Europa Europa:
This clip shows how the Nazi’s used ‘science’ through measurements and facial structure to push the authority of the ‘Aryan race’ as superior to the Jewish ethnicity. Through the use of this pseudo science and the perpetuation of the claims that Aryan/Nordic people are the most-talented and beautiful was a way of getting the population on their side. This ideological structuring of the races, combined with the use of scientific looking tools seemed to give a biological rationalization for some of the Nazi claims. It also demonstrates how these are false claims when Soloman/Josef Peters is pronounced to be of Aryan ancestry despite the fact that he is Jewish. This shows how Eugenics was used to garner support from the citizens of Germany to the expulsion and eventual mass-murder of millions of Jews. This is much the same way that we see America and Germany supporting the sterilization and euthanasia of African American and Afro-German children and adults.
Information on Graduate Mothers Scheme: http://furrybrowndog.wordpress.com/2011/07/15/dr-tony-tan-was-no-independent-minded-person-on-the-graduate-mothers-scheme
Other Population Control Methods:
The graduate mothers scheme, as well as the other population control measures that Singapore used, tie in with both the “Branded with Infamy” article and the chapter “The Black Stork”. The Graduate Mothers Scheme shows the worries of the Singapore government to be the same as those expressed by supporters of Eugenics in America decades earlier. The ‘undesirable’ portion of the population had the highest birth rate, while educated people were discovered to be having less children. From this came what they thought would be good incentives for educated women to want to have children, in the form of admittance of their offspring into the school systems. Other programs included matchmaking services for educated singles and incentives for lower classes to undergo sterilization.
Questions:
1) Do we still hold certain Eugenic beliefs today in regards to birth control?
2) Are the policies that Singapore put into place any less “morally repugnant” than those methods used in America and Nazi Germany? (195)
3) What does the use of Eugenics and how easily it was accepted tell us about the way that authority is imposed upon society?
4) Did it surprise you to discover that Planned Parenthood was started by a supporter of Eugenics?
I feel in regards to your first question that in today's society as in involves American society Eugenics in a very small way is still considered a form of birth control. Whether it is an tube tying for women or a vasectomy for men. However this action is voluntary for the people involved. As it concerns the rest of the world, population control can sometimes still get out of hand even in today's world. So such things as eugenics can occur without warning anywhere in the world.
ReplyDeleteA issue that has bothered me in the past came back to haunt me again while listening to the class discuss eugenics. That issue is the situation of those born medically unviable or disadvantaged and who are kept or made viable through government and private insurance money and efforts. While it is admirable we try to give them as normal a life as possible, it seems to me (exposing latent social darwinist beliefs in myself I guess) that natural selection is being denied it's course. In times past these individuals would have perished because they were flawed and not as viable as their more fortunate peers. Instead they are allowed to live their lives, albeit at the expense of other taxpayers and insurance payers. It could be argued that this unnatural and a drag on the rest of society. I'm not quite ready to advocate this belief, because who wants to deny life to someone who we are able to give it to? On the other hand, it just seems unnatural and ultimately wasteful to support these people. I'm not quite sure what to think, so I though I'd at least bring it up.
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