 | |
Type of site | Humor |
|---|---|
| Owner | Wendy Northcutt |
| URL | darwinawards |
| Commercial | Yes |
| Launched | 1993; 32 years ago (1993) |
TheDarwin Awards are a rhetoricaltongue-in-cheek honor that originated inUsenet newsgroup discussions around 1985. They recognize individuals who have supposedlycontributed to human evolution byselecting themselves out of thegene pool by dying or becomingsterilized by their own actions.
The project became more formalized with the creation of a website in 1993, followed by a series of books starting in 2000 by Wendy Northcutt. The criterion for the awards states: "In the spirit ofCharles Darwin, the Darwin Awards commemorate individuals who protect our gene pool by making the ultimate sacrifice of their own lives. Darwin Award winners eliminate themselves in an extraordinarily idiotic manner, thereby improving our species' chances of long-term survival."[1]
Accidental self-sterilization also qualifies, but the site notes: "Of necessity, the award is usually bestowed posthumously." The candidate is disqualified, though, if "innocent bystanders" are killed in the process, as they might have contributed positively to the gene pool. The logical problem presented by award winners who may have had children is not addressed in the selection process owing to the difficulty of ascertaining a candidate's parental status; the Darwin Award rules state that the presence of offspring does not disqualify a nominee.[2]
The origin of the Darwin Awards can be traced back to posts onUsenet group discussions as early as 1985. A post on August 7, 1985, describes the awards as being "given posthumously to people who have made the supreme sacrifice to keep their genes out of our pool. Style counts, not everyone who dies from their own stupidity can win."[3] This early post cites an example of a person who tried to break into avending machine and was crushed to death when he pulled it over on himself.[3] Another widely distributed early story mentioning the Darwin Awards is theJATO Rocket Car, which describes a man who strapped ajet-assisted take-off unit to hisChevrolet Impala in theArizona desert and who died on the side of a cliff as his car achieved speeds of 250 to 300 miles per hour (400 to 480 km/h); this story was later determined to be an urban legend by theArizona Department of Public Safety.[4] Wendy Northcutt says the official Darwin Awards website run by Northcutt does its best to confirm all stories submitted, listing them as, "confirmed true by Darwin". Many of theviral emails circulating the Internet, however, are hoaxes and urban legends.[5][6][7][8]
The website and collection of books were started in 1993 by Wendy Northcutt, who at the time was a graduate inmolecular biology from theUniversity of California, Berkeley.[9] She went on to studyneurobiology atStanford University, doing research on cancer andtelomerase. In her spare time, she organizedchain letters from family members into the original Darwin Awards website hosted in her personal account space at Stanford. She eventually gave up practical research in 1998, and devoted herself full-time to her website and books in September 1999.[10] By 2002, the website received 7 million page hits per month.[11]
Northcutt encountered some difficulty in publishing the first book, since most publishers would only offer her a deal if she agreed to remove the stories from the Internet, but she refused: "It was a community! I could not do that. Even though it might have cost me a lot of money, I kept saying no." She eventually found a publisher who agreed to print a book containing only 10% of the material gathered for the website. The first book turned out to be a success, and was listed onThe New York Times' best-seller list for 6 months.[12]
Not all of the feedback from the stories Northcutt published was positive, and she occasionally received emails from people who knew the deceased. One such person advised: "This is horrible. It has shocked our community to the core. You should remove this." Northcutt demurred: "I can't. It's just too stupid." Northcutt kept the stories on the website and in her books, citing them as a "funny-but-true safety guide", and mentioning that children who read the book are going to be much more careful around explosives.[13]
The website also awards Honorable Mentions to individuals who survive their misadventures with their reproductive capacity intact. One example of this isLarry Walters, who attachedhelium-filledweather balloons to a lawn chair and floated far aboveLong Beach, California, in July 1982. He reached an altitude of 16,000 feet (4,900 m), but survived, to be later fined for crossingcontrolled airspace.[14] (Walters later fell into depression and died by suicide, the same year Northcutt began the website.) Another notable honorable mention was given to the two men who attempted to burgle the home of footballerDuncan Ferguson (who had an infamous reputation for physical aggression on and off the pitch, including four convictions for assault and who had served six months in Glasgow'sBarlinnie Prison) in 2001, with one burglar requiring three days' hospitalisation after being confronted by the player.[15]
A 2014 study published in theBritish Medical Journal found that between 1995 and 2014, males represented 88.7% of Darwin Award winners (see figure).[16]
The comedy filmThe Darwin Awards (2006), written and directed byFinn Taylor, was based on the website and many of the Darwin Awards stories.[17]
Northcutt has stated five requirements for a Darwin Award:[1][9] Two of them are that the event must be verified to have happened, and that the nominee themselves were responsible for the activity. The others are:
This may be subject to dispute. Potential awardees may be out of the gene pool because of age; others have already reproduced before their deaths. To avoid debates about the possibility ofin vitro fertilization,artificial insemination, orcloning, the original Darwin Awards book applied the following "deserted island" test to potential winners: If the person were unable to reproduce when stranded on a deserted island with a fertile member of the opposite sex, he or she would be considered sterile.[18] Winners of the award, in general, either are dead or have become unable to use theirsexual organs.
The candidate's foolishness must be unique and sensational, likely because the award is intended to be funny. A number of foolish but common activities, such as smoking in bed or refusingmeasles vaccination, are excluded from consideration. In contrast,self-immolation caused by smoking after being administered a flammable ointment in a hospital and specifically told not to smoke is grounds for nomination.[19] One "Honorable Mention" (a man who attempted suicide by swallowingnitroglycerin pills, and then tried to detonate them by running into a wall) is noted to be in this category, despite being intentional and self-inflicted (i.e. attempted suicide), which would normally disqualify the inductee.[20]
In 2011, the awards targeted a 16-year-old boy in Leeds who died stealing copper wiring.[21] In 2012, Northcutt made similar light of a 14-year-old girl in Brazil who was killed while leaning out of a school bus window, but she was "disqualified" for the award itself because of the likely public objection owing to the girl's age, which Northcutt asserts is based on "magical thinking".[22]
Under this rule, and for reasons of good taste, individuals whose misfortune was caused by mental impairment or disability are not eligible for a Darwin Award, primarily to avoid mocking or making light of the disabled, and to ensure that the awards do not celebrate or trivialize tragedies involving vulnerable individuals. The same rule also disqualifies children under the age of 16 from winning the award.[23]
The Darwin Awards have received varying levels of scrutiny from the scientific community. In his bookEncyclopedia of Evolution, biology professor Stanley A. Rice comments: "Despite the tremendous value of these stories as entertainment, it is unlikely that they represent evolution in action", citing the nonexistence of "judgment impairment genes".[24] On an essay in the bookThe Evolution of Evil, professor Nathan Hallanger acknowledges that the Darwin Awards are meant asblack humor, but associates them with theeugenics movement of the early 20th century.[25]University of Oxfordbiophysicist Sylvia McLain, writing forThe Guardian, says that while the Darwin Awards are "clearly meant to be funny", they do not accurately represent how genetics work, further noting "...that 'smart' people do stupid things all the time."[26]Geologist andscience communicatorSharon A. Hill has criticized the Darwin Awards on both scientific and ethical grounds, claiming that many factors in addition to genetics impact personal intelligence and judgement. She then says the awards exemplify "ignorance" and "heartlessness".[27]
