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The Rise of Eugenics in America

Season 1 Episode 1 | 5m 54s

By the early 1900s, many white protestant Americans came to fear they were about to be outnumbered and outbred by immigrants and their offspring. They embraced a new pseudo-science born in Britain, called eugenics. It falsely claimed you could eliminate everything from poverty and prostitution to disabilities if you stopped the individuals they dismissed as “socially defective” from reproducing.

Corporate funding provided by Bank of America. Major funding provided by David M. Rubenstein; the Park Foundation; the Judy and Peter Blum Kovler Foundation; Gilbert S. Omenn and Martha A. Darling; The Arthur Vining Davis Foundations; and by the following members of The Better Angels Society: Jeannie and Jonathan Lavine; Jan and Rick Cohen; Allan and Shelley Holt; the Koret Foundation; David and Susan Kreisman; Jo Carole and Ronald S. Lauder; Blavatnik Family Foundation; Crown Family Philanthropies, honoring the Crown and Goodman Families; the Fullerton Family Charitable Fund; Dr. Georgette Bennett and Dr. Leonard Polonsky; The Russell Berrie Foundation; Diane and Hal Brierley; John and Catherine Debs; and Leah Joy Zell and the Joy Foundation. Funding was also provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and by public television viewers.
Extras
Asking how we as a society can learn from the past.
Asking if the U.S. has a responsibility to intervene in humanitarian crises.
Asking what it means to be a land of immigrants.
Asking what individuals can do when governments fail to act.
As war begins, some Americans work tirelessly to help refugees; others remain indifferent.
As the Allies liberate German camps, the public sees the sheer scale of the Holocaust.
Reversing open borders, a xenophobic backlash prompts Congress to restrict immigration.
An attempt to save refugee children in the US hits antisemitism "so deep and so cruel."
Una reacción xenófoba lleva al Congreso a restringir la inmigración.
Los Aliados liberan los campos Alemanes y el público ve la magnitud del Holocausto.