Richard Lynn writes in his book Eugenics:
First, eugenics does not require the extermination of undesirables. It is sufficient for eugenics that the mentally retarded and recidivist criminals should be sterilized. Second, eugenic considerations did not play any significant role in the Nazi program for the extermination of the Jews. Hitler did not regard the Jews as genetically inferior. No one could have reached such a conclusion in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s because it was a matter of common knowledge and observation that the Jews were exceptionally talented. Jews were prominent in business, the professions, and intellectual life. Although they constituted only approximately 1 percent of the population, Jews won 10 out of 32 Nobel Prizes awarded to German citizens between 1905 and 1931 and were thus overrepresented among this highly elite group by a factor of approximately 30 (Gordon, 1984). Anyone who asserted that the Jews were genetically inferior and hence eugenically undesirable would have forfeited all credibility, and Hitler certainly did not do so. Hitler (1943) was indisputably anti-Semitic, and this anti-Semitism was based on his views, set out in Mein Kampf, that the Jews had exceptionally high abilities and were consequently a threat to the German, or as he called them “Aryan” peoples, who included the British and the Scandinavians. Hitler believed that the Jews and the Aryans were the two most talented races and that they were in competition to secure world supremacy. Thus, , he wrote in Mein Kampf that the Jews are “the mightiest counterpart to the Aryan” (p. 64). He feared that the outcome of the struggle between these two peoples might easily be “the final victory of this little nation” (p. 300). This was the reason that Hitler was determined to destroy the Jews. He believed that if he could achieve this, the Aryans would remain as the unchallenged master race. The correct understanding of Hitler’s views on the Jews has been summarized by MacDonald (1998): “Hitler believed that races, including the Jews, are in a struggle for world domination, and he had a very great respect for the ability of Jews to carry on their struggle” (p. 146). The frequent assertion that Hitler exterminated the Jews on eugenic grounds is a misunderstanding of his position.
Third, among the numerous opinions expressed about the Jews in Germany in the 1930s, there were some contending that the Jews were parasitical because they worked predominantly in white-collar service occupations,
such as banking, law, the theater, the media, universities, and the like. Views of this kind fueled anti-Semitism but are economically and socially illiterate and cannot justify hostility to any ethnic or racial group.
Fourth, if eugenic views had contributed to the Nazis’ extermination of the Jews, gypsies, and others, this would certainly have been an ethically unacceptable misapplication of eugenics. Nevertheless, the fact that a social philosophy has been unethically applied does not imply that such a misapplication is inevitable or that the social philosophy must be rejected on this account. Numerous social philosophies that are in general commendable have, on occasion, been misapplied. For instance, Christianity consists of a generally acceptable social philosophy, and the application of Christian principles has led to many desirable outcomes, such as the abolition of slavery, the establishment of welfare provision for the destitute, and so forth. Nevertheless, Christianity has sometimes been misapplied. The Christian church has burned at the stake numerous people who disagreed with some of its tenets; and it has waged wars against unbelievers in which abhorrent brutalities have been committed, such as the Crusades in which the Christian crusaders slaughtered large numbers of women and children. These killings must be condemned. However, these deplorable episodes do not justify the total rejection of Christianity or the conclusion that an acceptance of Christianity is the beginning of a slippery slope that inevitably leads to the extermination of those who do not accept its doctrines.
Similarly, the social philosophy of socialism evolved in the Soviet Union into a tyranny with many ethically undesirable features, including the execution of large numbers of dissidents and the extermination of many millions in the gulags. Nevertheless, it would be wrong to conclude that socialism inevitably leads to such an outcome and that socialist ideals of equality, fraternity, and the like must be condemned because these principles were applied in ethically unacceptable ways in the Soviet Union. All social philosophies are capable of ethical misuse, but this does not mean that we cannot accept them because this would be to set foot on the slippery slope that could lead eventually to ethically abhorrent outcomes.
