While I enjoy history, it's always humbling, because there's no way to know everything about everything. The most that can be hoped for is to know a little bit about as much as you can in the time you have on this earth. But that, of course, is never "enough" for there are always countless people who know more. And if you think you know a little bit about everything, you'll only look like a moron if you get into a conversation with someone who specializes in one thing.

Anyway, there's that trite old expression, "you learn something every day." I am often surprised at how often it's really true, and this morning I stumbled onto something which surprised me about one of the great villains of the anti-abortion right.

Margaret Sanger (of Planned Parenthood fame) was a eugenicist who is on record as saying a number of despicable things about the need to reduce the black population. That this has caused embarrassment to Planned Parenthood is not surprising, and it fits right in with the "sting" campaigns which caught Planned Parenthood employees accepting donations from pranksters posing as racists who wanted to donate money for black abortions. Considering the disproportionate number of abortions that Planned Parenthood performs on blacks, to say that they are vulnerable to criticism on this issue might be understatement.

I have read many impassioned screeds condemning Planned Parenthood for the large numbers of black abortions, and they are usually sprinkled liberally with references to Margaret Sanger's racist statements. Because I knew that Sanger was a racist, and Planned Parenthood is the biggest abortion service provider in the country, naturally I just took it for granted that Sanger was in favor of abortion.

Well, guess what? Apparently, this racist crackpot was opposed to abortion. The confirmation comes directly from her autobiographical writings (which also condemn masturbation). The irony is detailed here, at an anti-abortion site.

While there are cases where even the law recognizes an abortion as justifiable if recommended by a physician, I assert that the hundreds of thousands of abortions performed in America each year are a disgrace to civilization.

Family limitation will always be practiced as it is now being practiced--either by birth control or by abortion. We know that. The one means health and happiness--a stronger, better race. The other means disease, suffering, death.

So Planned Parenthood honors this woman, an unequivocal racist and eugenicist, as a trailblazer and hero of women, particularly poor and ethnic women, and the most noteworthy socio-political cause they champion [abortion], she opposed? The irony, if she did in fact oppose abortion.

Sanger had some interesting points of view that would have certainly clashed with the popular ideologies of the current feminist movement:

Against masturbation: "It would be difficult not to fill page upon page of heartrending confessions made by young girls, whose lives were blighted by this pernicious habit, always begun so innocently, for even after they have ceased the habit, they find themselves incapable of any relief in the natural act...Perhaps the greatest physical danger to the chronic masturbator is the inability to perform the sexual act naturally."

Contrary to popular belief, Sanger actually opposed abortion: "To each group we explained what contraception was; that abortion was the wrong way--no matter how early it was performed it was taking life; that contraception was the better way, the safer way--it took a little time, a little trouble, but was well worth while in the long run, because life had not yet begun."

Speaking of things that don't fit anyone's narrative, another interesting tidbit I stumbled on was this embarrassing statement from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:

There is a striking kinship between our movement and Margaret Sanger's early efforts. She, like we, saw the horrifying conditions of ghetto life. Like we, she knew that all of society is poisoned by cancerous slums. Like we, she was a direct actionist -- a nonviolent resister. She was willing to accept scorn and abuse until the truth she saw was revealed to the millions. At the turn of the century she went into the slums and set up a birth control clinic, and for this deed she went to jail because she was violating an unjust law. Yet the years have justified her actions. She launched a movement which is obeying a higher law to preserve human life under humane conditions. Margaret Sanger had to commit what was then called a crime in order to enrich humanity, and today we honor her courage and vision; for without them there would have been no beginning. Our sure beginning in the struggle for equality by nonviolent direct action may not have been so resolute without the tradition established by Margaret Sanger and people like her. Negroes have no mere academic nor ordinary interest in family planning. They have a special and urgent concern.

A clever demagogue could probably use them to suggest almost anything.

I'm not trying to defend or attack Sanger here. I just find it a little surreal that this villain of the anti-abortion right, and hero of the pro-abortion left would have expressed opposition to abortion. This information is of no benefit to either side, but I thought I would share it for those who find the deconstruction of popular narratives entertaining.

If we add in King's lionization of her, it all makes me wonder about so many other narratives I tend to "safely" assume are true. I don't have time to investigate them all.