The Tragic Return of Eugenics, In Disguise
Francis Galton, an English intellectual and cousin of Charles Darwin, coined the term “Eugenics” in 1883. Galton and many leading intellectuals on both sides of the Atlantic greatly overestimated their understanding of the role of inheritance in determining human attributes such as behavior and intelligence. These academics were quite strident in promoting their newfound “insights” into racial and ethnic capabilities. They were forerunners of today’s academics who are also strident in their beliefs that different racial and ethnic groups have uniform beliefs and capabilities (Ref.1,2).
These concepts ignore the vast differences between human beings and other mammalian species. Looking at dogs, cats, lions, chimpanzees, or any other mammals besides us humans, one sees rather stereotypic behavior. Some animals in a species are brighter than others, but their range of behaviors is quite narrow and predictable. But humans are totally different. Because of our huge brains and protracted development, everyone is different, with almost an infinite range of beliefs and behaviors. So, our appearance, unlike other mammals, does NOT predict our beliefs, behaviors, or capabilities. Therefore, the idea that a person’s immutable physical characteristics or background will predict their behavior and potential is completely erroneous. Unfortunately, it took a world war and millions of casualties to dispel eugenics.
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But now we face the return of a different type of eugenics as described by Coleman Hughes as “Neoracism,” as he believes we are departing from the founding goal of the United States that “All Men Are Created Equal,” and we should strive for a color-blind society. “The principle of color blindness does not mean that we pretend we don’t recognize race. The definition I espouse is that we should treat people without regard to race, both in our public policy and in our private lives” (Ref.3).
Unfortunately, Neoracism has been with us and increasing for decades; it has been adopted in higher education and industry disguised as Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI). With this philosophy, the population of the world can be divided into two groups: the oppressed and the oppressors. People of European descent are the oppressors, while other racial and ethnic groups and LGBTQI+ are the oppressed. There is NO consideration of individual character, beliefs, and capabilities. The believers are strident, often canceling others with different views. A totally inappropriate action by a DEI officer and students at Stanford Law School was the subject of a previous essay on this site (Ref. 4). The blind racism manifested by thousands of students at our most prestigious universities in response to the extra-barbaric attack October 7th in Israel and the bland response in Congress by the presidents of Harvard, The University of Pennsylvania and M.I.T., have led many Americans to oppose this form of racism disguised as DEI (Ref. 5,6,7). The recent Supreme Court 6-3 decision barring racial preferences has strengthened anti-racism, returning us to judging people as INDIVIDUALS (Ref.8).
Is this drift to racism in America an isolated event or the result of a larger phenomenon? We in the United States are in the midst of a fundamental debate: collectivism versus the primacy of the individual. If we now, as in our founding, believe that each person must be evaluated as an individual, then racism, eugenics, and the DEI movement have NO place in this nation.
- Eugenics and Scientific Racism, National Human Genome Research Institute, May 18, 2022, USA.gov, available at: – https://w.genome.gov/about-genomics/fact-sheets/Eugenics-and-Scientific-Racism
- Thomas Sowell, Social Justice Fallacies, Basic Books, Hachette Book Group, 1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104, 2023, ISBN: 9781541603929
- Coleman Hughes, Coleman Hughes on the New Racism: The rise of a new race consciousness has turned elite American institutions into neoracist strongholds, The Free Press, February 12, 2004, available at: https://www.thefp.com/p/coleman-hughes-on-the-new-racism?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
- Ken Fisher, M.D., DEI AND Stanford’s Law School, Authentic Medicine, May 1, 2023, available at: https://authenticmedicine.com/2023/05/dei-and-stanfords-law-school/
- James Taranto, The Harvard of the Unwoke, WSJ, January 19, 2024, available at: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-harvard-of-the-unwoke-university-of-florida-is-fixing-higher-education-13f22b77
- Bari Weiss, Why DEI Must End for Good, The Free Press, YouTube, January 2024, available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZhvfRxJ3ul0
- James Freeman, Merit IS No longer Evil, WSJ, January 5, 2024, available at: https://www.wsj.com/articles/merit-is-no-longer-evil-8df27d4e?mod=panda_wsj_author_alert
- Supreme Court Of The United States, Students For Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President And Fellows Of Harvard College, October Term, 2022, available at: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/20-1199_hgdj.pdf
“The recent Supreme Court 6-3 decision barring racial preferences has strengthened anti-racism, returning us to judging people as INDIVIDUALS (Ref.8).” Except people are not judged as individuals. That never existed Ken, only nepotism. The presumption that that “before” was a reality for others not of the status quo is exactly why DEI is necessary. If fairness and judgment on individuality had existed, there would have been no need for DEI or AA in the first place. I’m not sure why you believe that a culture steeped in racism(I mean American history is American history) just seguéd naturally from being one of keeping people who did not fit the status quo out, despite their qualificiations, to one that suddenly welcomed “outsiders” in is a perspective of either of willing naiveté or blindness. Not just race, but women, LGBTQ, veterans and the disabled. Of course DEI only incenses those who focus on race, forgetting all the others who were also affected by discrimination and still are. The reality is that there is no human being on this Earth capable of being objective. Period. One cannot simply rely on people engaging in fairness, honesty, doing the right thing, etc. in education, medicine, law enforcement, arts & entertainment, business or any other field or profession. That will never happen. That is why laws for human rights, civil rights exist, employment rights, housing rights, etc. Human beings are inherently biased, forever fearful that someone is gaining something to which they believe they are intrinsically entitled. They bring that s**t with them wherever they go. Impossible not to. The most responsible one can be is to be cognizant of their biases in real time and decide if rightness or bias will predominate one’s decisions.
All you are describing is reverse discrimination, while tacitly acknowledging that pre-existent discrimination was indeed present..and acceptable. But efforts to dismantle that s**t are not. Got it.
Hear hear!
To paraphrase Winston Churchill, if the United States had not existed, we would all be German speaking slaves now.
The United States was the first victor of a war that neither carried away spoils, or taxed or worked the losing party.
Without doubt, societies begin as individualist and perish as collectivist. The American political spectrum is largely blind to this. Individuals across the political spectrum in America are blind to this. Propaganda drives mistrust in the individual and trust in the entity. Great suspicion is held towards arrogance. Only The Committee can determine quality, as the measures are shadowy and the committee meets in private. I rarely think and decide medical issues alone – someone always intervenes, just to remind me I’m being watched.