Competitiveness considered harmful?

Over Thanksgiving, I was complaining about people who crowd forward when boarding a plane, even if their row hasn’t been called, so that when it is called, they get on first. And if they can get away with boarding before their row is called, they’ll do that too. Someone close to me retorted, “competition made the human race what it is today.” I haven’t stopped thinking about that remark ever since. Can this person be right? I dearly, dearly hope not. Because all I can think of in reply is, “yes, it did make us what we are – especially the World Wars and the Holocaust.”