Everything that is concealed will be brought to light
When I was working as an award-winning reporter in Virginia before coming back to North Carolina nine years ago I first heard of the details of the eugenics movement in the American south. At the time I was flabbergasted. What a cruel, evil and hypocritical history we have as a nation in relationship to how we treat the powerless among us even as we project absolute power across the oceans and sands and mountains of foreign lands across the globe.
A quote from Bellow I recently came across sums it up quite well. Describing living in America as being:
“In a society that was no community and devalued the person. Owing to the multiplied power of numbers which made the self negligible. Which spent military billions against foreign enemies but would not pay for order at home.”
It’s stories like those told again today in a New York Times acrticle about how much the state will need to pay victims of our eugenics program in North Carolina that amplify that certain dead-on analysis that Bellow hit on more than 50 years ago.
This anecdote at the end of the article is just one small glimpse into our true nature and the legacy we leave truth once future generations scratch the surface beyond the thin layer of red, white and blue that we’ve long hidden behind:
For Nial Ramirez, 65, who was sterilized at 18 after she gave birth to her daughter, no amount could make it right.
A social worker from the Washington County Department of Public Welfare suggested that she get sterilized. Mrs. Ramirez said she did not understand that the procedure was permanent and thought she had no choice.
“They told me that my brothers and sisters were going to be in the streets all because of you,” she said. “It’s either sign the paper or mama’s checks get cut off.”
In 1973, with the help of the American Civil Liberties Union, she became the first person to file a lawsuit against the state eugenics board. It ended with a $7,000 settlement from the doctor, she said.
Now in a small apartment surrounded by the sound of the television and some of the 200 dolls she has collected through her lifetime, Ms. Ramirez remains angry. She does not want an apology, and she will not settle for the amounts being discussed.
“What would an apology do for me?” she said. “You don’t know what my kids were going to be. You don’t know what kids God was going to give me. Twenty thousand dollars ain’t gonna do it, honey.”
