From A Storehouse of Knowledge

Eugenics is any practice or ideology that aims at improving the overall gene pool of future generations. The history of eugenics has been marred by the practices of the Nazi regime and forced sterilisation programmes of various governments.

Types

Broadly, there are two distinctions that can be made between types of eugenics: First, negative eugenics aims to prevent or discourage reproduction by individuals with genetic defects or other hereditary traits that are perceived as undesirable by the individual or individuals responsible for the policy, while positive eugenics aims to encourage or compel reproduction by individuals with hereditary traits perceived as desirable by those responsible for the policy. Second, coercive eugenics involves the use of criminal penalties, involuntary medical procedures, and/or naked force to achieve its aims, while non-coercive eugenics involves the use of moral persuasion and/or financial incentives. Although it is not clear whether true coercive positive eugenics has ever been practiced, many programs of war rape are closely related. All three other combinations have been put into practice at various times by various groups, alone or together, although most attention and moral outrage focuses on coercive negative eugenics.

Eugenics is in some ways similar to selective breeding of domestic animals, a comparison which has been made by both its supporters and its detractors.

History

Eugenics was most popular in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Coercive eugenics has fallen out of favour in the modern era because its implementation requires a high level of government control over decisions that most people feel should be taken by the individual people concerned, and because of the bad reputation it gained as a result of association with the Nazis. The term eugenics is rarely used today because most people associate it with coercive forms, and also, again, with the Nazis. Whether this should be considered an example of the association fallacy is a matter of heavy dispute between supporters and opponents. In fact, programs of a eugenic nature, principally conducted by private citizens and non-governmental organizations and generally of a non-coercive negative eugenic nature, continue, without the use of the name. For example, genetic screening is, in practice, a tool for self-imposed negative eugenics.

Any programme of coercive eugenics can be hijacked by a malicious government and used to persecute certain minority groups or even individuals; this happened in Germany under the Nazi party before and during the Second World War, as well as in the United States, especially but not exclusively in the South.

Today, medical technology can enable doctors to test babies in the womb for inherited diseases and other conditions, and abort them very early in the pregnancy if they test positive. Opposition to this is partly due to its association with the sinister eugenics movement of the last century.