{"id":170597,"date":"2017-08-22T18:05:47","date_gmt":"2017-08-22T23:05:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=170597"},"modified":"2021-07-14T21:42:30","modified_gmt":"2021-07-15T02:42:30","slug":"planned-parenthood-founder-margaret-sanger-spoke-ku-klux-klan-supported-eugenics-organization-still-honor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/planned-parenthood-founder-margaret-sanger-spoke-ku-klux-klan-supported-eugenics-organization-still-honor\/","title":{"rendered":"Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger spoke to the Ku Klux Klan and supported eugenics. So why does the organization still honor her?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The media seems to be doing an effective job of rightfully condemning many people who have an association with the Ku Klux Klan — but one exception to this seems to be Planned Parenthood’s “beloved” founder, Margaret Sanger. Margaret Sanger is usually described as a “birth control pioneer” who founded Planned Parenthood, but she also met with members of the Klan,\u00a0advocated<\/a>\u00a0eugenics, and supported the use of sterilization to rid the planet of the \u201cunfit.\u201d Sanger\u00a0wrote<\/a> about her meeting with the Klan in her autobiography<\/a>. Yet somehow this fact is made light of, glossed over, or completely ignored by the media.<\/p>\n

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Margaret Sanger<\/p><\/div>\n

On page 366 of her autobiography, Sanger described her meeting with the Klan, where she says she received additional invitations to speak with similar groups:<\/p>\n

I accepted an invitation to talk to the women\u2019s branch of the Ku Klux Klan\u2026. I saw through the door dim figures parading with banners and illuminated crosses\u2026. I was escorted to the platform, was introduced, and began to speak\u2026. In the end, through simple illustrations I believed I had accomplished my purpose. A dozen invitations to speak to similar groups were proffered.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What about Sanger’s outspoken support for eugenics?<\/p>\n

While some may not be entirely familiar with the meaning of “eugenics,” it’s likely that those same people have seen it in action in various ways. Coined in the mid 1800\u2019s by Francis Galton, the cousin of Charles Darwin, eugenics was a popular movement to create a society in which those who were considered “superior” would reproduce… while those who were deemed “inferior” would be encouraged not<\/em> to reproduce. Tragically, this movement was credited with forcefully sterilizing many men and women. The targets of these horrendous acts were disproportionately Black and poor, according to many<\/a> reports.<\/p>\n

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Screenshot of PP honoring Sanger<\/p><\/div>\n

Eugenics victim Elaine Riddick<\/a>\u00a0speaks in the video below about being “cut up like a hog,” thanks to the philosophy of eugenics. Riddick, like some other Black citizens, was forcibly sterilized in North Carolina in 1968<\/a>. Her tearful testimony encouraged state lawmakers to vote for reparations for those like her, who were eugenically sterilized.<\/p>\n

So how does this relate to Planned Parenthood founder, Margaret Sanger? One of the prominent supporters<\/a> of that horrific eugenics program was Clarence Gamble, and Gamble was a director<\/a> of Margaret Sanger\u2019s American Birth Control League, which later changed its name to Planned Parenthood.<\/p>\n