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arguchikwow, that was quick. cold spring harbor's board of trustees has suspended james watson from his post because of the racist remarks i posted about yesterday. in the world of science, this is pretty huge. he's been there for 40 years.
i find it very disturbing, though, to hear comments like that from the guy who was in charge of a huge part of the human genome project (HGP).
lest cold spring harbor's trustees get too uppity on this matter--and don't get me wrong, they're doing the right thing, but their own station played a large role in the u.s.'s racist agenda: for decades during the first part of the 20th century, charles davenport worked at cold spring harbor. if you're not familiar with his name...he was a leader of the eugenics movement in the u.s., and he ran the central eugenics record keeping office at cold spring harbor along with a guy named harry laughlin. their agenda? to forcibly sterilize anyone deemed "feebleminded," which usually translated as "poor" or "of color." for them, this was an issue of national "racial hygiene." their agenda had a lot of popular support--theodore roosevelt wrote and spoke widely on the subject. it was also endorsed and enforced by the u.s. supreme court in buck v. bell.
lest we forget.
i find it very disturbing, though, to hear comments like that from the guy who was in charge of a huge part of the human genome project (HGP).
lest cold spring harbor's trustees get too uppity on this matter--and don't get me wrong, they're doing the right thing, but their own station played a large role in the u.s.'s racist agenda: for decades during the first part of the 20th century, charles davenport worked at cold spring harbor. if you're not familiar with his name...he was a leader of the eugenics movement in the u.s., and he ran the central eugenics record keeping office at cold spring harbor along with a guy named harry laughlin. their agenda? to forcibly sterilize anyone deemed "feebleminded," which usually translated as "poor" or "of color." for them, this was an issue of national "racial hygiene." their agenda had a lot of popular support--theodore roosevelt wrote and spoke widely on the subject. it was also endorsed and enforced by the u.s. supreme court in buck v. bell.
lest we forget.
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