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G: Unfit

In the past few weeks, most people have probably seen Britney Spears' name or face everywhere. When she stood in front of a judge (virtually) and protested the conservatorship she's been living under for the past 13 years, one harrowing detail in particular stood out. She told the judge, "I was told right now in the conservatorship, I'm not able to get married or have a baby." Today, we look back at an old episode where we explore why it is that hundreds of thousands of people can have their reproductive rights denied...and spoiler: it goes back to Darwin. When a law student named Mark Bold came across a Supreme Court decision from the 1920s that allowed for the forced sterilization of people deemed “unfit,” he was shocked to discover that it had never been overturned. His law professors told him the case, Buck v Bell, was nothing to worry about, that the ruling was in a kind of legal limbo and could never be used against people. But he didn’t buy it. In this episode we follow Mark on a journey to one of the darkest consequences of humanity’s attempts to measure the human mind and put people in boxes, following him through history, science fiction and a version of eugenics that’s still very much alive today, and watch as he crusades to restore a dash of moral order to the universe. This episode was produced by Matt Kielty, Lulu Miller and Pat Walters.  Special thanks to Sara Luterman, Lynn Rainville, Alex Minna Stern, Steve Silberman and Lydia X.Z. Brown. Radiolab’s “G” is supported in part by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science. Support Radiolab today at Radiolab.org/donate. 
Duration
56m
Broadcast on
15 Jul 2021
Audio Format
other

In the past few weeks, most people have probably seen Britney Spears' name or face everywhere. When she stood in front of a judge (virtually) and protested the conservatorship she's been living under for the past 13 years, one harrowing detail in particular stood out. She told the judge, "I was told right now in the conservatorship, I'm not able to get married or have a baby." Today, we look back at an old episode where we explore why it is that hundreds of thousands of people can have their reproductive rights denied...and spoiler: it goes back to Darwin.

When a law student named Mark Bold came across a Supreme Court decision from the 1920s that allowed for the forced sterilization of people deemed “unfit,” he was shocked to discover that it had never been overturned. His law professors told him the case, Buck v Bell, was nothing to worry about, that the ruling was in a kind of legal limbo and could never be used against people. But he didn’t buy it. In this episode we follow Mark on a journey to one of the darkest consequences of humanity’s attempts to measure the human mind and put people in boxes, following him through history, science fiction and a version of eugenics that’s still very much alive today, and watch as he crusades to restore a dash of moral order to the universe.

This episode was produced by Matt Kielty, Lulu Miller and Pat Walters. 

Special thanks to Sara Luterman, Lynn Rainville, Alex Minna Stern, Steve Silberman and Lydia X.Z. Brown.

Radiolab’s “G” is supported in part by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.

Support Radiolab today at Radiolab.org/donate. 


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Oh, wait, you're listening to Radio Lab from WNYC. This is Radio Lab. I'm Lula Miller here with Trusty Coast. Hey. Watch, if you know occasionally, we'll break from our regular scheduled pontiferous programming to report on actual news. Yeah. OK, well, I'm here to do that. OK. And the topic is Britney Spears. That's sort of uncanny because I got a push alert about Britney Spears like 10 minutes ago. OK, yeah. So I think most people in the past few weeks have probably seen Britney's name or face everywhere. Basically, for 13 years, she has been living under a conservatorship, a legal arrangement where somebody who is deemed to be unable to take care of themselves has their decision-making powers given over to somebody else. Right. For many years, there's been growing speculation that maybe Britney Spears was not happy under this arrangement possibly being exploited or abused. But for a while, that was kind of like this fringy conspiracy theory vibe. And then a couple of weeks ago on June 23rd, she finally spoke out. OK, so I have this written down. I have a lot to say. So I'm there with me and basically, a lot has happened since two years ago, the last time I wrote all this down, the last time I was in court. I will be honest with you. I haven't been back to court in a long time, because I don't think I was heard on any level when I came to court the last time I brought four sheets and very clearly said, I want out of the conservatorship. I'm being financially exploited. I'm being forced to work on being cut off from communicating with friends. And at one point, she even said, I was told right now in the conservatorship, I'm not able to get married or have a baby, I have a ID inside of myself right now. So I don't get pregnant. I wanted to take the ID out so I could start trying to have another baby, but this so-called team won't let me go to the doctor to take it out because they don't want me to have children, any more children. Whoa, that's like another level. Yeah. And I should say that part hasn't been verified. But in the state, it feels like a whole nother level, like it feels like a violation sort of like in your body in a way. Yeah, but here's the wild thing, like whether or not her conservators have done this to her, they likely legally could. And the same goes for many of the estimated 1.3 million people in our country living under conservatorships or guardianships. No. Oh, yeah, this is way bigger than Brittany.

Transcription truncated.

In the past few weeks, most people have probably seen Britney Spears' name or face everywhere. When she stood in front of a judge (virtually) and protested the conservatorship she's been living under for the past 13 years, one harrowing detail in particular stood out. She told the judge, "I was told right now in the conservatorship, I'm not able to get married or have a baby." Today, we look back at an old episode where we explore why it is that hundreds of thousands of people can have their reproductive rights denied...and spoiler: it goes back to Darwin. When a law student named Mark Bold came across a Supreme Court decision from the 1920s that allowed for the forced sterilization of people deemed “unfit,” he was shocked to discover that it had never been overturned. His law professors told him the case, Buck v Bell, was nothing to worry about, that the ruling was in a kind of legal limbo and could never be used against people. But he didn’t buy it. In this episode we follow Mark on a journey to one of the darkest consequences of humanity’s attempts to measure the human mind and put people in boxes, following him through history, science fiction and a version of eugenics that’s still very much alive today, and watch as he crusades to restore a dash of moral order to the universe. This episode was produced by Matt Kielty, Lulu Miller and Pat Walters.  Special thanks to Sara Luterman, Lynn Rainville, Alex Minna Stern, Steve Silberman and Lydia X.Z. Brown. Radiolab’s “G” is supported in part by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science. Support Radiolab today at Radiolab.org/donate.