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Social Darwinism Is A Controversial Essay

If studied carefully, this theory also hints at man's willingness and ability to survive. Those who lack this ability will naturally face extinction, while those who can fight can work things in their favor and hence improve their lot. If not used harshly, social Darwinism can help us understand man's need and ability to survive. Social Darwinism is most commonly defined as a theory concerning "eugenic population control" and offers "complete commitment to an exclusive genetic and hereditary explanation of man's evolution." (Offer, p. 142) in other words, social Darwinism says that man will survive if he has the ability or else he will meet some natural phenomenon too forceful for him and wither away. People have used this theory to explain natural disasters in poorest of countries, and in poorest of areas in some rich countries. It may actually be interesting to note that in recent past, some of the worst earthquakes and floods attacked poorest nation and areas....

Katrina wiped off a large part of New Orleans which we all know was an underprivileged area. Similarly thousands of people died in Pakistan's 2005 earthquake. Pakistan again is not a strong nation and the region where the earthquake occurred was the poorest of the poor.
But this is one side of the picture. If we apply a tunnel vision approach to the study of social Darwinism, it would make sense. But we need to see beyond the new examples of natural population control to fully understand the weaknesses of this theory. Los Angeles is the richest of the rich but still encounters earthquakes repeatedly. Germany and Japan were strong nations and still faced wars that killed millions. There is no way we can prove that God subscribes to the theory of social Darwinism. But we can definitely say that the theory holds merit when applied to competitiveness which allows societies to evolve.

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John Offer, Herbert Spencer. Routledge (2002)

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John Offer, Herbert Spencer. Routledge (2002)
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