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- Newsgroups: talk.abortion
- Path: sparky!uunet!usc!sdd.hp.com!nigel.msen.com!heifetz!rotag!kevin
- From: kevin@rotag.mi.org (Kevin Darcy)
- Subject: Re: Fetal tissue research, Nathanson, etc.
- Message-ID: <1992Jul25.234703.18393@rotag.mi.org>
- Organization: Who, me???
- References: <BrGKqr.En3@news.cso.uiuc.edu> <1992Jul16.131928.6243@pwcs.stpaul.gov> <BrIpKH.1AE@news.cso.uiuc.edu>
- Date: Sat, 25 Jul 1992 23:47:03 GMT
- Lines: 68
-
- In article <BrIpKH.1AE@news.cso.uiuc.edu> slkg9733@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Steven L. Kellmeyer) writes:
- >chrisl@stpaul.gov (Chris A Lyman) writes:
- >
- >>slkg9733@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Steven L. Kellmeyer) writes:
- >>> chrisl@stpaul.gov (Chris A Lyman) writes:
- >
- >
- >>Read 'em and bleep, Kellmeyer.
- >
- >>The following are excerpts from the book, "Mothers in the Fatherland" by Claudia
- >>Koonz, Ph.D. and professor of history at the College of the Holy Cross,
- >>Worchester, Mass. Ms. Koonz shows that the Third Reich was very much anti-
- >>abortion regarding BlondeBlueEyedChermanFrauen.
- >
- >> In the 1930's many Europeans shared a panic about declining birthrates,
- >> the decaying family, and economic crisis. The French awarded medals to
- >> prolific mothers. British legislators debated family subsidies and
- >> provided income tax relief for families with many children. Mussolini
- >> declared a "battle of the birthrate." Stalin sharply curtailed the
- >> rights granted to women during the 1920's. Everywhere politicians
- >> decreed harsher sanctions against birth control and abortion, and in
- >> many nations eugenics enjoyed considerable popularity. The Nazi
- >> revival of motherhood, like other aspects of Nazi social policy,
- >> carried to grotesque extremes plans that other nations advanced only
- >> timidly. The thoroughness of Nazi policy followed from Nazi leaders'
- >> frankly misogynistic view of women.
- >>
- >
- >Accurate, in re the birth rate worries, but hardly relevant.
- >
- >> ...
- >
- >> Although the combatants [Catholics and Nazis] were unevenly matched
- >> in the sterilization controversy, they agreed on one issue: The
- >> individual ought not be entrusted with the right to make decisions
- >> related to his or her reproductive potential. Catholic women
- >> disclaimed women's rights to limit pregnancy except by abstinence;
- >> Nazi women extolled motherhood as their highest goal in life, while
- >> denying to thousands of "undesirable" women the chance of ever
- >> marrying and bearing children. Neither group of women believed they
- >> had the right to control their bodies. According to Catholic dogma,
- >> no individual could interrupt a pregnancy for any reason without
- >> disobeying God's will because every human life was equal in the
- >> divine order. Nazi doctrine, founded on the distinction between
- >> "worthy" and "unworthy" life, enforced selective breeding by
- >> increasing penalties for abortions and prohibiting birth control.
- >> Both doctrines took decision making away from the individual.
- >
- >Dr. Koonz is incorrect. Penalties for abortion were not "increased".
- >Note that she fails to provide examples of what the law was before the Nazis
- >came to power, and how it changed afterwards. It takes very little research
- >to discover that Imperial Germany had outlawed abortion in 1870, mandating
- >a year's prison term for the woman, and a similar stretch for the
- >abortionist. That law was relaxed via the "eugenic courts" instituted in
- >1934. She omits this fact.
-
- "Eugenics". Think about that word, Kellmeyer. Maybe it's important to your
- research. Could it possibly be that the Nazis were ANTI-abortion for
- "desirable" races and PRO-abortion for "undesirable" ones? Could it be that
- they weren't "pro-choice" at all, since they, i.e. as a totalitarian regime,
- wanted to control the reproduction of their citizens, instead of entrusting
- those decisions to the citizens themselves?
-
- Does your research address this compellingly OBVIOUS interpretation of
- history? Or do you, as I suspect, suffer from a intellectual blind spot in
- this regard?
-
- - Kevin
-