How much did the Nazis Owe to the Worldwide Eugenics Movements - Essay Example

How much did the Nazis owe to the worldwide eugenics movements? The main aim of this paper isto answer the question “How much did the Nazis owe to the worldwide eugenics movements?” During our study we found a lot of information concerning the topic under the study and used the following books: Death and Deliverance: Euthanasia in Germany 1900-45. by M. Burleigh, Modernity and Nationalism in Social Histories of Disability and Deformity edited by David Turner and Kevin Stagg and Race, Science and Eugenics in the Twentieth Century by Marius Turda. Also we used here the information from the online resource Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. As the aim of this work we have chosen to uncover all the peculiarities of the Nazism phenomenon in its connection to the worldwide eugenic movements in historical progress. It is believed that eugenics, as the science of racial hygiene, arose in the Third Reich, and that only in Nazi Germany eugenic researches were held. But this is a completely erroneous view. In the twentieth century two countries were the leaders in eugenic research - the United States and Soviet Union. Germany is connected by no means with the flowering of these studies, but rather with its complete discredit. To prove that there is a close connection between eugenic theories and crimes against humanity committed by third Reich, we need to consider both these phenomena and study them in their historical progress. Keywords: Nazism, Eugenic movements, Nazi eugenics, Sociology It is believed that Eugenics, as the science of racial hygiene, arose in the Third Reich, and that only in Nazi Germany eugenic researches were held. But this is a completely erroneous view. In the twentieth century two countries were the leaders in eugenic research - the United States and Soviet Union. Germany is connected by no means with the flowering of these studies, but rather with its complete discredit. To prove that there is a similarity between eugenic theories and crimes against humanity committed by third Reich, we need to consider both these phenomena. Eugenic science expresses the deepest hopes of humans about rational control of their own nature, and, at the same time, explicitly embodies the experience of not just small mistakes and errors, but sometimes even crimes against humanity. Therefore, developing modern genetic technology, scientists are constantly coming back to the history of eugenics, which is a kind of understanding of the latest ethical issues background. Eugenics (from the Greek "Eugene" - noble) developed in the 1870s in England, and its ancestor was Francis Galton, a cousin of Charles Darwin. Darwin, in turn, thought a lot about the ideas of eugenics, but considered them to be unacceptable. He understood that the use of these ideas in practice would lead to the complete fall morality that will make senseless all possible achievements in improving the physical properties of the human. Developing the new science, Galton saw the features of religious morality in it. Eugenics (according to Galton) is the science and "religion" (i.e., the doctrine that reveals the hidden meaning of human history), that develops methods of social, biological and medical monitoring, which can correct or improve the racial qualities of future generations - both physical and intellectual. However eugenic practice existed for many centuries before Galton. It is well known that in Sparta ill babies were killed by dropping them into the abyss, which resulted in the well-known type of invincible Spartan warrior. In the eugenic movement two directions are clearly traced. Scientists distinguish positive and negative eugenics. Positive eugenics is a practice, aimed at obtaining the genetically improved offspring(s) with no harm. Negative eugenics, in turn, is a practice created to prevent the birth of children with genetic abnormalities. Until the end of the 20th century there remained the only method of eugenics - the artificial selection. Eugenics planned either contribute to the growth of valuable genes or inhibit the proliferation of abnormal gene carriers like the nature does, according to rules of which the first are provided to leave more offspring, and the second are destroyed in a ruthless struggle for survival. We should remember that the eugenics is a complex phenomenon. Its ideas and its proposed practical recommendations vary significantly depending on the political system prevailing in the society, and personal political attitudes of the eugenics themselves. Eugenics was widely popular in the early decades of the twentieth century. Eugenic ideas that appeared in the minds of scientists and physicians have been picked up by society. Despite the fact that knowledge of human heredity was not developed enough to take any practical steps, the eugenic social policy orientation has been actively conducted in many countries. Unfortunately, the scientific direction of eugenics which was presented at the beginning of the twentieth century by the founders of the developing, at that time, genetics in Europe and America increasingly receded. The strivings to found the social management of human evolution prevailed over the common sense and attempts to find the scientific evidence of eugenic measures. Later eugenics became associated with Nazi Germany, from which its reputation suffered greatly. Immediately after the Nazis came to power in 1933 the "Law on the Protection of progeny from genetic diseases" was issued. On the basis of this law for the incomplete decade about 350 thousand acts of enforced sterilization of "genetically inferior" individuals has been made. There was also a special program connected with the "euthanasia" (physical extermination of humans in gas chambers) for the psychiatric patients. In the postwar period eugenics was associated only with Nazi crimes, such as racial hygiene, Nazi human experimentation and termination of "undesirable" social groups. It is no coincidence that today the dominant negative attitude toward eugenics is directly caused by the involvement of German and American geneticists work in Nazi and racist institutions. Nazi racial policy is a policy of racial discrimination and xenophobia in the Third Reich, based on the concept of racial hygiene. In many European and American countries, racism in the 19th century and early 20th century was not banned, but in the Third Reich it received a governmental support. Jews were deprived of citizenship rights, opportunities to work in the public service, private practice and having own business, the right to marry the Germans (men or women) and get an education in public schools. Their property and businesses were recorded and subjected to forfeiture. The acts of violence were committed in uncountable amounts, official propaganda among ethnic Germans fomented feelings of prejudice and hatred of Jews. During World War II repression carried on a national basis, have been held not only in Germany, but also in all the occupied countries. There was the concept of racial hygiene, which meant the need to divide people into men of the higher race and lower elements and also the need for appropriate selection. According to this concept, the first should be artificially maintained, whereas the second were required to prevent the reproduction; The Nazi thought that the mixing of races may lead to the unwanted effects. This concept also requires to sterilize all the alcoholics, epileptics, persons with hereditary diseases, imbeciles. The desire to maintain the "racial hygiene" was manifested in government programs forced extermination of various categories of citizens. The eugenics and euthanasia program of Nazi Germany were two key elements to Hitler’s goal to creating his perfect racial community - the Volksgemeinschaft. (Hawkins, 2010). The German sterilization programs target was the elimination of the retarded and epileptic children, the mentally ill, and other groups of defective people. The program has been called a precursor to the gas chambers. During the early years (1934-38) the Nazi this program was not mainly an attempt to improve the gene pool. It was focused on eliminating "useless eaters" - persons who would consume resources without contributing to their production. It was a stated goal of the Nazis to sterilize as many persons at risk for this disorder as possible. The Nazi sterilization program owed part of its success to the efficiency with which the government maintained patient registries which made it comparatively easy to locate persons with various disorders (Burleigh 1994). Hitler believed that the nation may become weak, if corrupted by the infusion of degenerate elements into its bloodstream (Evans, 2006). July 14, 1934 the law "On prevention of birth hereditarily sick offspring," was issued in Germany. According to it a person who suffers from congenital dementia, schizophrenia, epilepsy, blindness and dumbness are subjected to compulsory sterilization. To carry this law into effect, special "hereditary health courts" were created, they consisted of two doctors, judges and the chairman. According to the sentence of this court, men and women, whose bad heredity considered to be established, was subjected to violent operations to suppress the possibility of procreation. From the year 1934 to 1937, 197,5 thousand people were subjected to sterilization. Carrying out a strict eugenic policies, the National Socialists faced a difficult situation when it became clear that the carriers of hereditary diseases could be not only representatives of the "inferior races" (Jews, Gypsies), but also the purebred Aryans. Facing this fact the racist eugenics was helpless. Children of the Aryan origin who inherited from parents schizophrenia, dementia or other ailments were trained in special schools where the correctional pedagogy was applied. If it turns out that the correction attempts were not successful, the child got into the so-called "shelters" where a defective child was physically destroyed. Since 1939, all the doctors and obstetricians were required to report of the birth of each disabled child. The fate of the child was determined by a special commission, but most likely it was physically terminated. The most humane way seemed to be subjecting the baby to starvation. Thus the ideology of racial intolerance came in conflict with the eugenic practice - pure-blooded Aryan child could be born with the same disease as the child of a Jewish family. There was also the idea that the “best” people, had been killed during the war, so eugenics measures had to be used to restore the balance. This idea was common in all other postwar societies not just Germany (Hawkins, 2010). In conclusion, we should say that the original eugenics was not seen as anti-human phenomenon, moreover it reminded genetics at the initial stage of development, but then the idea was borrowed by the Third Reich and distorted beyond recognition. So we can say that Eugenics served as the base for the Nazi philosophy. References Burleigh, M. (1994) Death and Deliverance: Euthanasia in Germany 1900-45. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. David Turner, Kevin Stagg (eds). (2006).Eugenics Modernity and Nationalism in Social Histories of Disability and Deformity. London, New York: Routledge Evans, Richard J. (2005). The Third Reich in Power. Penguin Press. p. 429. Hawkins Michael. (2010) Compulsory Death: Historiographic Study of the Eugenics and Euthanasia Movements in Nazi Germany. East Tennessee State University. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. (2014). Eugenics. Available from: [http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/eugenics/]. Accessed: [October 27th, 2014] Turda, Marius. (2010). Race, Science and Eugenics in the Twentieth Century. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Eugenics. Oxford University Press. Read More