The Eugenics Movement

• Part 1- Discuss book’s main arguments, supporting evidence and conclusions; Measuring Manhood, by Melissa N. Stein focuses on the influence by scientists in institutionalizing race as being a biological entity, using gender and sex differences to bolster these claims within the early periods of the United States from 1830 to 1934. Within the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, these physical differences as argued by scientists were used to create a hierarchy of beings in the United States. Through one’s physical body their social body was constructed as being directly dependent on their physical characteristics. Moreover, she is concerned with how these “facts” were internalized by the citizens and how this led to differences in treatment.

Race, simple external differences linked to other complex internal differences, has historically created issues in American society. “Race and racial inequalities are one of the most vital issues confronting contemporary U.S. society,” explains Sociologist Ronald Takaki. In the past race has had both biological and social implications across the country.

I support the guidelines outlined by Kitcher for the use of genetic information because of their responsible and ethical nature. I believe that future generations will benefit as a direct consequence of these guidelines. I shall begin by defining eugenics as the study of human genetics to improve inherited characteristics of the human race by the means of controlled selective breeding.

The eugenics movement was a very influential movement in America that was very prevalent during the early 1900’s. The premise of the eugenics movement was that society could be scientifically improved by classifying ranking members of society and trying to prevent those who were ranked low from reproducing. The eugenics movement was born out of the desire for the upper and middle classes of society to try and prove, scientifically, that they were superior to those who were in the lower classes. The people who typically made up the lower classes were usually immigrants and those who were of a different race. Eugenics was essentially the method that was used to try and exert control over the lower classes while validating the idea that those in the upper and middle classes were superior.

There are many events that happened in the 20th Century that overlap each other and some are results of previous events. Two specific events that were interesting and were as a result of one another, were the Eugenics movement in the early 20th century and the Disability Rights Movement in the 1960s.

Eugenics is the scientific belief that through “selective breeding… and [the] restriction of reproduction by birth control or surgical procedures” (Thomson), a ‘better’ and more productive society could develop. Similar to the ideas of Social Darwinists, Eugenicists used medical intervention to weed out the unfit members of society(anyone who was not white), and continued to grow the population of the ‘fit members. People believed that ‘unfit’ members of society had genes that would bring society down as a whole, and “race mixing, or crossbreeding, would deplete the national fitness of Anglo-Saxon Americans” (Thomson). Eugenics during the progressive Era: Although most progressive thinkers were against the Social Darwinist theory, there

Starting in the late 19th century, American philosophers, theorists, and scientists began experimenting and theorizing the idea of eugenics. Derived from Darwinian theories and the extensive works of Gregor Mendel, eugenics is known as a set of practices aimed at enhancing the human genome into sameness. Edwin Black’s “War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race” looks at the horrific background of eugenics, the ones who supported it, and the twisted ends it came to. This source, along with the two others, brings light to the awful means pursued to obtain a brilliant, but illogical and immoral goal of sameness. Overall, a negative vibe is shown through these sources.

During the 1920s, several movements were on the rise, creating changes both politically and socially. One such movement was the Eugenics Movement. Eugenics was described by the head of the movement, Charles B. Davenport as “the improvement of the human race by better breeding.” The ideas of eugenics were based on how the inheritance of traits determined one’s appearance and behaviours and along with the idea of certain races being more superior to others. Eugenicists, those who believed in eugenics, sought to use science to solve problems in society such as alcoholism, crime and mental illnesses such as manic depression or retardation which they called “feeble mindedness.”

Race matters! Race has been probably the most dominating factor beneath the eugenics movement and the pseudo scientific experiments the Europeans physicians and scientists conducted on people of African origin and other races since the 18th century. The foundation for these studies can be associated with ancient Greece, the roots of today’s western values of knowledge, civilized, and democracy which are considered to be the basis for human development. Similarly to today’s Europeans, Ancient Europeans mustered enormous armies and naval forces that conquered and destroyed more advanced civilizations in the Near East, Asia Minor and Africa during which they destroyed records and stole ideas from the conquered people. Hence, the Europeans rewrote the history books to advance their concept of race superiority, which have been essential in the Atlantic world for the last five hundred years.

Eugenics is the social construction of the human race by controlling reproduction. “Reducing the number of unfit people the term refers to the effort to improve a human population by either encouraging the reproduction of desired traits or preventing the reproduction of undesirable one” (Bethel University). The eugenics movement in America support laws that enforce racial segregation at the level of marriage, family planning, sterilization of the poor, disabled and education about human reproduction. They are in favor of reproduction among those thought to be the most genetically fit with characteristics such as hardworking, intelligent and physically fit. On the other had the movement discourage reproduction of the unfit considered to have

We have all heard of concentration camps, but we think about the Germans and the Jew. We usually never think of the Native Americans as being part of any type of concentration camps. But unfortunately they were. Back when the Germans started construction on their own camps in 1933 they based some ideas of them on some of the United States Civil War camps, the ending resolution was based on American Eugenics programs that were already working in the United States. You can obviously see there have been camps in the country for nearly 170 years. Even back before the Civil War we did the same exact thing to Native American Indians. One of the first "Happy Camps" was called Oklahoma.

Hansen and king go over several reason why eugenics became popular in the United States but not in the United Kingdom. Supporter of eugenics in England were mostly focused on people with mental illness and mental disorders. Though there were many supporters of eugenics, the idea did not catch on. One of the reasons being the European connection with the Nazis and their system of eugenics on people with mental illness in addition to people of other races and religions.

• Eugenics movement- A theory that came about to improve hereditary complications in the human race by selectively breeding. Example: An example of eugenics movement would be when the Nazi Army provided much of the inspiration for the latter.

The idea of eugenics was first introduced by Sir Francis Galton, who believed that the breeding of two wealthy and successful members of society would produce a child superior to that of two members of the lower class. This assumption was based on the idea that genes for success or particular excellence were present in our DNA, which is passed from parent to child. Despite the blatant lack of research, two men, Georges Vacher de Lapouge and Jon Alfred Mjoen, played to the white supremacists' desires and claimed that white genes were inherently superior to other races, and with this base formed the first eugenics society. The American Eugenics Movement attempted to unethically obliterate the rising tide of lower classes by immorally

This article argues that race is not only a social construction, but that genetics also play an increasingly pertinent role. The author supports this claim by analyzing the genetic tracings of many medical institutes whose purpose is to discover one’s ancestry. The author claims these genetic links are increasingly important because many grants, applications, scholarships, and the like are determined by one’s racial status. The author also claims that genetic racial differences are important because the white male has been used as the standard in medical practices and the author feels that needs to change.