fact have worthy people among them. Their beliefs might be a Tragic Flaw if they were drilled into them from a young age or they actually lived in some viciously hostile place where their views were justified.
Compare Evilutionary Biologist, Evil Colonialist, Evil Evolves, Kill the Poor, and Slobs Versus Snobs. Sometimes overlaps with Objectivism and the "Übermensch" concept. Hollywood Atheists are often stereotyped as this. The trope maker for The Beautiful Elite. There's a bit of this trope in the Satisfied Street Rat. Likewise, characters with a Darwinist Desire are usually only interested in applying Social Darwinism on themselves and their offspring rather than imposing it on society, though both tropes can overlap in the same character. Compare and contrast Living is More Than Surviving; Social Darwinists will variably put either survival or quality of life on top of others.
Note that Charles Darwin himself would not be amused by all these people and the way they interpreted his theory; he proposed nothing of the sort, and the idea predated him by centuries (and while Darwin did believe that the Caucasian race had evolved further than other races, his racism was not based on arrogance or sociopathy; it was simply the scientific consensus then). At the time, his insistence that all humans were the same species was controversial.note You never see a Social Darwinist treating societies in the same way a real Darwinist treats species: Darwinists are interested in maintaining biodiversity (so the greatest number of traits are available to "throw at the wall and see what sticks" when a change in habitat occurs), and Darwinism is a description of the way species work, not a prescription for which species should live or die. See Appeal to Nature for the fallacy of using "nature" to prescribe any behavior (moral, immoral, or amoral), and also see the Analysis page for this trope for more information on that. This did not stop Social Darwinism from becoming a fairly mainstream philosophy from the Victorian era to WWII when it became associated with the Nazis; this association contributed greatly to its loss of popularity. However, the emergence of culture war politics in the late 20th century appears to have won new adherents to the philosophy.
Not to be confused with Survival of the Fittest. Also contrast Underdogs Always Win, which takes this concept and flips it completely on its head.
