Buck v. Bell upheld the Virginia Sterilization Act of 1924, which allowed the sterilization of women and men in America (2). Eugenic sterilization was used to target people who held undesirable traits that should be weeded out of society. Those traits were based on their mental capacity, and their race. The sterilization first began in 1907 the time where Lovercraft was alive. Thousands of people were forcefully sterilized, some not even knowing they were being sterilized. Women would go to the OBG/YN and their gynecologist would sterilize them without their consent. Men were target, as well, however females were targeted more to control the birth so defective traits can be removed. In addition, to ensure the white race continues to flourish.
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In other cases they would not deliver a woman’s child unless she agreed to be sterilized. Thee tactics were viewed as constitutional while Lovecraft was alive and it is no surprise that his ideals in his writing follows the same ideals in eugenics. During the Eugenics movement in America the Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act was passed in 1924 to prevent interracial marriage (5). In Virginia there were only considered two races white, which is a person who only had lineage of Caucasians and colored, which was everyone else. The loop hole was if you were 1/16 or less native American you can still classify as white. People who were in interracial marriages that already occurred before this law was implemented were considered as criminals. The law also classified Native Americans as colored basically removing their identity as if they no longer exist (5). By preventing interracial marriage you are preventing mixed offspring’s that could “taint” the pure white bloodline that Virginia was trying to uphold. Lovecraft refers to mix people in “The Call of Cathulu” as “hybrid spawn… mongrel… mulattos”(4), which are all very offensive terms to describe someone who is mixed. In the story Cathulu is described as a monster composed of simultaneously “of an
In other cases they would not deliver a woman’s child unless she agreed to be sterilized. Thee tactics were viewed as constitutional while Lovecraft was alive and it is no surprise that his ideals in his writing follows the same ideals in eugenics. During the Eugenics movement in America the Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act was passed in 1924 to prevent interracial marriage (5). In Virginia there were only considered two races white, which is a person who only had lineage of Caucasians and colored, which was everyone else. The loop hole was if you were 1/16 or less native American you can still classify as white. People who were in interracial marriages that already occurred before this law was implemented were considered as criminals. The law also classified Native Americans as colored basically removing their identity as if they no longer exist (5). By preventing interracial marriage you are preventing mixed offspring’s that could “taint” the pure white bloodline that Virginia was trying to uphold. Lovecraft refers to mix people in “The Call of Cathulu” as “hybrid spawn… mongrel… mulattos”(4), which are all very offensive terms to describe someone who is mixed. In the story Cathulu is described as a monster composed of simultaneously “of an