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Everyone is subject to the laws of Darwinism whether or not they believe in them, agree with them, or accept them. There is no trial, no jury, no argument, and no appeal.
The jigsaw piece that I cut from my subjects was only ever meant to be a symbol that that subject was missing something. A vital piece of the human puzzle. The survival instinct.
The Darwinist is a bad guy who believes that only the strong, cunning, and ruthless come out on top. Basically, he (or she) uses Social Darwinism (or just plain "Darwinism", in the case of villains who believe they're the "next step" in evolution) to justify their looting and pillaging, their oppressive regime, their schemes for world domination, or what have you over "mere mortals". If the Darwinist doesn't suffer a Karmic Death, the heroes "disprove" his might-makes-right philosophy by demonstrating the The Power Of Friendship—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 anvilicious way to do it is to have the Big Bad beaten by a character who has glaring physical or mental handicaps.
Note that Social Darwinism is usually actively disavowed by biologists, including Darwin himself. Actual Darwinian natural selection is that the "fittest" survives, "fittest" being that which is best adapted to their current environment. This is not necessarily the strongest/most ruthless/etc., but can be (and often is) that which can band together in groups for mutual benefit.
Additionally, since actual Darwinian natural selection can adapt only to your current situation, the greedy only-the-absolute-fittest-survive version embodied by the villains of this trope is actually a poor long-term survival strategy — you would end up with a large number of almost-identical, seemingly-optimal 'perfect' specimens that are then promptly slaughtered en masse once something else evolves (or some other change to their environment occurs) that preys on one of their shared weaknesses. This is why actual evolution is in many ways conservative, frequently retaining 'non-optimal' genes through recessive traits and other mechanisms in case they become useful in the future; for a species, diversity is more valuable than individual strength (as illustrated by the fact that the most biologically successful species on earth are insects, which are individually weak but biologically diverse.)
Another point of view is that thanks to our gaining of sentience, we don't have to listen to our genes any more, and we can beat the effective but ultimately very wasteful system of natural selection.
Fictional Darwinists generally come in two flavors: One type believes in Social Darwinism, which is misinterpreting the idea of evolution and natural selection and deciding that people who rise to the top in society are automatically the "superior" ones. The sort of theory Herbert Spencer used to explain why in London, the richest city of the world, you could find people starving to death on the street. The other type is one who decides that humanity (or all sapient beings if it's of the science fiction or fantasy genre) is no better than animals and therefore anyone with a birth defect or in any other way "weak" deserves to die to keep the gene pool strong. This often involves the attitude of not wanting to "get in the way" of evolution, despite the fact that any interaction with any species technically does that, and that evolution happens by itself when it's necessary for survival, and when it isn't happening, it's because it isn't needed. One has to wonder if either of these two types ever paid any attention in biology class.
Alternatively, it's just a racist using it as a weak justification (as the Real Life Nazis did).
Compare Evilutionary Biologist, Nietzsche Wannabe, Klingon Promotion.
Examples
Anime
- One Piece has Captain Morgan, who seems to think that the fact he struggled to earn his rank gives him the right to kill anyone who questions his orders or opposes his methods, and Arlong the fishman, who thinks the physically superior fishmen should rule over the weak and puny humans.
- Morgan turns out to be a subversion, though, because his reputation is almost wholly from his use as a patsy to confirm Captain Kuro's fake death.
- The philosophy of Rurouni Kenshin's Shishio Makoto is that "the flesh of the weak is the food of the strong" — and he drives his point home by literally taking a bite out of the hero. He is inevitably defeated, but afterwards, Kenshin observes that his victory has not truly proven anything — and that, if the one in the right is merely the strongest warrior, then Shishio was correct all along...
- Light Yagami in Death Note straddles the line between Darwinist and Nietzsche Wannabe, and he happens to be the protagonist. He believes that by using the Death Note to pick off criminals and the unpleasant, he can make the world fall into a more obedient, law-abiding line.
- Emperor Charles di Britannia in Code Geass has this philosophy — 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 - while Charles did nothing.
- The Jester a.k.a. Kaizan Doushi in the anime series Grenadier
- The recently-revealed main villain of Gash Bell, Clear Note, is one of these.
- The Leader of the PLANTS from Gundam SEED, Chairman Patrick Zala, actively believes that Coordinators, genetically modified humans, are an entirely different species from Natural-born humans. This leads him to actively pursue the death of every single Natural on the planet Earth.
- Vicious of Cowboy Bebop shows shades of this, particularly in his attitude towards those who lose their ruthless side. Notably, he assassinates his former mentor Mao for attempting to make peace with another Syndicate, (then dismissively describes Mao as "a beast who lost his fangs") denounces the Elders of the Red Dragon as "corpses that can't fight", and demands to know why Spike survived his exile if he's no longer as cold blooded and ruthless as Vicious.
- Tomonori Komori from Naru Taru is a sociopathic teenager who finds the modern world overly complicated, and so he intends to use his Mon to kill the educated and the sickly, effectively turning things back to the Stone Age, to create what he claims would be a healthy, pure society. Ironically, it's revealed some time after his death that he had a sickly mother he was taking care of, and that he wasn't the healthiest of boys himself. He must've been bitter.
Comic Book
- Magneto from X-Men displays some attributes of the Darwinist, calling mutants homo sapiens superior. Mr. Sinister, a eugenicist, and Apocalypse take this even farther—Apocalypse isn't even concerned for himself, assuming automatically he is the pinnacle of evolution and that all he's doing is encouraging conflict to weed out the weak in everybody else.
- In the film version, Magneto's Social/Pseudobiological Darwinist tendencies are turned up to 11. Darwinism— or rather, hatred of humans rationalized with Darwinism— is essentially his only motivation in the third film.
Film
- In the first Matrix movie Smith opines that humanity's sprawling overpopulation and overconsumption is most like a virus; therefore, AIs are the "cure" that not only can but should dominate the Earth. This scene could be either ironic or prophetic of what Smith does in the later two movies.
- Commander Rourke of Disney's Atlantis: The Lost Empire fits this to such an extent that he invokes Darwin by name:
Rourke: You've read Darwin, haven't you, boy? Survival of the fittest? I'm just... helping it along.
- And both of the above examples show that those named are Completely Missing The Point of evolution altogether.
Literature
- Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels contain quite a few of these characters.
- There's Lady Felmett from Wyrd Sisters, who repeatedly describes those not as ruthless and tyrannical as her as "weak".
- In Interesting Times, the Agatean Empire's entire ruling class is more or less like this.
- 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.
- The Fifth Elephant introduces Sergeant Angua's werewolf-supremacist brother Wolfgang, who leads a Nazi-esque gang of like-minded young werewolves up until his demise near the end of the book.
- Capitan Wolf Larson of The Sea Wolf.
- 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 mechanised). Everyone picks on "static" settlements, which form the Anti-Traction League and fight back with hordes of airships and suicide bombers.
- The Dark One from the Wheel Of Time, this clearly backfires due to the fact that his chief servants, the Foresaken bicker and fight with each other as much as Rand al'Thor.
- In the David Brin book The Postman the Holnists believed in right of the strong to rule over, enslave and rape the weak (The Movie turns them into simple racists misguidedly following a self-help book).
- Back in the days when there were more than two of them, the Sith were pretty Darwinist. Actually, the Rule of Two didn't really change things that much, as the Master could expect innumerable assassination attempts by the apprentice, for only by taking power could a Sith Lord prove himself a Master.
- In the KotOR days, the Mandalorians were likewise Darwinist.
Live Action TV
- Almost all Nietzscheans in Andromeda — even the non-villainous ones, who are generally "good guys" only in that they exist in a state of permanent Enemy Mine.
- The Shadows in Babylon 5 use a Darwinist attitude to rationalize starting interstellar wars among the "lesser races" every few centuries. The "lesser races" slowly realise this and in season 4 demonstrate The Power Of Friendship (or, at least, an unwillingness to end up like their "predecessors") by banding together, refusing to fight on their terms, and tell The Shadows (and their equal and opposite numbers, the Vorlons) to "Get the hell out of our galaxy!"
- Another Babylon 5 episode had Ivonova trying to negotiate with the Lumati, an alien Planet Of Hats species who strongly believe in Social Darwinism; when they discover Downbelow, the "slum" of the station, they approve the "segregation" of "unwanted" elements and agree to grant the desired treaty. Ivanova doesn't bother to correct their misinterpretation.
- Any number of psychos on Millennium fill the bill. The imprisoned Serial Killer in "The Thin White Line" is a prime example.
- Sylar of Heroes. Even he himself defines his actions in terms of evolution.
- The Doctor Who serial Survival turns the Master into an essentially Darwinist villain - all the other characters are exploited for his own survival. He manipulates The Dragon, Midge, by playing on Social Darwinist beliefs - a specific comment on Thatcherism in Eighties Britain.
- Pick an advanced race in Stargate SG 1. Any advanced race. Pretty much the omnipresent reasoning for keeping most of humanity at medieval level or below.
- In the "Dear Doctor" episode of Star Trek Enterprise, Captain Archer and Dr. Phlox decide it's worth letting an entire sapient race of billions die off because they believe it to be inferior to another race on the planet. Family Unfriendly Aesop and failing biology grades ahoy.
- The Q being from Star Trek The Next Generation accuses humanity of being a "grievously savage" 'child' race, and says they must be removed to make room for more "worthy" species.
- Khan from Star Trek is the epitome of a Darwinist. He is himself is the product of genetic engineering designed to create stronger, faster, more perfect humans, and feels it's his right to dominate the whole galaxy due to his genetically engineered awesomeness.
Tabletop Games
- The drow in Dungeons And Dragons are a Planet Of Hats of Always Chaotic Evil darwinists, due to a spectacularly poor choice in patron deity. The fact that they, in most campaign settings, live in underworld caves whose native fauna makes it a near-Death World makes this all the more egregious. It does, however, ensure that drow who survive are all th e more dangerous.
- The now dead god Iyachtu Xvim also used to be a 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 situation and didn't deserve help.
- The Clans of BattleTech have been bred for war for centuries using intensely competetive rituals to determine whose genes get passed on and whose don't.
- Yawgmoth, from Magic The Gathering.
- The RPG Sufficiently Advanced features a Darwinist faction that isn't averse to giving natural selection a helping hand.
- Catachan Jungle Fighters of Warhammer 40000 are the very epitome of this trope, or rather, the very epitome of Darwin's original beliefs: Living on a world where everything tries to kill them, only the fittest survive.
- The Eldar from Warhammer 40000 tend to look down on other, less advanced races and will happily cause the death of millions to ensure the survival of one Eldar life. The Dark Eldar take it even further, enslaving and torturing the lesser beings in order to prolong their existance.
Video Games
- The City Of Heroes' main bad guy, Lord Recluse, has founded his entire evil organization on 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. This does explain why the majority of your enemies in City of Villains are not, in fact, heroes.
- Villain characters also first arrive in the Rogue Islands at Fort Darwin.
- It should be noted that that while Recluse adheres to Survival of the Fittest, he doesn't let it consume his organisation. Anarchy and insubordination are stamped out pretty quickly if they interfere with his plans - 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?
- Ashnard from Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance combined this with being a Blood Knight.
- Luca Blight from Suikoden 2 is a particularly extreme and sadistic example.
- Gilgamesh in Fate Stay Night reveals himself as one in the Unlimited Blade Works storyline. He stated that humanity has gone too weak and thus not deserving his rule anymore (he's got a very big ego, you see). Thus, he wants to use the Holy Grail to kill those who are weak and see who is strong enough to survive, and submit to his rule.
- Chiaki, a rich-brat-turned-demon-queen of Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne leads a faction of Darwinists. The main character even has the option of joining them and creating a true 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.
- Andrew Ryan from Bioshock has been accused of being this, what with his Theme Park Version of Ayn Rand's Objectivism. He even builds an underwater utopia so that the weak do not keep the strong down. Of course, that didn't stop him from bringing down all manner of working poor to scrub the toilets for him.
- Mortimer Mc Mire, the hero's rival in Commander Keen games believes that he is the most intelligent being in the universe and that gives him the right to wipe out all the lesser beings.
- To be fair, he does have an IQ of 315.
Web Original
- The RP Survival Of The Fittest derives its name from this. Of course, in the games, only one student is allowed to survive, making the use of the term pretty much literal. Characters such as Danya, Steve Wilson, and V3 participant Adam Reeves exhibit Darwinist tendencies. Considering that the first two organised and put into execution the program though, that's pretty much a given.
Real Life
- The Internet is home to a disturbingly large number of Darwists. There was an online post about a woman naming her girl šLe-aš (Ledasha) that was followed by several comments suggesting she should be sterilized.
- Two words: The Darwin Awards.
- Technically the Darwin Awards are more accurate to Darwin's work in that they simply observe people who are Too Dumb To Live removing themselves from the genepool. As opposed to most examples of this trope who think that only the "strongest" survive.
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