Spiritual Eugenics
Exploring the overlap between eugenics and New Age spirituality, from 1880 to the present day
Nazi spiritual eugenics (IV): life unworthy of life
Nazi spiritual eugenics (IV): life unworthy of life
The flipside of the Nazis’ absurd schemes to breed supermen was their horrific programmes to eliminate ‘subhumans’.
Nazi spiritual eugenics (III): Blood and Soil
Nazi spiritual eugenics (III): Blood and Soil
Exploring the Nazis’ agrarian-eugenic ideology of Blood and Soil, how it inspired the organic farming movement, and its ascendancy today.
Nazi spiritual eugenics (II): Hitler and the Will of Nature
Nazi spiritual eugenics (II): Hitler and the Will of Nature
Hitler’s worldview was a brutal nature-worship in which spiritual eugenics played a central role.
Nazi spiritual eugenics (I): the German occulture
Nazi spiritual eugenics (I): the German occulture
How the German occulture fostered ideas of spiritual racism and spiritual eugenics, which would inspire leading figures in the Nazi party.
How Putin fell for conspirituality (and we all suffered the consequences)
How Putin fell for conspirituality (and we all suffered the consequences)
A Russian philosophy called Cosmism inspired Putin and influenced the Kremlin’s bizarre eugenic programme
16) Madison Grant and environmental eugenics
16) Madison Grant and environmental eugenics
In the US, eugenics overlapped with conservation and white supremacy, in the idea of preserving the ‘Nordic race’.
14) The Garsington set and the religion of Life Worship
14) The Garsington set and the religion of Life Worship
Through the Garsington / Bloomsbury network, Julian and Aldous Huxley were imbued with the science-religion of ‘Fuller Life’.
13) The Huxleys and the intellectual aristocracy
13) The Huxleys and the intellectual aristocracy
The Huxleys were born into the ‘intellectual aristocracy’, a network of high-achieving families in which you must prove your worth.
12) Thomas Huxley, the ‘Church Scientific’ and the critique of eugenics
12) Thomas Huxley, the ‘Church Scientific’ and the critique of eugenics
This is the latest entry in my ‘Spiritual Eugenics’ project, which explores the overlap between New Age spirituality and eugenics. For a…
8) The future is female: feminism, spirituality, eugenics
8) The future is female: feminism, spirituality, eugenics
In the 1870s-1940s, feminism, spirituality and eugenics cross-fertilized in interesting ways.
7) Edward Bulwer-Lytton and the Coming Race
7) Edward Bulwer-Lytton and the Coming Race
Edward Bulwer-Lytton helped to inspire the 19th-century occult revival, and the idea of the spiritual evolution of a new race of…
4) Francis Galton and the new religion of Eugenics
4) Francis Galton and the new religion of Eugenics
On the 18th of January, 1874, a remarkable dinner party took place at the London home of Erasmus Darwin, older brother of naturalist…