The case for sterilisation / by Leon F. Whitney.

  • Whitney, Leon F. (Leon Fradley), 1894-1973.
Date:
[1935]
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: The case for sterilisation / by Leon F. Whitney. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    26/240 (page 6)
    enlightened understanding. The case for sterilisation rests on sound principles, it has the highest possible humanitarian aims and the support of countless scientific authorities, and it is growing more vitally important in our lives every day. No one can deny that our present trend is toward a planned society—planned biologically as well as economically ; and no planned social order is attainable without careful consideration of the kind of people we want to have forming the race of the future. Inevitably the question arises, How are we to achieve the desired effect ? And the answer is : Cut off the useless classes by preventing their reproduction, and increase the better—that is, the useful and self-sustaining, not necessarily the more brilliant. For the sake of our children if not for our own sake, we must reduce the terrific burden of degeneracy that we have loaded on our shoulders through our policy in the past. I believe that sterilisation is but a part of the general discipline that we call social planning, and it is from this point of view that I shall discuss it. This is to be no neutral book—it is frankly advocacy of a worthy cause that I have for many years studied in all its aspects. I have even debated it on a number of occasions, sometimes taking the side against sterilisation. But after reading all that I could find on the subject and weighing the evidence carefully, I am now whole heartedly in favour of it under certain strictly defined conditions, and it would be hypocritical to assume an attitude of neutrality. But by advocacy I mean educa tional advocacy of the most disinterested sort. In two chapters I have brought forward all the objections that