The Lynchburg Story
- Episode aired Feb 17, 1994
- 1h
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8.6/10
17
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- 1 win & 3 nominations
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An expose of how leading medical doctors in the U.S. were chief exponents and practitioners of forced eugenics
A shocking revelation that eugenics was actually practiced in the United States in the 1930s and 40s. Leading medical practitioners, backed by the rich and legal luminaries (including the revered Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes), practiced forced sterilizations on "feeble-minded persons." Their objective was to "purify the white race." And who were the feeble-minded? In their practice if not in their definition they were the "poor white trash." Women who had children out of wedlock were adjudged as "moral imbeciles" and locked up in institutions where they were sterilized. Hitler was inspired by the efforts of the American eugenicists and used their questionable hypotheses to purify the putative Aryan race first through sterilization but later with mass slaughter of those whose lives were deemed "unworthy of living." The American eugenicists in turn presented Hitler with a letter of commendation for his efforts in promoting the practice of "social hygiene." Clips of B&W movies critical of the practice were used in the movie. Somebody ought to help me identify them. In any case, I remember Laura Dern starring in a color movie on the same subject. She portrayed one of the victims of the gruesome social experiment. The state with the most number of forced sterilizations is Virginia with its huge mental institution at Lynchburg which housed thousands of inmates.
helpful•31
- Deusvolt
- Sep 17, 2006
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- Runtime1 hour
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