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So as a result, the first sterilization law in 1935 and the renewed law in 1950,
enacted that a person could be sterilized even against his or her own will,
usually her own will, if that person's condition was such that it would either
be passed to one's offspring or that it would prevent one from rearing the child
properly. What amounts either to a forced or a voluntary sterilization is
sometimes a matter of interpretation, but if the person was not informed about
the operation and decision was made by a proxy, like the manager of an
institution in question, I think it's quite safe, or it was considered that the
person was incapable of understanding what the operation was all about, then I
think its safe to classify these as forced sterilizations. I had a look at
these, I was supposed to conduct research on the archive material of these
decisions, but then I went into philosophy. But, there were quite a few cases I
remember, where women wrote to authorities, like five or ten years after the
sterilization, saying that they didn't know what was happening.
And yeah... So, abortion became also a eugenic tool in 1950s, because quite a
few abortion permits were granted for eugenic reasons, and sterilization was a
precondition for abortion. So if you wanted to have an abortion, you got it if
you were sterilized as well. According to official Finnish statics, 7,530
sterilizations were performed on eugenic grounds between 1935 and 1970 and only
996 were performed between 1935 and 1950, so the heyday of eugenic sterilization
in Finland was the late 1950s and early 1960s, where more than 500 people were
sterilized annually on eugenic grounds. And, it's hard to tell, I remember from
the archives, there were these forms where people were asking "please sterilize
me," but its kind of hard to tell whether that was actually the case, but
formally they were voluntary sterilization, but if you lived in an institution
and you had an intellectual disability and you were told that it's for your own
good, well, I don't know if that counts for a voluntary act.
Now this part of Finnish history is considered as troublesome and embarrassing
and thus it's mostly kept in silence. There was a, it was reported largely in
the late 90s, so about ten years ago, and public reaction was really, people
were surprised, most people didn't know about it, and then also it was a kind
of, like all embarrassing things, all emotionally difficult things in Finland
they kept quiet, so we just don't talk about it so then the problem doesn't
exist. And when eugenics is mentioned, the discussion is immediately directed
towards Nazi atrocities of which we had nothing to do with supposedly and how
different everything is now. And drawing a parallel between a eugenic past and
present medical practices is easily labeled as a logical flaw named playing the
Nazi card and indeed simplified analogies between past and present should be
avoided as unhelpful. And in my view, reminding about the eugenic past is not
always the best way to start a discussion, it's not a very good way to convince
doctors or physicians that the practices are somewhat questionable, because when
you mention eugenics, you lose your audience immediately. People are just "no,
that's not what we're doing" and then when they refuse to listen, what do you
say after that? So I think that sometimes a better was is to make an argument
first and then boost it with emotionally charged analogy or then reminding about
the past and possibly making a fair parallel to what's happening now.
Nowadays, the official policy is based on the principle of autonomy. For
instance, in Denmark the National Health Service declared in 2003 that there has
happened a paradigmatic... paradigm change in prenatal practice. Whereas
previously, the main goal was prevention of disability but now the main-and this
was based and it was even admitted that this goal was based pretty much on
eugenic principles-but now the main goal is providing people with autonomous
unlimited freedom for choice and so the success of prenatal genetic testing and
various measures is measured by freedom of choice. So autonomy is the prominent
value, everything is based on autonomy. In practice this means that the more
tests there are available, the more choices you have and the more freedom you
have. This is the kind of logic, which can be... and people actually, I think,
believe this, although of course it's not very credible, because more
medicalized and technical pregnancy gets, women are more and more at the mercy
of doctors who are the only ones who actually know what's being tested and how
to interpret and understand these test results.