Eugenics is Considered a Form of Scientific Fascism Today, But 100 Years Ago It Was Universally Popular

History Unplugged Podcast · May 4, 2023 · 1h 1m

Inspired by Charles Darwin’s ideas about evolution, the theory of eugenics arose in Victorian England as a proposal for ‘improving’ the British population. It quickly spread to America, where it was embraced by presidents, funded by Gilded Age monopolists, and enshrined into racist laws that became the ideological cornerstone of the Third Reich. Despite this horrific legacy, eugenics looms large today as the advances in genetics in the last thirty years—from the sequencing of the human genome to modern gene editing techniques—have brought the idea of population purification back into the…