How can that be, America compared to genocidal Nazi’s? How is the thought even fathomable? The arduous battle fought by our brave soldiers to end the tyranny of Adolf Hitler. To abolish the Third Reich and end their years of torture and murder.

We’re all familiar with the atrocities performed by the Nazi soldiers and the like. Hitler’s undying desire to rid Germany of the meek and feeble, the worthless, the poor, the genetically “unfit”, his ultimate plan of Creating the Master Race. The very thought of having to live through a time in history where the government sought to exterminate it’s own people on the absurd belief that they were unfit to live, makes me cringe.

Jumping back into current times, we presume that we are far removed from such an event, even further from a government and it’s followers to even think of devising such a plan. After some research, I’ve come to find out that we aren’t that far removed from such an atrocity. In fact, as I write this, I’m burdened with the truth that had my mother been declared an unfit citizen of the United States, I would not be here right now. Yes, declared unfit by the United States.

Being surrounded with horrific details of current war crimes, I’ve found myself fumbling through America’s dark history. The first thing I learned was that during World War II, America really wasn’t disgusted with Hitler’s plan for a master race, that in fact America aided Hitler in his quest. Sound absurd? It isn’t.

From 1933 to 1945 Nazi Germany’s government began racial health policies that began with mass sterilization of “genetically diseased” persons. Something that was practiced, surprisingly by numerous countries.

What most American’s don’t know, is that during the years of 1927 and 1979, America sterilized more than 60,000 people nationwide. (Hitler actually praised the U.S. for it’s eugenics movement in Mein Kempf.) What is more startling is that the Eugenics law was first passed in 1907 in Indiana!

Even after the tragedies of World War II, after the entire nation had been exposed to the discovery of genocide and the techniques that had been performed by the Nazi’s upon innocent life, America still continued the practice of forced sterilization in it’s own plan to “cleanse the nation of genetically diseased” people.

California led the nation, recording over 20,000 involuntary sterilizations, Virginia being second with 8,000, most done before World War II.

Our fine nation had already begun it’s pursuit of genetic purity, which then became a blueprint for the Nazi effort to create their own master race.

These forced sterilizations happened so frequent, especially among poor Southerners, that it was labled “Mississippi Appendectomies”. Which is why many of these people never even new they were sterilized until years later when they tried to conceive. As most were given these surgeries disguised as appendix removals or in order to improve their health.

Think of your relatives, your mom,dad, grandparents, think of how old they were, think that the last forced sterilization was in 1979.

The numerous accounts of these forced sterilizations emerged in the newspaper in 1980. Late in the year of 1980 the American Civil Liberties Union of Virgina filed suit to force the state to locate, notify, and offer treatment to victims, almost 30 percent of whom were still of childbearing age!

A lawsuit was settled in 1985 and the state agreed to fund a campaign to alert patients to their possible sterilization. They even set up a confidential hot line to help those who had questions.

However, it wasn’t until 2002 when the state apologized for what it had done. Virginia wasn’t the first, Alberta, Canada apologized in 1999 for the forced sterilization of more than 2,800 people and also agreed to pay $82 million to 246 victims, in addition to more than $140 million they dished out in settlement with 900 other victims. Which just goes to show you that genocide wasn’t just practiced by Nazi Germany, it in fact stemmed from America who first practiced systematically sterilizing it’s own people to “racially cleanse it’s great nation”.

In fact, the more I keep reading about this, the more I discover it’s not really a secret. It’s just something we’re not told about, it’s something we have to look for. Just type “Nazi Eugenics” into your search engine, you’ll find more archives about the American Eugenics Society than you will about the Nazi’s Eugenics plan.

In addition to that, the new United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has an exhibit dedicated to the forced sterilization that was carried out in the United States.

What I’ve learned: Acts of torture are only bad when places other than the U.S. are doing it.