Arguments Against Eugenics

Who decides who is perfect, normal, and genetically acceptable? The argument of for Eugenics is a widely debated topic that has been going on since as early as 4th Century B.C., when Plato suggested a state-run program to control mating in order to strengthen what Plato considered as the Guardian Class (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2014). Historically, Eugenics has been at the root of several movements to ensure a better human race, throughout a wide variety of cultures. How Eugenics is pursued is decided by the individual and his or her purpose for applying Eugenics. Eugenics has various applications that include anything from medical science to war. The question is whether or not mankind has ‘crossed the line’ with Eugenics allowing
only certain humans to create human life; therefore, playing God? The name Eugenics, derived from the Greek ‘eu-genes’, meaning ‘well-born, good, generation’. Eugenics is defined as “science that tries to improve the human race by controlling which people become parents” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary 2015). Furthermore, it defines Eugenics as “a science that deals with the improvement (as by control of human mating) of hereditary qualities of a race or breed” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary 2015). It should be no surprise that Eugenics seeks to engineer a better human race by purposefully selecting traits which characterize the ultimate human. Eugenics targets characteristics which would make a weaker, vulnerable human. However, this will cause unpredictability in the human gene pool and the effects it will have on future generations. Animal breeders have applied Disassortative Mating to successfully improve the breeds of livestock since the early 1700s, as well as horticulturists applying Eugenics to produce better varieties (Wikipedia, May 2015). Advocates for Eugenics proposed the concept for mankind.
Philosopher Plato's ideas may have been one of the earliest attempts to play God on a large scale by mathematically analyzing genetic inheritance by suggesting a plan to arrange marriages according to selected desirable traits in the individuals in order to produce offspring with particular traits. Francis Galton, as it relates to the modern concept of creating an improved human population, originally developed the term Eugenics in 1883. Galton, a half-cousin to Charles Darwin, was seeking to apply Darwin’s Theory of Evolution to the human race. Galton believed that it was possible to obtain desirable traits in humans. The concept gained popularity in Great Britain, France, Germany, and the United States in the early 1900s. In the 1920s and 1930s, the Eugenic policy of sterilizing certain mental patients became popular in Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Japan, and Sweden (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2014).
During the times leading up to Nazi Germany (1933-1945), and decades afterwards when people thought of the term ‘Eugenics’, it was automatically associated with Adolf Hitler (Chancellor of Nazi Germany). The world thought of Hitler as a mad man determined to create a ‘master race’. However, the idea of a white, blonde haired, blue-eyed master race was not actually Adolf Hitler’s. Instead, the idea was created in the United States at least two decades before Hitler came to power (Black, 2003). In fact, in 1924 when Hitler wrote Mein Kampf, he quoted American Eugenics and displayed thorough knowledge of the topic. “There is today one state”, Hitler wrote, “in which at least weak beginnings toward a better conception are noticeable. Of course, it is not our model German Republic but the United States’” (Hitler 1925). Hitler told his fellow Nazis he closely followed American Eugenic legislation. “I have studied with great interest the laws of several American states concerning prevention of reproduction by people whose progeny would, in all probability, be of no value or be injurious to the racial stock” (Hitler 1925). Quite possibly an example of mankind stepping in for God? Eugenics claims that is it possible to distinguish between superior and inferior elements of society, to create a human population free of physical, mental, or moral defects (Wikipedia, 2015).
With the desire to create this flawless human population, Eugenics gained proponents whom the world deemed as some of the greatest and most admires thinkers in western civilization. Some of the well-known supporters were US President Teddy Roosevelt, John Maynard Keynes, US President Woodrow Wilson, Alexander Graham Bell, George Bernard Shaw, H.G. Wells, Margaret Sanger (founder of Planned Parenthood), Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, and foundations connected to the Rockefellers, Harrimans, and Carnegies (Intellectural TakeOut, 2015; Wikipedia, 2015). Considered as the worst human monsters to ever walk the earth, Adolf Hilter and his Third Reich, which showed no remorse or mercy but just a purging of what they considered undesirable, were probably the greatest recognized advocates for Eugenics (Currell, Susan, 2006). How can the purging of certain undesirable traits be humane, when in reality, it’s the purging of human life
itself?
Eugenics has had multiple conceptually different explanations throughout American history trying to support Eugenic practices.
The term has been referred to as prenatal care for mothers or forced sterilization or euthanasia. The term was used in concept of avoiding inbreeding. Eugenics has been called a Pseudoscience because it refers to genetic improvement of a desired trait through cultural choice. The most controversial aspect of Eugenics is the concept that Eugenics is the improvement of the human gene pool resulting in scientific racism (de Araujo, Emily, and Lucia Sommer, 2015). In 1904, Steel magnate Andrew Carnegie established a center to study the effects of racial mixtures. In 1906, the American Breeders Association formed a committee on Eu-Genetics. Their emphasis was on the value of ‘superior blood’. Multiple wealthy American families established foundations and societies to better the human race. In 1919, the first birth control movement through what became known as ‘Planned Parenthood’ began to promote “more children from the fit and less from the unfit” (de Araujo-Sommer
2015). Economic and social unrest were growing as more and more immigrants were arriving in America from the late 1800s to the early 1900s. Eugenic research was showing mental and physical conditions of many institutional people were inherited. 30 US states adopted Eugenic Sterilization Laws, which resulted in over 60,000 Americans being sterilized. What human has the right to say whether or not another human can bear offspring? The Eugenic research also led to the Immigration Act of 1924 which limited the number of southern and eastern Europeans who could enter the US and almost completely barred all immigrants from Asia (de Araujo-Sommer 2015).
By the 1930s, Eugenics was scientifically discredited in the United States. However, the Eugenics movement in Germany was just starting to gain in popularity. In 1933, the Nazi Germany government ordered the involuntary sterilization of over 400,000 Germans with such ‘defects’ as mental illness, epilepsy, and physical deformities. By the late 1930s, Hitler’s Eugenic program of ‘Race Hygiene’ resulted into a program which euthanasia killed children and adults with “so called” mental and physical disorders. It climaxed with the deaths of millions of Jews during the Holocaust. Where is the proof that this act in the name of Eugenics created a better human population? These lives, along with countless others in history, were loss in vain due to humans believing they have the right to play God.