My Response to America's Eugenics movement

So as many of you know, I am in New York City, studying at CUNY (City University of New York) in their Graduate Disability Studies Program. One of the courses I am taking is Psychosocial, Cultural and Political Aspects of Disability. This past week, we read a lot about the Eugenics movement in America and how that influenced the Holocaust. I made the mistake of reading all the readings in one day and quickly discovered that if one wanted to, they could fall in love with Vodka this way. I didn’t but it just goes to show that someone could. Below is my response to a few questions asked by the teacher:

Question 3: How did the Eugenic movement in America set the precedent and serve as the foundation for the Nazi Holocaust?

The opening sentence of chapter 13 of The War Against the Weak by Edwin Black, begins: “Murder was always an option” (Black, 2013) This was certainly the case in the Eugenics movement. From lethal chambers, institutions (such as the one in Lincoln, Illinois) that exposed inmates to fatal illnesses, doctors withholding lifesaving treatment for “defective” babies, to movie propaganda like The Black Stork, the collective mood was uprooting and purging the “defectives,” be they child or adult. An example of this is seen in a 1917 advertisement for The Black Stork: "Kill Defectives, Save the Nation and See 'The Black Stork."'49 (Black, 2013). No one who was disabled was safe in America. Hitler would study these underpinnings while he was in jail, pouring over textbooks that would quote Eugenic hero, Charles Davenport among others like Madison Grant, who wrote The Passing of the Great Race. The Eugenics movement in America was the prologue to the Holocaust, the greatest tragedy in human history.

 

Question 4:  Share your own personal feelings about the readings on Eugenics in America and the Holocaust.

It is beyond heartbreaking to learn through very detailed readings that America’s hands were already stained in the blood of innocents, whose only crime was being misunderstood and unwanted by society. The Eugenics movement began with the intent of the betterment of the human race but took a hideous turn when it was used to control and to destroy those deemed “unworthy of life.” This included the poor and those considered “degenerate.” The movement proved that no one who was different was safe and the actions in America would propel a German to take these ideas to the most extreme. Anyone who was not perfect by strict standards set forth would be killed without mercy. That could most likely include those who had minor disabilities like me, a person with a speech impediment; because anyone who could not breathe correctly and had trouble speaking from time to time was obviously not sane and therefore must be put to death for the betterment of the state!   It makes me feel ashamed to see how low humans can sink, even in this country, the land of the free.

A few classmates of mine encouraged me to get angry and not ashamed. I don’t find it hard to do both