Eugenics 'n me
To the modern person, having a neurologist pronounce you as barren seems just plain whack.
Unfortunately, the neurologist didn't distinguish between couldn't and shouldn't.
Eugenicists were crazy for finding ways to measure your societal worth.
In this picture, the lovely woman is having the bumps on her skull measured with a pschyograph.
In some ways, you could say I was a victim of the 1920s eugenics craze.
Eugenics was a pseudo "science" that promised eradication of disease and poverty by rewarding breeding amongst the fit. The U.S. hosted "fitter family" contests every summer, giving cash prizes to white folks who had lots of pretty babies.
Many states jumped on the eugenics bandwagon and pass laws allowing forced sterilization of the "unfit." Thirty-one states were pro-forced-sterilization, 17 states were vague. Only two states -- Alaska and North Carolina -- prohibit forced sterilization. (Thanks to the National Women's Law Center for compiling the updated list.
The racism-disguised-as-science culminated in the 1927 Buck v. Bell Supreme Court case, which made it legal nationwide for any doctor to sterilize any "unfit" patient with or without consent.
"Unfit" was loosely defined as citizens who were morons, poor, deformed, non-white, blind, deaf, and those with epilepsy. In the 1970s I lived in Pennsylvania, it was still legal and encouraged to sterilize people with epilepsy. There were also laws that prohibited people with epilepsy from marrying.
Shockingly, Buck v. Bell has never been repealed.