[waterbadger]

Yeah, I wasn’t trying to imply that they are the same. As a Catholic we don’t condone artificial birth control (or believe in divorce!) so it’s very different than the general 20th century perspective on things.

I do think it is important to historically understand where things most people take for granted come from because sometimes it can be pretty eye-opening.

There are many aspects of the modern world (birth control and related issues are just one) that were invented by people with intentions I think 90% of people would strongly disagree with if the they understood them.

[eesmith]

You said "Birth control is also rooted in eugenics." That is a tough argument to make.

Eugenics and birth control have been around for a very long time. Eg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_birth_control and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugenics#Origin_and_developmen... .

Galton, an early eugenicist, coined the term in 1883. I'll use ~1880 as the start date for that strain of eugenics.

The history of birth control page points out "The Malthusian League was established in 1877 and promoted the education of the public about the importance of family planning and advocated for the elimination of penalties against the promoters of birth control.[38] It was initially founded during the "Knowlton trial" of Annie Besant and Charles Bradlaugh in July 1877"

It also points out how "In the United States, contraception had been legal throughout most of the 19th century, but in the 1870s the Comstock Act and various state Comstock laws outlawed the distribution of information about safe sex and contraception and the use of contraceptives".

Which means birth control, and family planning, predate Galton, so cannot be rooted in eugenics, in the way you likely mean "eugenics" to mean.

Modern statistics was invented by eugenicists and "race scientists", like Galton.

[waterbadger]

Uh, I would consider something called the “Malthusian League” close enough to eugenics from my point of view.

But you are right, birth control itself predates modern era eugenics. What I meant was “modern” birth control.

A lot of the people who have shaped this cultural stuff are just very disturbed. In the past they were pretty open about their perspective before talking about it openly became somewhat taboo. As an example of the “Malthusian mindset” in 1954:

Nuclear scientist Harrison Brown publishes his book "The Challenge of Man’s Future". In the book Brown examines carefully the probability that the human carrying capacity of the planet is between 50 and 200 billion people, before summarizing the reasons this fact is best kept secret:

“If humanity had its way, it would not rest content until the earth is covered completely and to a considerable depth with a writhing mass of human beings, much as a dead cow is covered with a pulsating mass of maggots.”

Here is the papal encyclical “Humanae Vitae” by the way if you are interested in why the Church considers birth control to be harmful:

https://www.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/encyclicals/docume...