Page 20 - The Social Weapon: Darwinism

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had been regarded as cruel, suddenly began to be defended
with the falsehood that they were “scientific practices based on

facts of nature.” What was it that suddenly justified all these
forms of ruthlessness?
Charles Darwin's theory of evolution was put forward in
his book The Origin of Species. Published in 1859, it contained a
number of conjectures about the origin of life that led to a most
deceptive world view, devoid of any scientific evidence, and a
perverted philosophy that denies the existence of God and re-
gards “chance” as a creative force (surely God is beyond that).
Views that man was a kind of animal, and life was a sphere of
struggle and fierce competition were accepted as scientific truth.
Darwin did not develop this theory, which was advanced
as a result of the 19th century's primitive understanding of sci-
ence, on his own. Some 50 years earlier, in 1798, Thomas
Malthus proposed a number of ideas that had nothing to do
with reality, in his book Essay on the Principle of Population. This
study—which has now been proven to have no scientific value
at all—claimed that population increased far more quickly than
food resources, and that therefore, population increase needed

to be controlled. Malthus suggested that wars and epidemics
acted as “natural” checks on population, and were thus benefi-
cial. He was the first to refer to the “struggle for survival.”
According to his thesis, far removed from humane values, the
poor must not be protected but allowed to live under the worst
possible conditions and prevented from multiplying, and suffi-
cient food resources must be reserved for the upper classes. (For
details, see Chapter 2, “The History of Ruthlessness, from
Malthus to Darwin.”) This cruel savagery would certainly be
opposed by anyone with a conscience and common sense.
Although religious moral values require extending a helping
hand to the poor and needy, Malthus—and his follower

The Social Weapon: Darwinism