We can thank Henry H. Goddard - an American psychologist and eugenicist who practiced his nastiness in the early part of the 20th century - for coining the word "moron". It's from an ancient Greek word - moros - which meant dull. Goddard also created the Binet Scale - a test to measure intelligence. Morons were a notch above imbeciles and two notches above idiots. Psychologists soon got rid of these terms and since then they've been used mainly for those in the insult business.
Really interesting and pathetic: Goddard was concerned about the gene pool and "inferior" immigrants coming to our country. He sent female assistants to Ellis Island to administer
tests to immigrants (he said women were more intuitive *) and the results of
their tests showed that 40% of immigrant Hungarians, Italians and Jews were “morons”. Das Trumpf would've loved Goddard.
* Wow - who knew women were good for more than cleaning/cooking/procreation in the early 1900"s?
No comments:
Post a Comment