In October, Royal Mail is issuing a series of stamps entitled 'Women of Distinction' which will include Marie Stopes, a eugenicist who was so extreme in her beliefs that she disinherited her son Harry for the 'eugenic crime' of marrying a woman who wore glasses.
A woman who continues to be lauded as a champion of 'reproductive rights' was not terribly bothered by basic human rights when they got in the way of her ideology and she campaigned openly for the "sterilisation of those totally unfit for parenthood (to) be made an immediate possibility, indeed made compulsory."
We live in an age where millions of women around the world continue to suffer as a result of state-enforced sterilisation and abortion and where a supposedly developed country like Britain kills the overwhelming majority of babies with disabilities before birth because society has still not faced up to the inherent evil of eugenics. Marie Stopes and the other architects of this society should be treated with the contempt they deserve not be honoured for promoting policies that continue to cause so much suffering.
