The Rest of the Story

By Drew

Appropos of Mitchell's post yesterday, it is impossible to talk about abortion without bringing up the subject of eugenics. Just as Cormac McCarthy's quote shows that the discussion of abortion invariably brings you to euthenasia, Ron Radosh's New York Sun review of Jonah Goldberg's new book Liberal Fascism demonstrates that no analysis of abortion can be complete without understanding the barbaric - and essentially racist - topic of eugenics. Here's an excerpt of Radosh's review:

Turning to what he calls liberal racism, Mr. Goldberg offers readers his finest chapter. It is a devastating picture of how liberals adopted eugenics — a basic part of Nazi doctrine — which was not, as some liberal intellectuals have argued, an outgrowth of conservative thought. Fans of Margaret Sanger, perhaps the single most important feminist hero of the 20th century, will never be able to think of her in the same way. Mr. Goldberg dissects her hidden views of eugenics. A socialist and birth-control martyr, she favored banning reproduction of the "unfit" and regulation of everyone else's reproduction. She wrote, "More children from the fit, less from the unfit — that is the chief issue of birth control." She opposed the birth of "ill-bred, ill-trained swarms of inferior citizens." Her words reveal her motive in advocacy of birth control. She sought to remove "inferior" people from being born to poor people, whose mothers by definition were "unfit." Sanger's partisans in Planned Parenthood, the group that stemmed from her work, will be shocked to learn that her publication endorsed the Nazi eugenics program, and that Sanger herself "proudly gave a speech to a KKK rally." That was not surprising, since she clearly viewed blacks as inferior. Hence her "Negro Project," in which she sought to urge blacks to adopt birth control.

This isn't a secret, mind you. Or, rather, it's the dirty little secret of the "pro-choice" movement. But Santayana once pointed out what happened to those who don't remember history, so it might be a good thing to remind people of it. Remind them the next time someone refers to Planned Parenthood as a "women's health clinic." Remind them when the breast cancer Race for the Cure comes around in May, sponsored by the Susan G. Komen Foundation, and remember that the Komen Foundation contributes to Planned Parenthood. Remind the supporters of Planned Parenthood and the Komen Foundation (and other organizations supporting PP) of this inconvenient little truth, and ask them to defend it.

If they can.