Written by Kathy Clubb
Abortion provider, Marie Stopes International, recently changed its name to MSI in an effort to distance itself from its founder’s policy of eugenics. Marie Stopes, who was a well-known advocate for contraception in the early twentieth century, was equally well-known for her views on racial purity – something which was far less controversial in those days than in our own. Conversely, it was Stopes’ promotion of contraception which was seen as radical at the time, whereas today that would hardly raise an eyebrow.
The current head of MSI, Simon Cooke, was interviewed earlier[1] this month and explained that his organisation had been contemplating the name change since late last year, but finally took action when Black Lives Matter protests reignited the topic of racism. Cooke said that conflict over the name had largely been confined within the organisation; staff had become increasingly uncomfortable with Stopes’ racist views.
Cooke also noted that most of MSI’s work is done outside the UK, so not many people are aware of the abortion provider’s eugenic roots. But this simply is not true as FLI and other pro-life groups have been exposing Stopes’ desire for racial purity for some time.
In reality, Marie Stopes International does have close ties with eugenics, even in our day, despite Cooke stating that his organisation ‘neither adheres to nor condones’ the practise.
Apart from well-educated members of the pro-life community, most people are unlikely to consider that abortion on the grounds of fetal abnormality is eugenic. However, purifying the gene pool is precisely the role of this kind of abortion, and in the UK, where around 74% of abortions are performed outside the public health system[2], Marie Stopes is an integral part of this eugenic programme.
One disability for which the prognosis is overwhelmingly weighted towards abortion, is Down Syndrome. British journalist, Dominic Lawson, who has a child with Down Syndrome, wrote a very eloquent defence[3] of the value of all human life; his article is an equally harsh condemnation of eugenics.
Lawson cites an upcoming episode of the UK soap opera, “Emmerdale”, in which two popular characters contemplate an abortion for their Down Syndrome baby. The episode has underscored the pressure faced by parents from a medical industry that is hostile to families wishing to lovingly accept babies who are not ‘perfect.’ Dominic Lawson’s article relates the experiences of several parents who were under immense pressure from doctors and nurses to abort their Down Syndrome children – one mother said she had been offered an abortion on around fifteen occasions, with another saying that medical staff continued to pressure her even at 38 week’ gestation. Lawson’s experience is typical of most parents who chose life for their Down Syndrome babies and abhor the thought of eliminating this condition through eugenic abortion.
The disconnect between MSI’s politically correct policy and the horrific reality of its eugenic abortions is nowhere clearer than in its dealings with China. The MSI website proudly claims that it began working with the Chinese government to supply abortions and contraceptives in 2000, officially opening Marie Stopes clinics in that country in 2015. While MSI is quite open about its ‘social marketing’ of abortion equipment and the education it provides for Chinese abortionists, it is more reticent about its role in China’s genocide against the minority Uigher population.
China’s population control efforts were originally aimed at ensuring couples limited their family size to only one, and occasionally two, children. This One-Child policy resulted in the wholesale slaughter of millions of unborn and even born babies, with a majority being baby girls, who are seen as inferior by that culture and this has left countless Chinese men unable to find wives. Chinese women also have an extremely high rate of suicide, which has led many to believe that this is connected with China’s forced abortions and high voluntary abortion rate.
Even after the policy was extended to allow for another child per couple, Chinese women have by and large failed to increase their family size. The Chinese government’s newest five-year-plan for population control is aimed at reversing the alarming demographic decline it inflicted on its own people through the bloody One-Child policy, whilst “improving the quality of the population.”[4]
This means that the Chinese government is committed to encouraging more children among its native Han Chinese population, whilst reducing birth rates in the mostly Moslem Uigher community, whom it deems to be inferior. Uigher women can be sent to detention centres for having too many children and are targeted by Chinese authorities[5] for forced pregnancy testing, forced insertion of IUD’s and forced abortion and Marie Stopes International is right on hand to help with those grim tasks.
Since 2015, Marie Stopes China has been part of the China-UK Global Health Support Programme (GHSP). The first stage of the programme ran from 2012 to 2019, and was funded by the UK government to the tune of 12 million pounds.[6] The GHSP is committed to implementing the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, and as it has been well-documented, population control is a key part of this agenda.
According to a research paper, China has, for the last few decades, ‘faithfully executed the global development agenda’ but the paper fails to mention that this has been achieved by faithfully executing millions of tiny babies.
Marie Stopes’ eugenic work is not limited to eliminating unwanted Chinese babies, however. Under the Global Health Support Programme, MSI works with China to provide ‘reproductive health’ services to other countries, such as Myanmar and Ethiopia.
The nation of Myanmar, also known as Burma, has been undergoing ethnic cleansing of its minority Rohingya population since 1948. In addition to shocking genocidal massacres, Rohingya couples have had restrictions placed on their ability to marry and have children. (Perhaps it’s one of those lost-in-translation quirks, but a medical supply company known as “Eugenics Company Myanmar” sells pregnancy test kits in its range[7].)
Even if the Rohingyans manage to flee across the border to Bangladesh, they are still under pressure – from within refugee camps run by the UN – not to have more than two children.[8] And, as usual, Marie Stopes is there to help provide contraception and abortion.[9] In fact, MSI has been part of the world-wide push for providing abortion and contraception to refugees and making ‘reproductive health’ a human right even when nefarious governments are acting in a clearly eugenic manner.
It is quite heart-breaking to think that instead of allowing displaced families to experience some joy and hope for the future at the prospect of welcoming a new baby, Marie Stopes is able to rush in with fear and loathing to convince poor women to have their children executed. This is done under the cloak of compassion of course, with abortion providers using the utilitarian jargon of NGO’s to hide their true intent. Buzzwords like ‘gender equity’, ‘women’s empowerment’ and ‘maternal health’ sound so much more palatable than the words of Stopes herself – the “degenerate, feeble-minded, and unbalanced” should not be allowed to reproduce and those who are “totally unfit for parenthood” must be sterilised.[10] The mission statement of Stopes’ Racial Progress organisation stated that “The haphazard production of children by ignorant, coerced, or diseased mothers is profoundly detrimental to the race.”[11]
In 2010, Marie Stopes hosted Li Bin, then head of China’s Family Planning department, at their UK headquarters. Spokesman Dana Hovig, who at that time was MSI’s Chief Executive, said that “the minister wanted to see how you can take voluntarism and choice into account and still deal with the population pressures China faces.”[12]
Judging by this comment, Marie Stopes was fully aware of China’s forced abortions and sterilisations but despite this, continued in its partnership with the Communist nation. Hovig went on to reassure the public that “Marie Stopes represents the good guys.” If baby-killers are the good guys, I’d hate to see the bad guys!It is reassuring to reflect that the Catholic Church has always been a major obstacle to the ideology of eugenics. Catholics are meant to live by the principle that all human beings are made in God’s image and that human life is sacred. New Advent provides a concise explanation of why the modern scientific world differs from traditional Catholic teaching in the area of eugenics:
“The root difference between Catholic teaching and that of modern eugenics is that the one places the final end of man in eternal life, whilst the other places it in civic worth. The effectual difference is that the Church makes bodily and mental culture subservient to morality, whilst modern eugenics makes morality subservient to bodily and mental culture.”[13]
The Church’s focus on the next life highlights why abortion is wrong in any situation and not only in the case of eugenic abortion; this life is temporary, but the next life is eternal.
We know that God will not be fooled by Marie Stopes International’s sleight of hand but experience has sadly shown that the majority of the world’s population are more than willing to have the wool pulled over their eyes when it comes to abortion. After all, how many people have unhesitatingly allowed the abortion industry to convince them that a baby is just a clump of cells with no more rights than a piece of trash?
