Nazi_Eugenics

Nazi Eugenics Millions of people were executed in the Nazi attempt to establish the Aryan race as the majority of German population. It is believed that war was a cover-up of the mass murder occurring under the noses of the rest of the world. The theory of eugenics began long before the rise of Nazi rule with Darwinism. Applying the theory to society, the Nazis tried to improve German society through the “purification” of race. The ways in which they went about trying to achieve it scarred an unfathomable amount of people. After failing to win the wars, both foreign and domestic, many of those who participated in the mutilation and destruction of so many innocent lives were punished. Others escaped prosecution due to the sheer number of guilty parties involved. Lessons have been learned since the atrocities of the attempted racial cleansing occurred and laws have been created to ensure that no group will ever be able to so easily repeat the mistake. Eugenics is most commonly known as the biological social movement that advocates the improvement of the genetic composition of a population. The term was coined by British naturalist and mathematician Francis Galton in 1881. Since then the concept has been extremely controversial and still is today. Renowned scientists, doctors, and socialists have provided a variety of arguments for and against the theory of eugenics. Even American eugenicists believed that “foreign and inferior” groups of people hinder human advancement, and must therefore be prohibited from entering the country and contaminating the superior native population’s gene pool. Eugenics embraces the views of Darwinism. Charles Darwin, half-cousin of Francis Galton, was an evolutionist and proposed the idea of natural selection in his Origin of Species. This theory asserted that through breeding, specific biological traits are adapted and passed down to the offspring to better succeed in future life. Natural selection and evolution ideas were accepted by some as the most influential factor on the success of a society. There are five basic assumptions of Social Darwinism: 1. There are weak individuals (and societies, and races) and there are strong individuals (and societies and races). 2. The life of individuals (and societies and races) is characterized by the ‘struggle for existence’ and it is ruled by the principle of the ‘survival of the fittest’. 3. The state should not intervene in society to protect the weak, otherwise the process of natural selection would not operate and hence society would cease improving. 4. Social stratification should not be tampered with because it was the natural outcome of some people being industrious and frugal and others being lazy and spendthrift. 5. At the international level, social Darwinism was in favour of imperialism and racism. German leaders in political, medical, and social fields took these assumptions to new levels in their attempt to achieve the ultimate race. It is important to keep in mind that Darwin did not encourage the persecution of millions of people. Shakespeare once wrote “The evil that men do lives after them; the good is often interred with their bones.” In the early twentieth century, Germany was gradually gravitating towards conflict and ultimately war. Numerous theories and ideas were in circulation amongst the German leaders and officials. One of the more popular feelings was the growing concern of the threat to Germany society. Many wanted to rid all groups who posed danger to the purity of the Aryan race which was perceived as superior to all others. These inferior groups were also thought of as a forced economic burden on Germany. The solution to this “problem” of removing the inferior groups from Germany was touchy and complicated. The main goal was to eliminate the degenerate and perfect the superior elements which made the Aryan race the most advanced. Exclusion of the superior race was based on biology. Others such as Africans, Orientals, Jews, Gypsies, and the disabled were considered alien and inferior. Social Selectionism split the population up into categories: military, political, religious, moral, legal, economic, profession, and racial. Although there are a number of groups, Germans viewed race as the most important influence on advancement. A series of laws and acts were established by the Nazis in order to establish and enforce the separation of groups. The Marital Health Law required couples to get a certificate of fitness so as not to damage the race if they reproduced. The most notorious of all laws passed were the Nuremberg Laws of 1935. They contained a series of laws to better define the status of Jews in Germany, especially considering marriage and citizenship. A person was considered Jewish if he/she had three fully Jewish grandparents. Marriages and sexual contact between Jews and Aryans became illegal and punishable by death. The Nuremberg Laws laid the foundation for more radical and discriminatory laws regarding races and groups of people the Nazis perceived as inferior. The approach to achieving a pure Aryan race was disputed and changed over the years. The first method was called “positive” eugenics. This aimed to increase Aryan birthrate to create a majority of the population. When this failed to create the desired results, “negative” eugenics was implemented. This pushed for the expulsion of inferior races which was executed in various ways. Sterilization became a common method used by eugenics advocates. Tubal ligations and vasectomies were the most common forms. It was performed on “lives unworthy of life.” The Rhineland children, a group that Hitler despised, became a prime target for sterilization. He had the children examined to determine their racial characteristics. After determining that they were all products of rape or prostitution, Hitler ordered the creation of Special Commission No. 3. This committee assumed the responsibility to set up and oversee the secret sterilization of all Rhineland offspring which accumulated to approximately 385 people. Countless women in concentration camps were also sterilized. Doctors performed experimental operations on them without any anesthesia and many died as a result. Euthanasia was another popular method of eugenics. The term is derived from the Greek term “eu thanoatos” meaning good death. Sterilization was not satisfactory to the Nazis. Officials were also concerned with the economic costs of keeping people with serious illnesses alive. Euthanasia provided a legal way to eliminate thousands of patients. One third of the patients in German mental institutions died from malnutrition. Physicians claimed they were “preserving food for the war effort.” A classical example of euthanasia was addressed to support the practice. Hitler praised Spartan parents for killing their weak babies in order to maintain a superior people. He arranged a top-secret Infanticide Program to be established. Many prominent physicians held positions on the committee. They were ordered and paid to report infants with deformities as well as to euthanize them. Some were injected with poison over long periods of time and others were starved to death. At first, Hitler was unwilling to make Euthanasia legal so as not to expose the secret and open it up to public debate, but he was finally convinced because it would encourage more doctors to euthanize without fear of criminal charges. The Madagascar Plan was a proposal to deport all of the Jews to Madagascar, an island directly southeast of Africa. The island was estimated to hold a capacity of one million people. Deportation was a radical idea. It would require funds to transport large numbers of people far away. Strict policies would need to be implemented and enforced in order to ensure that the deportees remained in their new home, which Hitler envisioned as a giant concentration camp. Although the idea of deporting the Jews to other countries with the idea that it would be the destruction of them, there were too many uncontrollable factors that resulted in the abandonment of the plan. Progress of racial cleansing deemed too slow for Nazi officials and they implemented more radical measures to eliminate their “biological enemies.” Specially trained killing squads were sent to eliminate large numbers of Jews in Poland. Officials were afraid of the effects the murders would have on their men and they wanted a more secretive and efficient way of killing large numbers of people. Death camps proved to be the “perfect solution.” In 1933, the first concentration camp was opened in Munich. Four other main camps were created for the sole purpose of exterminating Jews. Gas chambers were used daily to kill thousands of people. Those who were too weak or old to work were sent to the chambers to be executed. The bodies would then be put into the crematoriums. Complete control over the “enemy” population that came with running these camps led to the creation of other labor camps. Groups perceived by Nazi officials as inferior were persecuted if they resided in Germany or in the territories in which Germany occupied during the World Wars. The group that received the most unwanted attention was the Jews. Before World War I, Jews only made up .76% of the German population which was about 66.1 million at the time. They were a loyal, well-integrated part of German society. Many served in the military during World War I. A large portion of Jews was married to non-Jews. Hitler and members of the Nazi party created propaganda and myths that the Jews took advantage of others and hoarded money in the banking and press industries. He convinced millions of his followers that the Jews were a hindrance on the German economy and race advancement. In his Mein Kampf he asserts: What we must fight for is to safeguard the existence and reproduction of our race and our people, the sustenance of our children and the purity of our blood, the freedom and independence of the Fatherland, so that our people may mature for the fulfillment of the mission allotted it by the Creator. In response to the mass propaganda, the Sturmabteilung, a violent anti-Semitic group, and many other of Hitler’s followers attacked and boycotted Jewish businesses. Soon after the war began, Jews were forced to live in ghettos and not long after transferred to the labor and concentration camps. Homosexuals made up another group perceived as a threat to the Aryan race. The government included them in Article 75 of German Criminal Code because it was thought that they would assist in the downfall of the German nation. Officials made orders to create special committees in charge of comprising “pink lists” which documented all previous files on homosexuals since 1900. It was thought that women became lesbians due to either lack of male companionship or an improper upbringing. One hundred thousand homosexuals were arrested between 1933 and 1945. Between five and fifteen thousand were sent to concentration camps and forced to wear special badges with pink triangles on them. During their stay an estimated sixty percent were castrated or died. Physicians also experimented on prisoners in the attempt to change them to be heterosexual. Handicapped Germans composed of a large number of those discriminated against under Nazi reign. This group included those who had “feeblemindedness, schizophrenia, manic depression, epilepsy, Huntingtons disease, blindness, deafness, physical deformities, and extreme alcoholism.” Physicians and courts were in charge of assessing the severity of specific cases. Those who could not care for themselves were seen as a burden to the German economy and should not be able to reproduce, increasing the odds of offspring gene pools to harbor the same defective traits. Family members could appeal to the courts, but only eleven percent was overturned. An estimated 375,000 to 400,000 handicapped Germans were sterilized between 1934 and 1937. In 2008 the United Nations Security council passed Resolution 1820 which “denounces violence committed against women and girls in wars.” Women in concentration camps were so deprived of nutrients that they lost the ability to menstruate and furthermore reproduce. Those who were pregnant upon entering the camps or who became pregnant in the prisoners brothels were forced to have abortions in order to prevent further creation of an inferior race. German Aryan women at the time were forbidden to have abortions in order to increase the Aryan population. Auschwitz death camp in Poland was notorious for medical experiments. Dr. Carl Clauberg experimented on over seven hundred women in order to research sterilization techniques. The brutal hate crimes against countless people did not go unnoticed or unpunished. The Nuremberg Trials took place from 1945 to 1946 and consisted of the prosecution of twenty-four of the most important captured leaders of Nazi Germany. The International Military Tribunal tried these individuals for three crimes: crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Of the twenty-four prosecuted, twelve were put to death, three were acquitted, seven were sentenced to jail time, one was seen as unfit for trial, and one committed suicide before trial. Smaller trials were held for doctors and judges who participated in the war crimes. Along with their death and prison terms, it was determined by “a number of scientific commentators” that the Nazi medical experiments were a scientific failure. It was furthermore considered a “decay of science into irrational and sadistic fanaticism.” It therefore, became a moral dilemma. Physicians who participated and led practices which included euthanasia, such as Dr. Hermann Pfannmuller, were accused of murdering three thousand people during the Munich trials in 1951. He was sentenced to five years in prison. The International Military Tribunal revealed the first estimate of 5.7 million Jews murdered. It was later changed to a more accurate count of 6 million. This enormous amount did not however, include the millions of others including African Americans, homosexuals, and handicapped. The Nazis failed to achieve the ultimate Aryan race. Through propaganda, cruel intentions, and ignorance, they did manage to create a reign of terror that will haunt some for the rest of their lives. The theory of eugenics is perceived with more care and caution than ever today because of its commonly assumed association with the brutalities and violence that occurred in the not-so-distant past.