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The Holocaust and the Disability Community Bad Attitudes - part 9. Contents 1  Bad Attitudes                        - 2  Dedication and copyright issues      - 3  keith comment                        - 4  A mystery tour of related WEB sites  - Bad Attitudes If we look back at the numerous paths the various currents of activity took in the first 3 decades of the Twentieth Century we see that in the thirties they gradually amalgamated and a trend emerged in a certain direction (sterilisation of the mentally ill Nuremberg Laws etc.). which was striving to even greater heights .  The German racial and mental hygienists had prepared the ground for an all embracing project which they called the Euthanasia Programme but would more accurately have been called Mass Murder of Mental Patients. In 1921 the Professors Dr Erwin Baur, Dr Eugen Fischer and Dr Fritz Lenz jointly published the first edition of their two volume book, Human Hereditary Teaching and Racial Hygiene.  which was internationally recognised as a standard text book and soon was even used in  universities abroad In the second volume by Dr Lenz, first Professor for racial hygiene in Germany (1923 Munich), en_title_d 'Human Selection and Racial Hygiene, (Eugenics)' he wrote A real restoration to health of the race cannot be begun without generous measures and the organisation of social - racial hygiene, but these are mostly only introduced when the racial hygienic idea has become popular knowledge of the population or at least of the mental leaders,  These must first develop a feeling for the senselessness of a civilisation which allows a race to decay an order of society and economics which has no regard for the interests of eternal life, which in fact is often detrimental. The introduction of racial hygienic education in the secondary schools (high schools) and universities could effectively counter this illiteracy (lack of education) , unfortunately this will only become known in the right places.  As long as this is not the case the most important practical duty of racial hygiene is the private promulgation of racial hygiene ideas.  As soon as the racial hygiene conviction has become a living ideology then the racial hygiene organisations of life even public life will happen by itself.   Anyone who loves his race cannot wish for it to fall into decadence.  He must realise that the industriousness of the race is the first and unrelenting condition for the thriving of the race Even the fight for freedom and self assertion of the race must in the final instance serve the race.  When in a fight for power the best blood is sacrificed without substituting it, then it is senseless.  And when  racial damage has been caused through war, be it through error or because it was inevitable, it must  the first concern of those who do not want to see the race blind but seeing,, to even out these damages.  This is not just the substitution in number, much more important is the substitution of racial fitness. Even this requires the spirit of sacrifice and fortunately there is no lack of this.... there is only  a lack of understanding. . A brief look at the professional and ideological background of both of the authors of the first volume proves very interesting.  Baur and Fischer had both worked devotedly in the Kaiser Wilhelm  Institute for Anthropology,.  Human Hereditary Teaching and Eugenics in which Rudin first acted as curator. Baur, the biologist later became the first Nazi Rector of Berlin University where Fischer later lectured as a Professor for Anthropology.  In his de_base_ment of knowledge Fischer sank to the depths of praising Hans K F Gunther the author of 'racial Knowledge of the German Race'. who was a popular target for general ridicule even in Germany before the  Nazis promoted him to a university professorship. Later in 1941 Dr Otmar Freihwerr von Verschuer, Nazi professor and former colleague of  Baur, Fischer and Rudin in the Kaiser  Wilhelm Institute supported the Baur, Fischer. Lenz textbook with warm recommendations. Verschuer was the founder and first director of The Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Research at Frankfurt University opened in 1934.  Even if it produced nothing else, it brought a further star into he Nazi sky; Verschuer's former assistant Dr Joseph Mengele. From this position he later advanced to be one of the most infamous doctors in the concentration camp at Auschwitz, where he conducted experiments with living and fully conscious prisoners and tortured the inmates for the benefit of 'scientific advancement'.  After the war Mengele succeeded in escaping the Allies and the law.  he left Germany and fled via Italy to Paraguay. At the twelfth meeting of the international Federation of Eugenic Organisations, in Holland 1936, Verschuer appeared as the representative of his Institute with Ploetz,  Rudin and Fischer.. One of the papers read to the meeting was by Professor Karl Astel from Himmler's SS, ' race and Resettlement Office.' In 1923 Lenz took a further step  forward in his endeavours to find a solution to racial hygiene problems by stating that Euthanasia definitely had a place in the racial hygiene plan.  The propaganda drums beat without pause but it was only in the Thirties that the fatal Euthanasia propaganda campaign broke loose and went far beyond Germany's borders.  In July 1931 the Union of Bavarian Psychiatrists held a congress at Munich University. V Falthauser, psychiatrist and active proponent of the mental hygiene movement, who was striving towards yet greater achievement of the euthanasia programme, laid bare the basic thoughts behind the campaign got sterilisation and euthanasia with the following words; We Germans cannot totally neglect events which occur outside our borders.  A whole series of nations have positively accepted that the laws of heredity do affect the development of mental abnormality and have understood the consequences of that and created sterilisation laws.  The Americans have been reproached with their reckless pluck because of laws they passed in 22 of their states.  But when we see that an otherwise cool and calculating race such as the Danes pass a sterilisation law, how the Canton Waadt has also done this, while the Swedish ministries are seriously dealing with this problem then this must really give us something to think about. Before I end I must permit myself a few short comments which are forced upon me by an _object_ive conscience.  I believe that we must beware of exaggerated expectations of the success of sterilisation. Sterilisation, even compulsory will not be able to plug all the fountains of  bad hereditary mass. The principle used here to hoodwink the public into accepting enforced sterilisation is to first start a propaganda campaign for voluntary sterilisation.  This same rule also applies for compulsory euthanasia where propaganda starts with the introduction of  voluntary euthanasia.  Both Germany and England were literally flooded with Euthanasia campaigns. In England,  Dr Charles Killick-Millard, President of the Society of Medical Officers of Health,  brought up in his 1931 Presidential Speech the question of voluntary euthanasia and proposed a suitable law.  A few years later, he became a fellow founder of the Voluntary Euthanasia Legislation Society and became its' first Honorary Secretary. In 1935, Lord Moynihan, President of the Royal College of Surgeons, founded the Euthanasia Society.  A year later this Society handed its' recommendations for an Euthanasia project to the House of Lords. Among other things it provided for the possibility of incurably ill persons being able to petition 'the Euthanasia Office of the Ministry of Health' to let themselves be delivered from their sufferings.   It further suggested that the applicant should after consulting his close relatives, handle his estate and choose two medical advisors and a doctor.  The Ministry could give its' consent for the mercy death to take place after a period of seven days, time allowed for the chance of a change of heart, or an appeal if the relatives so desired.  This proposal was fortunately turned down. However, as early as 1923, a step in this direction was taken in Switzerland and a draft for such a law was presented in Denmark in 1924.  In the U.S.A., The Chamber of Doctors of the state of Illinois even requested the approval of mercy death .     In 1937 draft laws were presented to the parliaments of Canada and Nebraska, USA.  The American Society of Euthanasia was established in 1938,  on similar lines a society of voluntary euthanasia was founded in Connecticut.   1934 in  Germany, Baur (who had long advocated the sterilisation law) foretold that such a law would only be a start. The actual German campaign for euthanasia took many forms. FILMS Films were produced (among others I accuse ) which were to make obvious that there were useful and less useful members of society.  These were intended to cause astonishment on the part of the viewer as to why anybody bothered to prolong these unproductive human lives at all .   NEWSPAPERS Articles in newspapers informed the reader about the costs caused by the mentally ill and showed plainly how the money could be used for more productive and creative things . SCHOOL BOOKS The campaign was so extensive that it even reached school books, in which the nature of the problems were to direct the attention of the pupil of the subject.  One example is the 1935 arithmetic textbook written by Alfred Dorner, whose series of distorted and disguised questions were to have the desired influence. to be continued............. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - dedication and copyright issues This text is humbly dedicated to the memory of countless ordinary people - those men, women, children and babies of many races and beliefs, whose lives were taken because they were considered less than perfect and, therefore unworthy to live. I hope this will help serve in its own way to keep their memory alive and that it will help to remind us all of the price we have to pay when extremists have the power to decide upon our right to live It is my desire that this text be distributed as widely as possible; and thus I hereby not only give my consent, but urge the distribution, translation,publication, reprinting and quoting of this book in part or in whole by any person, group or organisation that may wish to so do. Unfortunately, my financial situation made it impossible to distribute this text as widely as I  would have liked and I hope that the step I have taken will inspire others to actively participate in this German warning to the world. Bernhard Schreiber - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - keith comment: This series will be posted in a number of parts (frequency dependent upon how i'm feeling), the last being an extensive bibliography on the subject. i hope that the new format is easier to read. one of the main problems faced by the disability community is the lack of knowledge of the collective history. London Evening Standard 11, June, 1996 article by Lesley Garner Why we should think before we judge this woman. about a mother who is suing Northwick Park & St Marks NHS Trust because they failed to diagnose Spina Bifida in her unborn baby . The mother stated that her son should have been aborted. no one positive comment about people with the condition in the thoughout the article.  no interview with adults who have the condition.   in seeking to re-address this imbalance i am posting a series from Bernhard Schreibers' The Men, behind Hitler (out of print) about the Holocaust and the Disabled Community. i hope that the circulation of this text goes some way in preventing history repeating itself. while the majority of this well researched text is about Germany, many other countries have had eugenic policies that have harmed members of the disability community, at present we do not know the full truth. together we must make sure that it never happens again! it is quite ironic that these Nazi thugs with respectable _title_s suffered a major blow in second world war by a western leader who was both a wheelchair user and a Polio survivor.  Roosevelt (possibly the greatest US President of all time) would himself have been murdered at the hands of these respectable  eugenistis. So would Einstein, he had dyslexia. keith  : - a mystery tour of related sites - http://www.africa2000.com/ENDX/endx.htm http://www.batech.com/~gottshall1/article.htm http://www.oup-usa.org/docs/0195077318.html http://www.aladdin.co.uk/cfinney/biosis/human/toc.html http://www.carol.net/~ndsc/eugenics.html http://www.africa2000.com/ENDX/aedata.htm http://www.ahoynet.com/~all/eugenics.html http://www.appi.org/ajp/ajptoc.html (see AJP January, 1996) http://www.globalnet.co.uk/~pmatthews/DisabilityNet/MusclePower/Issue... http://www.ohre.doe.gov./ http://www.med.upenn.edu/%7Ebioethic/library/papers/art/EugenicsNotre... http://mercury.cair.du.edu/~jperlman/IQpaper.html