Thursday, September 17, 2009

Margaret Sanger: Frightening Founder of Planned Parenthood

I watched a video posted by Beetleblogger that mentioned Margaret Sanger, the founder of planned parenthood. The information the video presented was frightening. I had never heard of Margaret Sanger before, and wondered if the video information was accurate. I decided to do an internet search of her, and actually came across some papers that she had written. There is something very "hitler"-ish about the way she wrote. I had no idea that from her views sprang what we know today as planned parenthood.

Basically, Margaret Sanger believed in selective reproduction, and even thought we should have forced sterilization. She felt that women were creating hordes of useless humanity, and this needed to be controlled. Here are some of her own words:
"...woman has, through her reproductive ability, founded and perpetuated the tyrannies of the earth. Whether it was the tyranny of a monarchy, an oligarchy or a republic, the one indispensable factor of its existence was, as it is now, hordes of human beings---human beings so plentiful as to be cheap, and so cheap that ignorance was their natural lot. Upon the rock of an unenlightened, submissive maternity, have these been founded; upon the product of such a maternity have they flourished."

"While unknowingly laying the foundation of tyrannies, and providing the human tinder for racial conflagrations, woman was also unknowingly creating slums, filling asylums with the insane, and institutions with other defectives. She was replenishing the ranks of the prostitutes furnishing grist for the criminal courts and inmates for prisons. Had she planned deliberately to achieve this tragic total of human waste and misery, she could hardly have done it more effectively."

She goes on to question whether our "melting pot" of different cultures creates a better race of people. Her thinking is that we should "selectively" breed, and not allow certain populations, such as prostitutes, to breed. She said, "That these foreigners who have come in hordes have brought with them their ignorance of hygiene and modern ways of living and that they are handicapped by religious superstitions is only too true." She goes on to make a case for their desire to also live freely, but about which foreigners was she speaking? The Chinese who labored in California had superior hygiene to the "forty-niners".

While I do agree that if people are going to be sexually active with multiple partners they should use birth control, and a family should take in to account the mother's health, and their own circumstances when having a family, I find many of her views frightening, and I still do not agree with abortion, which I view as just another form of infanticide. In addition, the government should not be the one to determine who should be allowed to reproduce. The other thing that really bothers me about her writing is that she fails to look at each individual as a valued human being. I wonder if those people who laud Margaret Sanger as if she were a saint (Hillary Clinton included among those who admire her) have read her writings and understand how she viewed humanity.

2 comments:

Stick said...

Unfortunately, many of them DO know what she purported, and still agree with her. She failed to see that in her prohibition of certain people reproducing, she would also limit the ideas which would come from their progeny. How many children of prostitutes, other races, and etc. went on to create some of the scientific marvels of this generation.

Inklings said...

Ah, if only HER mother had used birth control. :0)