Tuesday, August 25, 2015

Eugenics and The Big Lie

Ben Carson, Republican candidate for president and retired neurosurgeon, appeared on ABC News to spread another historical inversion about Eugenics and Margaret Sanger. Bob Cesca called out the good doctor's inaccuracies and pointed out that these crazy ideas come straight out of the fevered imagination of agent provocateur and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. Cesca pointed out that the quote from Sanger was grossly taken out of context and the only other piece of evidence ever presented by the glossy-eyed true believers of this mythology is a completely doctored map manufactured by a propaganda outfit purporting to show that Planned Parenthood clinics are largely sited in predominantly black neighborhoods. These falsehoods are also exposed by a study from FactCheck.org already in 2011 when they were uttered by the last GOP Forkboy Herman Cain. The reason for all these attacks on Planned Parenthood are simple, PP and Margaret Sanger were the "good guys" in Eugenics history, and need to be destroyed as part of the larger war on women declared by the fascist right.

Ideology is a set of guiding ideas that inform the actions and beliefs of adherents. Ideological conflict can occur within and between these ideas, which compete to drive politics and government policy. The free market fundamentalism guiding government and corporate policy in the United States is an ideology that has been internalized to such a degree that it has lost it's identity as one of many guiding sets of ideas, much to the detriment of living things in this country and on Earth. It has many commonalities with Eugenics' competing ideology, Social Darwinism. As Planned Parenthood represents the positive side of Eugenics and was supported by many Progressives at the turn of the century as well as today, it is naturally an enemy that must be destroyed. Contraception, family planning, and yes, even abortion were liberal in that they empower individuals at the expense of elites. However much family planning empowers elites as well, working-class people gain a great deal from controlling the size and composition of their families. Children in Progressive Era America were coming to be seen as economic liabilities as many families crammed into urban tenements and no longer worked their own land. As such, having control over the number of mouths to feed was a positive for parents as well as a social good in itself.

To backtrack a little, Eugenics was Greek for "good in birth" and was coined as a name for certain principles by Sir Francis Galton, the British scientist who coalesced many ideas about genetics and evolution into this ideology. In short, Galton was influenced by his distant cousin, Charles Darwin, about natural selection and wanted to improve humanity through artificial selection. Galton was not exactly a heroic character, his own childless marriage led him to the hypothesis that aristocratic women failed to produce enough offspring from husbands of genius on their own and needed to be compelled in some way to have larger families and thereby increase intelligence in society. Conversely, imbeciles should be prevented from marrying and reproducing, thereby improving the race through guided breeding.

Two things can be taken away from this foundation story. First is that these "negative" eugenicists were elitist, they would use the power of the state to enforce who can have children and how many. Sanger and other "positive" eugenicists would use the power of the state to improve sanitation, medical care, the distribution of milk, education about hygiene and so on, but depend on the power of self-interest for people to voluntarily use contraception to limit the size of their families. Negative eugenicists were often progressives but in elite positions like doctors, prison wardens, social workers and were therefore used to making decisions for other people. In the US eugenics was less concerned with encouraging the strong and intelligent to have more children but much more concerned with stopping the "feeble-minded" from reproducing. And their methods were confined mostly to wards of the state, segregating by sex in mental asylums and prisons, prohibiting marriage between the indigent, and ultimately sterilization of social work cases that could be deemed "degenerate." After all, eugenics was concerned with improving the (white) race and arresting degeneration in white people, a prevalent idea that many in the lower classes were actually de-evolving after some golden age of enlightened superiority. Actually much of the supposed degeneration was caused by problems in the environment, not genetics, from poor working conditions to crowded living spaces.

I was as surprised as anyone after doing research that historic eugenics in the US and English-speaking world was not concerned with eradicating the inferior races. In every instance I found, eugenic sterilization and segregation measures were about purging degeneracy among white people, they didn't care about African-Americans or other races. Why would one expend energy studying or "improving" other races that you were supposedly competing with? In any case, eugenic ideas had a very difficult time gaining hold in "backward" areas of the US like the South because of entrenched religion. Eugenic sterilization did occur in the South but it was limited compared to a "frontier" area like California, which as a newer area of the US lacked the strong traditions that opposed new-fangled ideas like evolution or engineered breeding.

So when Ben Carson or anyone carrying water for Alex Jones tries to project Nazi holocaust images onto historical eugenics in the US, they are selling a big lie. The contradictions of pitching this idea that Planned Parenthood is carrying out an extermination of the African-American community to the Republican base that frequently complains about the very existence of African-Americans is mind-boggling. It must take an enormous amount of ideological discipline to believe that an under-funded organization can carry out such a feat through the voluntary actions of individual patients. But contradictions are at the heart of anyone claiming to be "pro-life" yet supports the death penalty, mass incarceration, police brutality, the proliferation of firearms, "stand your ground" and the republican enthusiasm for endless war. It is a good example of the compartmentalized thinking from right wing authoritarian followers that they can separate these contradictory ideas.

Belief in the zombie lie that Planned Parenthood targets blacks for extermination while ignoring actual history is strong evidence that ideology trumps facts in the minds of partisans. What exactly do Forkboys like Dr. Carson and Mr. Cain achieve through this particular lie?

For further reading




Horwitz, Howard. “Always with Us.” American Literary History 10 (1998): 317-334.

Klausen, Susanne. “’For the Sake of the Race:’ Eugenic Discourses of Feeblemindedness and               Motherhood in the South African Medical Record, 1903-1926.” Journal of Southern                   African Studies 23 (1997): 27-50.

Nye, Robert. “The Rise and Fall of the Eugenics Empire: Recent Perspectives on the Impact of Biomedical Thought in Modern Society.” The Historical Journal 36 (1993): 687-700.

Sandall, Roger “Sir Francis Galton and the Roots of Eugenics.” Society 45 (2008): 170-176.


Soloway, Richard. “Counting the Degenerates: The Statistics of Race Deterioration in Edwardian           England.” Journal of Contemporary History 17 (1982): 137-164.

Thursday, August 13, 2015

Vietnam, Rick Perlstein, and Ur-Fascism

Searching for truth is a full-time job. A quest that this feeble blog will never complete. The chances of convincing an individual that they are being lied to, manipulated, or played for a fool is approaching statistical insignificance. Nonetheless, many people still commit themselves to learning and trying to pass on their knowledge and wisdom to the larger world. In a classroom this activity is usually met with blank stares and indifference, but in our hyper-polarized political climate it can be downright dangerous.

I have mentioned before that I am a former Army Tanker and a member of a tanker group on Facebook. I am also one of the very few anti-fascists in a sea of wannabe brown shirts. What started as an innocent way to keep in touch with my former brothers in arms has become embarrassing. The only reason I have not unfollowed the group is that it is enlightening to observe right wing memes and comments from some members. In between posting generally nasty memes about liberals or women or Democrats, scantily-clad women or downright terms of service violating nudie pics, or boasting about their guns, or taking pot shots at other branches of the military, there are people posting some outrage or another along with as much personal contact information as they can come up with about the perpetrators  and urging others to "go get 'em." Outrages like standing on the American flag, saying something negative about veterans or guns, generally anyone exercising the freedom of expression that all of these guys claim to defend but when it comes right down to it are hypocrites. So far none of these angry vets have actually attacked any of the targets but every mass shooting that occurs in America further de-stigmatizes the idea of political violence. I feel it is important to try and draw the authoritarian aggression sometimes on display into the open because it is harder to build up the resolve to do something one might regret outside the epistemic self-reinforcing system of closed Facebook groups. The potential for violence is what concerns me. Political or religious violence is the most dangerous road a society can travel.

I don't know anyone who has stood on the flag as an act of protest and find the phenomenon counter-productive, not worthy of comment. Nor do I get ruffled by other idiots flapping their gums about  veterans being dishonorable, or impersonating a soldier. And I could care less about porn put up by anyone. But when the threats start rolling in about someone I do kind of know and respect, it is time to speak up. Rick Perlstein is a fellow historian who has written some great books about the era I study and I have learned a lot from his work. His latest book is The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan and should be considered required reading for everyone interested in contemporary politics and why the reactionary right is as off the spectrum as it is today. But books are for people whose attention spans exceed those of fruit flies.

However, an article Perlstein wrote for the Washington Spectator that attempted to untangle one of the great con jobs of American propaganda in the service of authoritarianism, got the attention of 'wingers all over the place. This is part of a very important and as yet unfolding story of the American "stab in the back" surrounding the Vietnam War. You know the one "if only the damn 'libs had let us nuke Vietnam" and so on. Perlstein's essay is an abridged version of a chapter in his book mentioned above, "a bizarre psychic reversal" as he puts it about the POW-MIA flag and how it has been used to buttress America's victim status and cruelty by the North Vietnamese. And the propaganda symbol value this sympathy provides to American authoritarians. To the right wing authoritarian follower, it is a symbol of solidarity with phantoms that he will never admit do not exist. To the social dominator seeking to lead them, the flag is a cudgel to smear and demonize anyone who does not go along with the mythology. He originally tied this flag to the racist history of the Confederate flag and that is where the trouble started. 

Karoli already wrote up the fauxtrage and pearl clutching on display from Fox and Friends and the reactions from 'wingers. I just wanted to add how violently the so-called defenders of freedom reacted to Perlstein on a personal level. In case anyone actually believes that our brave men and women in uniform "will not obey unconstitutional orders, such as orders to disarm the American people, to conduct warrantless searches, or to detain Americans as “enemy combatants” in violation of their ancient right to jury trial" if ordered to by our tyrannical government. 

From the M1 tankers group [closed] on Facebook:

This is the civilian shit bag that wrote the POW/MIA story. Feel free to contact him and let him know how u feel. .
[Picture of Rick Perlstein's Facebook page]



Angry, well-armed, self-righteous, and ready to attack anyone who disagrees with them. This is not what I was taught in the military, apparently things have changed. Having to issue a lengthy apology for presenting a not patriotically correct historical theory based on actual empirical research is something I doubt Rick Perlstein was taught in graduate school either. Having to then make himself scarce on social media due to threats was probably not something he contemplated when he submitted the article. 

Update:

The author of the post in question found my response. As you can guess it was not well-received. After looking at Tim's page briefly I take back what I implied, he is not a fascist, just a vindictive special snowflake. I do not know why Rick Perlstein's article got him so angry. As you can see from the discussion he wasn't the only one, but there is no criticism of why the flag isn't what Perlstein argues it is, a demagogic propaganda symbol designed to cut off and prevent debate, which is exactly what happens in these exchanges. Juvenile character attacks and random, arbitrary name-calling as proxy for argument. As though simply mentioning keywords should trigger a Pavlovian response of aggression. I wonder if the information was presented in a less-antagonistic manner, would this untold story of the POW-MIA flag get a less rigid, knee-jerk, and aggressive response? I took this post down for a few days to edit it, because it was kind of unfair and was written in haste. After initially publishing I did a google search of responses to the original article for comparison, and whoa my findings make the comments I recorded here look civil by comparison. I am not going to link to anything ranting about "hate-filled kike demons" or "Faggot Jews" but you could probably guess where the real fascists would go with language like that. It plays right into the fantasy land of all-powerful liberals and conservative victim hood constructed by the right-wing where a barely noticed opinion piece from a free lance historian somehow equals all liberals calling for and immediately receiving whatever they wish for. The world does not work that way.

In case you read this Tim, I am not a blue falcon or any of the things you accused me of. I could care less if you or anyone else posts pictures of boobies. I have never reported anything to Facebook, nor do I know anyone who did. Facebook does not share my concern about political violence and I do not share their interest in making social media safe for elementary school kids. I do not care about sexy pics or off-color jokes or even the continuous outrage from certain members of that group. A group of which I am no longer a part of, by the way. After some reflection I realized that everything about it is a waste of my time. When I first joined, there was serious discussion between master gunners, interesting stories about our brothers' experiences in the field or on deployment, and general camaraderie. That is pretty rare to find now, and I'm tired of sifting through the garbage to find anything interesting. So thank you for convincing me to move on. I'm too old to find that Friday night grab-assing at the barracks style amusing anymore. And your since-
removed post with screen grabs of my writing just confirmed that I am correct in my concern over the potential for violence.

I have often felt annoyed that my service, in the opinion of people like you, did not count because we disagree on one thing or another. But by all means keep the crusade going. Being in a perpetual state of outraged and self-righteous victim hood is great for your heart and I hear it can even prevent ulcers.