The Role Of Eugenics In America

Eugenics in America Every country, at some point or another, has undergone a dramatic, cynical stage. This may come as a surprise, but the United States of America is no different. A country that prides itself on equality, liberty, and freedom for all used to be a dark, morbid place. The country you know and love today has not always had these morals! This period of time is one that is usually left buried under the generic history facts. This is a period that you never learn about in history books. It falls under the title of “Eugenics”. At the time, Eugenics seemed like a very reasonable, intelligent thing to support. Looking back upon it today, we can see that it was flawed, unreasonable, and completely corrupt. What exactly
At this point in time, which was the early decades of the 1900’s, war made life chaotic. The acceptance of Eugenics promoted a more peaceful, proper future (which we today can obviously see as being severely incorrect!). Scientifically, Eugenics was also receiving praise. It was viewed as being a way to improve humanity. There was a fear that the intelligent people would have fewer kids, and the “less than adequate” would in turn have more kids. It was believed that this would have a negative impact on natural selection, and be harmful to society. To promote such an idea, there were two main “methods”- positive eugenics and negative eugenics. The former involves trying to promote the healthy/regular people to have children. The negative eugenics system involved using medical and sterilization (which I will discuss more later on) processes to prevent the others from having kids. Awkwardly enough, to be deemed “unfit” and to undergo negative eugenics was not a punishment. After all, people viewed the problem as being a defective
What you just read is not fiction, though! This is truly what used to happen in America. For a time, liberty and equality were overshadowed by the twisted need for a more perfect society. Now a section of America’s horrible history has been brought to light. This paper has revealed the key concepts behind Eugenics, and how population control was being used to try and make a better society. We have seen how Eugenicists have studied these “incapable people”. Might I add that, in contrast to today, it is crystal clear as to how wrong they were, and how wretched their actions were! Finally, this paper went in-depth into sterilization laws, marriage laws, and immigration restrictions- three of the largest ramifications of the Eugenics Movement on society. It is impossible to change what has happened in the past. This is a shadow that will follow the United States for eternity. The good news is that this horrible time period has passed, and America possess prized attributes we currently value! We are extremely fortunate that today we don’t have Eugenics in