Page 150 - The Disasters Darwinism Brought To Humanity

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portunities or support for the weak in any field, from health to the eco-
nomy, the foremost theoreticians of Social Darwinism prepared a "philo-
sophical" and "scientific" support for capitalism. For example, according
to Tille, a foremost representative of the Darwinist-capitalist mentality, it
was a great error to try to prevent poverty by helping the "defeated clas-
ses," because that meant interfering with natural selection which
brought about evolution. 119
In the view of Herbert Spencer, the main theorist of So-
cial Darwinism, who introduced the principles of Darwi-
nism to the life of society, if someone is poor then that is
his mistake; nobody must help this person to rise. If some-
one is rich, even if he has acquired his wealth by immoral
means, that is his competence. For this reason, the rich man
survives, while the poor man disappears. This is the view
which has come to prevail almost completely in today's societi-
es and is a summary of Darwinist-capitalist morality. Herbert Spencer
Spencer, who defended this morality, finished his work Social Statis-
tics in 1850, and opposed all systems of help offered by the state, precauti-
ons for the protection of health, state schools, and compulsory inoculati-
on. Because according to Social Darwinism, social order arose from the
principle of the survival of the strong. Supporting the weak and allowing
them to survive was a breach of this principle. The rich are rich because
they are better fitted; some nations rule others, because they are superior
to them, some races fall under the yoke of others, because these others are
more intelligent than them. Spencer applied the doctrine to human soci-
eties with a vengeance: "If they are sufficiently complete to live, they do li-
ve, and it is well they should live. If they are not sufficiently complete to
live, they die, and it is best they should die." 120
Graham Sumner, Professor of Political and Social Sciences at Yale
University, was Social Darwinism's spokesman in America. In one of his
writings he summed up his thoughts on human societies in these words:
…if we lift any man up we must have a fulcrum, a point of reaction. In soci-
ety that means that to lift one man up we push another down. 121