The American Eugenics Movement
View the two video clips below on the American Eugenics Movement. Then answer the questions below:
Video Clip on American Eugenics movement from the documentary series
The Gene: An Intimate History – Part One
Video Clip on Carrie Buck and the Eugenics movement from the documentary “The Eugenics Crusade.”
Carrie Buck
From Title:
The Eugenics Crusade
Answer the following questions:
1. Eugenics scientists believed that alcoholism, promiscuity and poverty were inherited in the same way as hair and eye color. Explain why they were incorrect and describe the harmful social effects of this fallacy.
2. Who was Carrie Buck, and why was she the subject of a 1927 U.S. Supreme Court case?
3. Recent advances in genetics have made it possible to alter the human genome and select for particular genetic traits. Do you think the lessons from the American Eugenics movement are relevant when considering how to regulate new genetic technologies? Why or why not?
Sample Solution
The Eugenics is a aggregation of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic superiority of a human through systematic exclusion of people and groups believed to be inferior and promoting those adjudged to be superior. The concept predates the term that had been used by popular Greek philosopher Plato who proposed principles of selective breeding around 400 BC. Early advocates of eugenics in the 19th century regarded it as a way of improving groups of people. However, Edwin Black, journalist and author of War Against the Weak, claims eugenics is often deemed a pseudoscience because what is defined as a genetic improvement of a desired trait is often deemed a cultural choice rather than a matter that can be determined through objective scientific inquiry.
