Eugenics in America

"One of (the American Eugenics Society)'s popular traveling exhibits, consisting of a board with blinking lights, was titled "Some People Are Born to Be a Burden on the Rest." Every fifteen seconds a light flashed to warn onlookers that American taxpayers had just spent another $100 caring for defectives. Every thirty seconds, a light flashed to signal that another defective had been born. At intervals of fifty seconds, a flashing light told of another criminal being carted off to prison, with the audience informed that "very few normal persons every go to jail." Finally, after seven and one-half long minutes, a light blinked to announce that a "high grade person," at long last, had been born."

"To further its point, the AES organized 'Fitter Familes' contests, with entrances submitting family histories, undergoing psychiatric exams, and taking IQ tests, all in the hope that they would be deemed Grade-A humans. Winning families joined other best-of-show livestock--pigs, goats, cows--in the end-of-fair parades, the humans riding in automobiles decorated with banners proclaiming them the state's 'best crop.'"

- Robert Whitaker, Mad in America