Posted on 08/04/2007 11:02:02 AM PDT by wagglebee
The State of North Carolina sterilized Mary English.
The Fayetteville woman was 22 at the time, pregnant and divorced. The year was 1972.
She says the doctor who performed the procedure told her it was birth control.
Almost three years later the same doctor, an OB-GYN, said she had been sterilized. English cried that she had not been told that before. She says the doctor scoffed at her concern and even laughed.
The doctor still works in Fayetteville, she says.
I know who he is, and he knows who he is, she says.
She is not ready to reveal his name, but says it will be soon.
Meanwhile, English and others told their stories to the state House Appropriations Committee on Thursday. State Rep. Larry Womble, a Forsyth County Democrat, is leading an effort to get compensation for English and 7,600 others who underwent procedures as part of a sterilization program funded by the state from 1929 to 1974.
The woe of English and others present a no-brainer for our legislators. They should duly compensate each one of the victims of this tragic abuse.
Since the state did this, the state ought to be responsible for this, Womble has said. And the state ought to make sure these people are made whole.
What monetary amount would be just, Lord only knows. How can the state truly make amends for robbing people of their ability to give that most priceless gift, life?
The sterilization effort was based on the bankrupt theory of eugenics, that society would improve if those designated as the worst sort were not allowed to reproduce. These were people who were supposedly morally or mentally deficient. Usually, they were poor people.
Although a disproportionate number of blacks such as English were targeted, class played as big a role as race.
Whites accounted for the largest number of victims, with 2,851 women and 675 men sterilized, according to an exhibit on eugenics at the State Museum of History in Raleigh. The numbers for blacks are 2,098 women and 235 men.
Visitors to the exhibit can pick up a receiver upon entering and hear English and others tell their stories. She took part in the opening ceremony in June.
She does not know why her doctor encouraged her to take part in what he said was a birth-control program, paid for by the state. She admits to signing a piece of paper but says she was misled. She says she would have definitely remembered if the doctor had said the word sterilization.
I totally trusted my doctor, she says.
Today, English, whom friends call Bunny, does not sound bitter, but determined. She has made a good life for herself, she says, and raised three children whom she had before the procedure. She has five grandchildren.
She has worked on TV and radio in the Fayetteville area and now volunteers for the Arts Council. She was downtown Friday for the Fourth Friday arts event, enjoying life.
She says people have encouraged her to seek legal action against the doctor, but she does not see the good in that. She is just glad that people are now aware of what went on.
A lot of people dont know it happened, she says.
So are you telling me that the participants did not know they were receiving an operation that would prevent pregnancy?
I certainly consider it to be one.
You have a very twisted moral code. But I do find it very telling that you quoted Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (who was not actually Chief Justice of the United States). Holmes was widely known for being a moral relativist and a great supported of eugenics as shown in his Buck v. Bell opinion which MANDATED sterilization of the mentally retarded.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_v._Bell
Got it.
“War Against the Weak:Eugenics and America’s Campaign to Create a Master Race”
by Edwin Black
available through Amazon and many other dealers.
For the record,
If our leaders do not protect our right to life, by what principle do they defend lesser rights to liberty or to bear arms?
If they think the fundamental purpose of gov’t-
PROTECTING OUR LIVES
is a right that is reserved to the states to protect IF they so choose,
under what principle do you think they will protect your right to bear arms?
If you have no unalienable right to life,
then you have no unalienable right to defend your life.
I hardly think supporting one idea that just happens to be among the myriad under the eugenics umbrella amounts to total embracement of the entire package.
Forced sterilization is a PRIMARY component of eugenics.
Margaret Sanger would be proud!
A lot of this disgrace occurred while Sanger was alive and with her support.
You should come take a look at this thread.
Apparently you either have a warped definition of the word 'forced' or you think some people are legally required to accept public assistance and by extension the conditions attached to receiving it.
Wow, there was a neat group for you to join back in the 30s. Neat uniforms,a leader with charm and appeal and a whole other class of people to hate. Back then, you could not only make sure they are not able to have children, but you could put them in camps and gas them.
Sieg Heil Mien Furher......
You can judge a society by the way it takes care of its unforunates. America is the greatest land in the world because we help people like this out.
If the North Carolina was involved in this woman's sterilization, then it ought to be held accountable, even though it happened over 30 years ago.
Here're more details on state-sponsored sterilizations:
http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/essay8text.html
You are deliberately and dishonestly associating one idea you don't like with a whole host of ideas that are not endorsed by the post you responded to. It amounts to guilt by association and is a strawman argument. You can't refute the single idea as it has been proposed so you invent a larger position that was never claimed and attack that instead.
How pathetic.
In short, no, these women, as well as Indian women had no idea what was being done to them. They were just handed a piece of paper, told to sign it to receive treatment (sometimes under coercion), and then operated on. I study this kind of stuff for a living, so I know of what I speak...
Norplant is not sterilization. It is birth control. The military used to give it to female enlistees, I think. Maybe they still do.
I think it is a good idea. It’s not permanent. It wears off in a few years. A female soldier that is taken captive and raped does not want to end up pregnant. She also does not want the hassle of the monthly cycle coming around when trying to fight for her life.
Excuse me? We have someone advocating forced sterilization and you think it is wrong to bring up the connection to Hitler?
You keep using the word ‘forced’. I don’t think it means what you think it means.
No, YOU don’t.
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=80921&sID=4
In short, no, these women, as well as Indian women had no idea what was being done to them. They were just handed a piece of paper, told to sign it to receive treatment (sometimes under coercion), and then operated on. I study this kind of stuff for a living, so I know of what I speak...
I do not doubt that there have been programs that deceived and/or forced sterilization. However, do you have information that shows this to be so in the specific case in this article - keeping in mind Ms. English herself acknowledges that she volunteered, knew it was an operation, and knew it would make her unable to get pregnant?
Any other program you can cite, while tragic and wrong, is entirely irrelevant to Ms. English's case.
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