Eugenics as the cure for welfare?

I really enjoyed our class discussion on Thursday in regards to Eugenics and welfare. It was thought provoking and something that didn't come to mind when I was reading. I can see how some people may think that it would help the situation because Eugenics aims to "weed out" the undesirable attributes and leave us with a society that reproduces people who have qualities that would benefit society.

With this being said, I do not think that this would solve the problem of some people in our society needing social assistance. Like we said in class, some traits are learned and not passed down genetically. I completely disagree with the essentialist view that all of our traits are based on our DNA. There are so many things that we learn and are socialized to do. Our environment really has a strong influence on us and help to shape who we become and who we are.

If people decide that they want (or do not want) to do something- or are taught certain behaviors- their genetics may not make a difference. If people are going to work hard or not is not necessarily determined by their biological makeup. I do not think that Eugenics would solve the "problems" that we see in our society today.

I also agree with what people were saying about our welfare system needing reform. I fully agree that we should value community and have a system in place to help those in need. However, because there are people that take advantage of the system, and some people who don't want to get off the system because it pays them more than a minimum wage job in some cases. This is a real shame and I think we really need to make more of an effort to support the people who need it by offering job training and other resources instead of just giving financial support. I also think it would help if there was a limited amount of time that people were allowed to collect benefits, and to have a stricter process of screening and checking in to make sure individuals were actually job hunting.

At the end of the day, however, I like the fact that I live in a society that will help me if I need it, and I although I would like to see it improve, I also think it could be a lot worse. Eugenics is more of a system of control that serves to reinforce norms and keep the status quo for the powerful group. I don't think it would have made a difference to make society "better." If anything it's scary to think about our society consisting of people that are all the same instead of a society that values individualism and has a variety of people.