Eugenics And Its Impact On Human Life

Forced sterilization and Eugenics are terms you would associate with Hitler's heinous World War II crimes. Those terms were not isolated to war time Europe. From 1929 until 1977 Eugenics was a terrible part of North Carolina History that used selective breeding to extinguish lower class mentality and guarantee future generations. The State is trying to make amends to the victims of the past. For almost 50 years over 7,600 victims were evaluated harshly and then coerced or sterilized against their will. Eugenics scientists have used this method to target what they consider as the “undesirables,” mainly unwed, black females, and also the mentally disabled in North Carolina. This was done under the pretense to make future American generations stronger and smarter. Eugenics still negatively affects the people of North Carolina today.

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 began in the 20th century by a man named Francis Galton. As the cousin of Charles Darwin, Galton believed that eugenics was a moral philosophy to improve humanity by encouraging the ablest and healthiest people to have more children (Carlson). This Galtonian ideal of eugenics is often thought of as positive eugenics. Eugenics can be defined as the outgrowth of human heredity aimed at "improving" the quality of the human stock (Allen and Bird). At the other end of the spectrum is what can be classified as negative eugenics and is presently in disrepute. Negative eugenics entails selective breeding in which the least able from the population is taken out of the reproduction pool to preserve humanity's best traits.

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 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

In late nineteenth century on into the early twentieth century America was going through a change. A change may in society thought was for the best. Slavery was ending, and the upper class was worried about the estimated four million African Americans and immigrants introducing themselves in the economy with little or no education. These people were worried the overload in population would negatively affect the economy they have worked so hard to create. It was felt something had to be done to prevent the impregnation of “bad genes” into the American community. Eugenics seemed to offer that solution. Eugenics still implements their version of “population control” and/or “family-planning” in our society today and we don’t even know it. We play along and support without even knowing why we’re playing along or what we are supporting. To help open the eyes of the majority, we need to go back in time and show how the “Eugenics Movement” started. How the country we love so much, did not love us back and how the support of this movement is stronger today than when it started.

The Eugenics era was said to have ended in 1981 with the last case of forced sterilization. The ideology of eugenics is viewed as pseudoscience now and as a inhumane event in American history. However, there are many individuals who still hold the same sentiment. This is evident in laws and different organizations in America. African Americans make up 13% of the population, however they make up 40% of inmates. This is due to racial bias leading to mass incarceration of minorities, specifically Black men. America implements racial bias laws and acts, such as the War on Drugs and alters the message to show it in positive light. The Dream Act proposed in America was not passed, however there is DACA for illegal immigrants. In this year Trump

One reason our government should not limit how many children one has is because it can lead to abuse to citizens.

At the beginning of the 20th century, power and prestige was held by the majority of (if not only) White people. African Americans were living under Jim Crow laws, Native Americans were forced into reservations and all of the new immigrants were in crowded ghettos. Those that were a race other than White were at “the bottom of the social and political hierarchy.” One of the aims of the Eugenics Movement was racial purification. Using the concept of Mendelian genes, scientists would try to breed the best, smartest, most talented, most beautiful and always white individuals and breed out the worst and weakest colored individuals. Mixed race people were seen as not put together because it was a combination of the best and worst traits someone could have.” Frederick Hoffman, presented data, statistics and a theory that claimed African Americans would become extinct because of high death and disease rates that were caused by African Americans being biologically lesser than Whites. However, his analysis was flawed because it failed to mention how systematic poverty and social neglect could be affecting the health of African Americans.

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

There is much bias and confusion surrounding the topic of eugenics. Many times the reason for this is the lack of understanding of what the term means, where it states “In 1883, Sir Francis Galton, a respected British scholar, and cousin of Charles Darwin, first used the term eugenics, meaning ‘well-born.’ (Genetics Generation, 2015).” This term has evolved to encompass more than just “well-born” as can be seen in the encyclopedia. “The eleventh edition of The Encyclopedia Britannica defines eugenics as ‘the organic betterment of the race through wise application of the laws of heredity.’ (Court, 2004).” The meaning of the word eugenics, due to the way it has been used, confuses many people.

Ethical barriers prohibiting the practice of eugenics today include principles provided for in the American College Healthcare Executive code of Ethics (Board of Governors, 2016). The principles outlined in the code help protect the patients’ interests through guiding

Eugenics, the word that got its bad reputation years ago through an event that changed history: the Holocaust. First dubbed by Francis Galton in the 1880’s, the word Eugenics stemmed from the words “good” and “generation.” (Eugenics-Meanings) Eugenics means the study of or belief in the possibility of improving the qualities of the human species or a human population. This improvement is done through discouraging reproduction by persons having genetic defects or presumed to have inheritable undesirable traits (negative eugenics); or encouraging reproduction by persons presumed to have inheritable desirable traits (positive eugenics). (Contemporary)There have always been heated discussions over right or wrong, moral or immoral concerning

The roots of eugenics can be traced back to Britain in the early 1880’s when Sir Francis Galton generated the term from the Greek word for “well-born”. He defined eugenics as the science of improving stock, whether human or animal. According to the American Eugenics Movement, today’s study of eugenics has many similarities to studies done in the early 20th century. Back then, “Eugenics was, quite literally, an effort to breed better human beings – by encouraging the reproduction of people with "good" genes and discouraging those with "bad" genes.” (www.eugenicsarchive.org) According to Merriam-Webster, the modern day definition of eugenics is, a science that deals with the improvement (as by control of human mating) of