This morning I was googling online coverage of the launch of Eugenics and the Firewall:Canada's Nasty Little Secret. I noticed that very few people commenting on blogs announcing my book want to own their eugenics past. They blame 'others' for it.( If you live in a Western Democracy and much of the rest of the world, there's a good chance one of your great-granddaddies believed in eugenics. And whether you consider yourself left-wing or right-wing, your political legacy includes pro-eugenics advocates.)
The on-line debate I saw between Darwinists and IDers, over whose fault eugenics was, reminded me of the question posed at the Monk Debate between Christopher Hitchens and Tony Blair last night in Toronto.
Yes, "Is religion a force for good in the world" sounds a lot like "Who should we blame for eugenics and other human rights abuses: Christians or Athiests?"
Interesting questions, to be sure. But they miss the point: Human beings seem happy to use any excuse - religion, politics, and, dare I say it, even science - to demean and kill one another.
The answer to the question, who was responsible for eugenics disasters (such as Auschwitz, the out of control Eugenics Board in Alberta,Canada, murdering Ukranians in Soviet Russia, or segregating and sterilizing blacks, criminals, and other so-called 'defectives' in the United States)is easy: People were.
The hard, hard truth for us in Alberta, Canada to accept is that it wasnt't the CCF, the communist miners, or the Father of Medicare who brought about our eugenics disaster. It was church-going Farmers, shopkeepers and populists, enamoured with how the U.S, dealt with defectives, who pushed for the Sexual Sterilzation Act brought in by the United Farmers of Alberta (UFA) government in 1928.
British Columbia was the only other jurisdiction in the Commonwealth (British Empire) that had a eugenics board. The rest of the Commonwealth rejected forced sterilization of defectives. The Commonwealth countries adopted positive eugenics ideas that were grafted to the older Christian tradition of charity and to the idea of equality of opportunity.)
It was not Adolf Hitler who removed the consent clauses for several classes of citizens in Alberta; it was an elected government led by a Christian radio evangelist. Eugenics was taught in churches. Eugenics corrupted the Calvinist doctrine of the 'Elect'. (I'm sure it's not what Calvin in mind.)
But before the athiests get too smug, they should remember that Sir Francis Galton, half cousin of Charles Darwin, is considered the founder of Eugenics. Both Galton and Darwin used the work of Thomas Malthus, a classical economist (remember trickle down theory?)who feared the poor breeding more than he feared hell's fire (Malthus was a clergyman)to create their theories.
Classical economists portrayed money markets, human greed and selfishness (self-interest) as noble natural forces that humanity shouldn't interfere with. Anything that comes of out neo-liberalism: from Marxism to Free Market economics is based on these dubious ideas.
Eugenics was particularly popular with the middle and upper class in the Commonwealth, The U.S. and Northern Europe. On both sides of the Atlantic, the middle and upper classes feared they were being overrun by poor people and foreigners. They saw only two choices: turn poor people into middle class people (positive eugenics) or stop them from breeding or even breathing (negative eugenics).
Eugenics was an an idea that resonated so much with middle class fears of crime, insanity, and moral degradation that it got grafted into Christianity (where it nearly destroyed older notions of charity, grace and redemption). It spread throughout society as far as the Communists (many of whom thought children should be owned by the state). Eugenics is one of the worst examples of 'group-think' in modern history.
Whether people are capitalists, socialists, Christians, athiests, democrats or autocrats, they will use whatever they regard as 'right' to justify their most evil acts. That's the second scariest bit of the whole saga.
The scariest bit? We don't appear to have learned anything. Instead we revert to blaming the 'other guy' or the the other guy's belief system for evil.
Saturday 27 November 2010
Monday 15 November 2010
Eugenics and the Firewall: What's the book about?
It’s a dirty little secret the heirs to Alberta’s populist legacy don’t want Canadians to talk about.
In 1928 the non-partisan United Farmers of Alberta passed the first Sexual Sterilization Act. The UFA’s successor, the Social Credit party, led by a radio-evangelist William Aberhart, and later by his protégé Ernest Manning, removed the need to obtain consent to sterilize “mental defectives” or Huntington’s Chorea patients with dementia.
Between 1928 and 1972 nearly three thousand citizens were sterilized, lied to, experimented on, and subjected to daily abuse at the hands of provincial staff in Alberta. Most Albertans have forgotten the victims whose names made headlines in the 1990s, and politicians and pundits have shown little empathy for the victims.
The Eugenics Board horror story has largely been buried in Canada’s mainstream national media. Conservative bloggers and columnists in Canada continue to blame the Liberals and CCF for Canada’s barbaric eugenics program. The tar sands, oil royalties, health care budgets, environmental policies, and making sure the province’s interests remain high on the federal agenda top the provincial headlines.
But the questions must be answered: How did a province that claims “strong and free” as its motto deny basic freedoms to so many of its own citizens? Why does the extent of Alberta’s eugenics past and its link to the UFA/Social Credit legacy remain the unacknowledged moral blind spots in Canadian politics?
It’s time to set the record straight.
You are welcome to attend the national launch of Eugenics and the Firewall: Canada's Nasty Little Secret (J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing.) 1:30-3:30 PM at the Galt Museum & Archives. Can't make the launch? Eugenics and the Firewall will be available in bookstores throughout Canada.
You should also be able to order it in the United States. (Distributor in the U.S. and Canada is University of Toronto Press.)
If you are in another country, contact J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing directly for information about how to order.
In 1928 the non-partisan United Farmers of Alberta passed the first Sexual Sterilization Act. The UFA’s successor, the Social Credit party, led by a radio-evangelist William Aberhart, and later by his protégé Ernest Manning, removed the need to obtain consent to sterilize “mental defectives” or Huntington’s Chorea patients with dementia.
Between 1928 and 1972 nearly three thousand citizens were sterilized, lied to, experimented on, and subjected to daily abuse at the hands of provincial staff in Alberta. Most Albertans have forgotten the victims whose names made headlines in the 1990s, and politicians and pundits have shown little empathy for the victims.
The Eugenics Board horror story has largely been buried in Canada’s mainstream national media. Conservative bloggers and columnists in Canada continue to blame the Liberals and CCF for Canada’s barbaric eugenics program. The tar sands, oil royalties, health care budgets, environmental policies, and making sure the province’s interests remain high on the federal agenda top the provincial headlines.
But the questions must be answered: How did a province that claims “strong and free” as its motto deny basic freedoms to so many of its own citizens? Why does the extent of Alberta’s eugenics past and its link to the UFA/Social Credit legacy remain the unacknowledged moral blind spots in Canadian politics?
It’s time to set the record straight.
You are welcome to attend the national launch of Eugenics and the Firewall: Canada's Nasty Little Secret (J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing.) 1:30-3:30 PM at the Galt Museum & Archives. Can't make the launch? Eugenics and the Firewall will be available in bookstores throughout Canada.
You should also be able to order it in the United States. (Distributor in the U.S. and Canada is University of Toronto Press.)
If you are in another country, contact J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing directly for information about how to order.
Saturday 13 November 2010
Eugenics and the Firewall: National launch 17 November
You are welcome to attend the national launch of Eugenics and the Firewall: Canada's Nasty Little Secret (J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing.) 1:30-3:30 PM at the Galt Museum & Archives. Can't make the launch? Eugenics and the Firewall will be available in bookstores throughout Canada.
You should also be able to order it in the United States. (Distributor in the U.S. and Canada is University of Toronto Press.)
If you are in another country, contact J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing directly for information about how to order.
You should also be able to order it in the United States. (Distributor in the U.S. and Canada is University of Toronto Press.)
If you are in another country, contact J.Gordon Shillingford Publishing directly for information about how to order.
Tuesday 2 November 2010
Eugenics and the Firewall heading to bookstores 12 November.
Mark 12 November 2010 on you calendar! That the day Eugenics and the Firewall will be ready for bookstores across Canada. Launch details are being pinned down as I write this.
In the meantime, here's a sneak peak at the back cover text:
It’s a dirty little secret the heirs to Alberta’s populist legacy don’t want Canadians to talk about.
In 1928 the non-partisan United Farmers of Alberta passed the first Sexual Sterilization Act. The UFA’s successor, the Social Credit party, led by a radio-evangelist William Aberhart, and later by his protégé Ernest Manning, removed the need to obtain consent to sterilize “mental defectives” or Huntington’s Chorea patients with dementia.
Between 1928 and 1972 nearly three thousand citizens were sterilized, lied to, experimented on, and subjected to daily abuse at the hands of provincial staff in Alberta. Most Albertans have forgotten the victims whose names made headlines in the 1990s, and politicians and pundits have shown little empathy for the victims.
The Eugenics Board horror story has largely been buried in Canada’s mainstream national media. Conservative bloggers and columnists in Canada continue to blame the Liberals and CCF for Canada’s barbaric eugenics program. The tar sands, oil royalties, health care budgets, environmental policies, and making sure the province’s interests remain high on the federal agenda top the provincial headlines.
But the questions must be answered: How did a province that claims “strong and free” as its motto deny basic freedoms to so many of its own citizens? Why does the extent of Alberta’s eugenics past and its link to the UFA/Social Credit legacy remain the unacknowledged moral blind spots in Canadian politics?
It’s time to set the record straight.
In the meantime, here's a sneak peak at the back cover text:
It’s a dirty little secret the heirs to Alberta’s populist legacy don’t want Canadians to talk about.
In 1928 the non-partisan United Farmers of Alberta passed the first Sexual Sterilization Act. The UFA’s successor, the Social Credit party, led by a radio-evangelist William Aberhart, and later by his protégé Ernest Manning, removed the need to obtain consent to sterilize “mental defectives” or Huntington’s Chorea patients with dementia.
Between 1928 and 1972 nearly three thousand citizens were sterilized, lied to, experimented on, and subjected to daily abuse at the hands of provincial staff in Alberta. Most Albertans have forgotten the victims whose names made headlines in the 1990s, and politicians and pundits have shown little empathy for the victims.
The Eugenics Board horror story has largely been buried in Canada’s mainstream national media. Conservative bloggers and columnists in Canada continue to blame the Liberals and CCF for Canada’s barbaric eugenics program. The tar sands, oil royalties, health care budgets, environmental policies, and making sure the province’s interests remain high on the federal agenda top the provincial headlines.
But the questions must be answered: How did a province that claims “strong and free” as its motto deny basic freedoms to so many of its own citizens? Why does the extent of Alberta’s eugenics past and its link to the UFA/Social Credit legacy remain the unacknowledged moral blind spots in Canadian politics?
It’s time to set the record straight.
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