Race Theory in Practice: Who Was the First
It is generally accepted that Nazi Germany was the first to use racial theory and the national prejudice that some were better and more capable than others. However, Germany has become only a follower of a practice that was widespread at the beginning of the 20th century in the United States.
Researchers attribute the emergence of racial ideas to the spread of Social Darwinism. In short, Social Darwinism is considered to be a non-scientific (pseudoscientific) direction of theories and social practices based on the idea that people of different human races are representatives of different biological species. The difference between these species is characterized by a difference in instincts, heredity, reason, and the capacity for intellectual development. These physiological differences determine the difference between species in social life and create a hierarchy from the fittest to the less fit.
In this way, Darwin’s teachings formed the basis of the race struggle. At first, these theories were prevalent in Western Europe and North America. And if in Western Europe Social Darwinism first of all lay on colonial soil and smoothly passed into the policy of governing the colonies (here it implies the burden of the white man – the desire to “help” other races through education, religion, and the creation of social institutions), then in the United States this trend was reflected in the domestic political soil.
It is worth saying that at the end of the 19th century, the concepts of nationality and nation were just beginning to take hold and become political motivators for the creation of separate nation-states. The U.S. was no exception to this. The idea that the people of the United States were one nation also began to spread only during this period: it was Woodrow Wilson, in his speeches to the people, who would use the term “American nation” to unite the people under the single concept of “nation.” True Americans, from his point of view, are those who are the descendants of the first settlers who went through the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, etc.
However, for a long time, the United States was a fairly open state for emigration – refugees from European countries, as well as from the Russian Empire (Jews, Germans) flocked there. Thus, on the nascent soil of a united American nation and a policy of isolation from the rest of the world (refusal to participate in European wars and an ultimatum to other countries not to interfere in American affairs), these theories fell remarkably.
How it was
First, the ships that arrived with the emigrants were strictly selected from among those who had the right to live in the United States: only the most able-bodied. The sick, the disabled, and all those who, in the opinion of the commission, could not be of any use to the state in the ports, were sent back. You can imagine how many families have been separated because of this selection.
Secondly, Social Darwinism had to be used against its own people: those who were seen in deviant behavior – people who were in prisons and mental hospitals – were also seen as unworthy of procreation in the United States: men were castrated, and women were deprived of the opportunity to bear offspring.
Thirdly, the measurement of beauty began to spread in the United States: calipers, various signs indicating the “correct” facial features, height and body weight – all this formed the basis of the newly emerged beauty contests, in which people who had passed a preliminary medical examination could participate. Why let in people whose parameters didn’t fit the right ones?
Naturally, beauty contests existed even earlier: in Ancient Greece, in the Muscovite state (bride shows). However, if in the old days they mainly concerned only women, then in the United States the practice of beauty contests among children and men began to spread.
The practice lived for several decades and gradually came to naught with the advent of the new government. However, Germany managed to intercept so many important ideas for it after the defeat in the First World War, so even before the arrival of the Nazis, special institutions began to appear in which the “useless” inhabitants of the country were kept: the disabled, the mentally ill, the elderly. Some were also deprived of the opportunity to continue their lineage, and some began to be subjected to completely new methods: murder in gas chambers.
The Third Reich successfully adopted the methods of creating the ideal race that had been developed over the years by identifying the right physiological characteristics and eliminating those that did not fit them.
Author – Kateryna Brotskaya.