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The Oklahoman uses eugenics as example to cast doubt on modern scientific study…

12:21 PM EDT on July 25, 2017

In last Thursday's paper, The Oklahoman published a ridiculous editorial that attempted to compare the eugenics movement –  a cruel social experiment popularized in the early 1900s that aimed to improve the genetic composition of the human race through selective breeding and the sterilization of targeted "undesirables" like the poor, disabled and minorities – to modern scientific study.

Although the paper doesn't mention the words specifically, it's basically just another attempt by "The State's Most Trusted News" to discredit and cast doubt upon the proven science of global warming – the biggest environmental crisis we'll face as a civilization.

Get your eyes ready to roll...

In policy debates, bowing to "science" can lead down dark paths

AMONG the most intellectually offensive tactics of some activists is to proclaim “science” a cudgel for silencing debate. That's not a new practice, and it's worth noting how acquiescence to such tactics played out in the past.

Throughout much of the first half of the 20th century, the “science” of eugenics was aggressively promoted by prominent politicians, attorneys and medical professionals, particularly political progressives. Darwinian evolution and advances in genetics and biology were cited as scientific justification for a wide range of policies, including forced sterilization.

Yep. It's "intellectually offensive" to go all Thomas Dolby and proclaim "Science" a cudgel for silencing debate," but using a sick social movement of the early 1900s to unfairly discredit science is intellectually brilliant and A-okay! Who cares that eugenics was developed in a time before the advent of technologies, breakthroughs and discoveries that have revolutionized our understanding of the human body and universe around us. It's a totally fair comparison.

Here's more:

In 1915, Dr. W.C. Rucker, associate surgeon general of the U.S. Public Health Service, flatly declared, “Eugenics is a science. It is a fact, not a fad.”

In 1916, an Oklahoma State Board of Health column, which ran statewide, declared the object of eugenics was “the improvement of the inherent type and the mental and physical capacities of the individual in the future.” The board advised the “most important eugenic recommendations” included “segregation of defectives so that they may not mingle their family traits with those on sound lines” and “sterilization of certain gross and hopeless defectives.

Right. And until the mid-1800s, many doctors practiced bloodletting. Maybe The Oklahoman is saving that example for an editorial that attempts to cast doubt on the science surrounding man-made earthquakes.

Seriously, what point are they trying to make here? Are we supposed to be weary and distrustful of the scientific consensus because some uninformed physicians who lived 100 years ago thought it was okay to practice selective breeding on humans? This argument is so stupid it's insulting. It's like comparing apples to Orange Crush. Hell, even The Blaze wouldn't publish an editorial this ridiculous.

Actually, they will. Check out this article from April of 2016:

Eugenics and Global Warming. Both Settled Science. Both Wrong.

At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th the intellectual consensus was that eugenics was “settled science.”

It was believed that “the best” human beings were not having as many children as inferior ones. Those considered inferior were foreigners, immigrants, Jews, Blacks, degenerates, the unfit and the “feeble minded.” The solution was for government to control reproduction in order to improve the gene pool...

The “settled science” around which the elites have rallied today is global warming.

The solution to global warming, of course, is similar to their solution for most of the problems they see. First, we must raise taxes. Second, we must give the government more power.

As was the case with eugenics, global warmists attract huge sums of money from governments for research that reinforces the preordained position.

Fortunately, as was the case with eugenics, not all scientists fall for the most recent politically popular position and frank scientific discovery is raising serious questions about the scientific fad that is global warming.

There has been no warming in the past 18 years and 10 months.

Let it be known that on July 20th, 2017, The Oklahoman – the flagship newspaper of Oklahoma and the official paper of record for the state's stodgy and conservative Grand Old Party – has stooped to the level of regurgitating anti-science propaganda that was first published on The Blaze. I'm not sure if E.K. Gaylord is turning in his grave or dancing.

This is alarming in one of three ways:

A. The Oklahoman Editorial Page writers are mining alt-right paranoia propaganda outlets for material
B. The Oklahoman Editorial Page writers actually share the same twisted thoughts and viewpoints as alt-right propaganda outlets
C. Both "A" and "B"

There's another thing we have to worry about, too. Let's go back to The Oklahoman's editorial and check out this history lesson. I guess Oklahoma lawmakers were stupid idiots in the 1930s, too.

By the 1930s, Oklahoma's Legislature authorized sterilization of inmates at prisons and mental asylums. Sen. Louis Ritzhaupt, a Guthrie Democrat and medical doctor who would serve as president of the Oklahoma Medical Association, championed the law.

In 1934, Ritzhaupt warned that the number of jail and mental hospital patients was growing steadily, draining taxpayer dollars. “The only way to curtail this expense is to stop production of potential inmates.” He claimed people subjected to sterilization, “during any sane interval, will welcome the procedure.”

Great. Next year, expect the Derplahoman caucus of the Oklahoma legislature to introduce legislation that will bring back eugenics concepts to "treat" the mentally ill, prisoners, and other "undesirables" all in effort to control the prison population. Hell, they'll probably use it on greedy fat-cat school superintendents, too. History always has a way of repeating itself.

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