'Lebensborn': The Nazi Program To Breed More 'Racially Pure Children' To Counter Declining Birthrate

[appalachiablue]

- A 'Lebensborn' birth house and flag with SS symbol above.
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- U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. - BROCHURE FOR THE LEBENSBORN PROGRAM. -

Nazi racial ideology asserted that a large and "racially pure" German population was necessary for Nazi Germany to conquer and colonize much of Central and Eastern Europe. Created by the SS in late 1935 to counter Germany’s declining birthrate, the Lebensborn program began as a campaign to encourage “racially valuable” Germans to have more children. Lebensborn initially focused on giving financial aid to SS men with large families and providing pregnant "Aryan” women with medical care in comfortable maternity houses. During World War II, the program also became involved in the kidnapping of thousands of foreign children for adoption into German families.1

The featured promotional brochure was published to encourage future mothers to join the Lebensborn program. Containing several photographs of the maternity centers, this pamphlet informed potential candidates of the rules and admissions requirements for the program. Lebensborn focused on recruiting unwed women expecting babies fathered by SS men or others deemed “biologically valuable,” and copies of this brochure were likely passed discreetly to single pregnant women by their doctors or nurses.

By offering single mothers secluded accommodations for the time of pregnancy and labor, these maternity centers were designed to protect women from social judgments and prevent them from seeking illegal abortions.2 However, women willing to join the program had to meet certain terms to prove their “Aryan” ancestry and good hereditary health. Those accepted into the program received the benefits of medical supervision, legal support, and job placement after labor. In the case of single women, the Lebensborn central office determined whether to release children into their mother’s custody or place them with an adoptive family.

Between 1936 and 1945, approximately 7,000 children were born in the Lebensborn maternity houses. Although roughly 60 percent of them were born to unmarried parents, having children outside of marriage was controversial in German society. By encouraging unwed but "racially worthy" mothers to have children, Lebensborn challenged traditional ideas about family.3 Elsewhere in its propaganda, however, the Nazi regime promoted early marriage as a way to have many children while reducing the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. Although these approaches seem very different, they both contributed to the goal of creating a large and healthy “Aryan” nation.

- View the original promotional brochure + more...
https://perspectives.ushmm.org/item/brochure-for-the-lebensborn-program
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- DW, 'War Children Appeal to European Court of Human Rights,' March 8, 2007. "War children" born to Norwegian mothers who had relationships with German soldiers will ask the European Court of Human Rights to consider their demand for compensation for the abuse they suffered since World War II.
https://www.dw.com/en/war-children-appeal-to-european-court-of-human-rights/a-2376111
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- Christening of a Lebensborn child, c. 1935–1936, Rhenish Hesse region.



- (wiki- ed.) LEBENSBORN e.V. (literally: 'Fount of Life') was an SS-initiated, state-supported, registered association in Nazi Germany with the goal of raising the birth rate of Aryan children of people classified as 'racially pure' and 'healthy' based on Nazi racial hygiene and health ideology. Lebensborn provided welfare to its mostly unmarried mothers, encouraged anonymous births by unmarried women at their maternity homes, and mediated adoption of these children by likewise 'racially pure' and 'healthy' parents, particularly SS members and their families. The Cross of Honour of the German Mother was given to the women who bore the most Aryan children. Abortion was legalised (and, more commonly, endorsed) by the Nazis for disabled and non-Germanic children, but strictly punished otherwise.

Initially set up in Germany in 1935, Lebensborn expanded into several occupied European countries with Germanic populations during the Second World War. It included the selection of 'racially worthy' orphans for adoption and care for children born from Aryan women who had been in relationships with SS members. It originally excluded children born from unions between common soldiers and foreign women, because there was no proof of 'racial purity' on both sides. During the war, many children were kidnapped from their parents and judged by Aryan criteria for their suitability to be raised in Lebensborn homes, and fostering by German families.

At the Nuremberg Trials, much direct evidence was found of the kidnapping of children by Nazi Germany, across Greater Germany during the period 1939–1945.

The 1st Lebensborn home opened in 1936, in Steinhöring, a tiny village not far from Munich. The 1st home outside of Germany opened in Norway in 1941. Many of these facilities were established in confiscated houses and former nursing homes owned by Jews. Leaders of the League of German Girls were instructed to recruit young women with the potential to become good breeding partners for SS officers.. While Lebensborn e. V. established facilities in several occupied countries, its activities were concentrated around Germany, Norway & occupied NE Europe, mainly Poland. The main focus in occupied Norway was aiding children born to Norwegian women & fathered by German soldiers. In NE Europe the organsation, in addition to services provided to SS members, engaged in the transfer of children, mostly orphans, to families in Germany.. About 8,000 children were born in Lebensborn homes in Germany, & between 8,000 and 12,000 children in Norway. Elsewhere the total number of births was much lower..

- Germanisation: Main article: Kidnapping of children by Nazi Germany. In 1939, the Nazis started to kidnap children from foreign countries – mainly from Yugoslavia and Poland, but also including Russia, Ukraine, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Estonia, Latvia, and Norway – for the Lebensborn program. They started to do this because "It is our duty to take [the children] with us to remove them from their environment ... either we win over any good blood that we can use for ourselves and give it a place in our people or we destroy this blood," Himmler reportedly said. The Nazis would seize children in full view of the parents. The kidnapped children were administered several tests and were categorised into 3 groups: those considered desirable to be included into the German population, those who were acceptable, and the unwanted. The children classified as unwanted were taken to concentration camps to work or were killed... - More, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebensborn



- Kidnapping of Polish children during the Nazi-German resettlement operation in Zamość county.
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*ALSO: Singer From Music Band ABBA Was Born in the Horrific Nazi Project, Anni-Frid Lyngstad was born because of the notorious Lebensborn program, Medium, 20212,
https://medium.com/short-history/singer-from-music-band-abba-was-born-in-the-horrific-nazi-project-fe6f6ce9af5f

- The Lebensborn Program- The Nazi Monstrous Initiative to Increase German Population, Medium, May 1, 2021. 20,000 children were born and 200,000 children were kidnapped as part of the Lebensborn program,
https://medium.com/lessons-from-history/lebensborn-3ceac4608d1a

The Lebensborn was presented also as an alternative to abortions. The Nazis made abortions punishable by prison or even death. Consequently, the women could give birth in the Lebensborn homes to avoid social stigma. A lot of teenage girls used this option. Over sixty percent of all the children born in the Lebensborn were from single mothers. Also, the local women in the occupied countries, who got pregnant with German soldiers, gave birth in the Lebensborn homes...

[Shellback Squid]

1. Abba

[appalachiablue]

4. I just got back with the info & saw your post, tx.

[appalachiablue]

6. Abba - Dancing Queen

- ABBA (/ˈæbə/ AB-ə, Swedish: [ˈâbːa]) are a Swedish pop group formed in Stockholm in 1972 by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. The group's name is an acronym of the first letters of their first names arranged as a palindrome. One of the most popular and successful musical groups of all time, they became one of the best-selling music acts in the history of popular music, topping the charts worldwide from 1974 to 1983, and in 2021... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ABBA

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anni-Frid_Lyngstad

[Judi Lynn]

2. Amazing. Was thinking of the racist connection with the exploding anti-abortion frenzy

earlier tonight before seeing your post, remembering reading the US birthrate is declining.

Perfect time in US history to see an article like this. Thank you!

(I had never known they crept upon blond children in other countries to snatch them! Very glad to finally know about it. How low down and dirty. It makes me think people who are trying to cross the border should start bleaching their hair before making the trip! They would probably get a different reception.)

[IronLionZion]

9. That girls looks like she has albinism

and there are some Latinos with naturally blonde hair and brown/tan skin.

[appalachiablue]

10. Beautiful family and one girl could have albinism; the light

hair and skin, and eye sensitivity to light are characteristics. Sweeties!

[Bernardo de La Paz]

3. Cross-reference to Quiverful, similar motives

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiverfull#Population_and_demography

Population and demography

According to journalist Kathryn Joyce, writing in the magazine The Nation: "[T]he Quiverfull mission is rooted in faith, the unseen," even if "its mandate to be fruitful and multiply has tangible results as well."[4] Joyce writes that "Population is a preoccupation for many Quiverfull believers, who trade statistics on the falling white birthrate in European countries like Germany and France. Every ethnic conflict becomes evidence for their worldview: Muslim riots in France, Latino immigration in California, Sharia law in Canada. The motivations aren’t always racist, but the subtext of 'race suicide' is often there."[4] Others remark that Quiverfull resembles other world-denying fundamentalist movements that grow through internal reproduction and membership retention such as ultra-Orthodox Jews, Amish, and Laestadian Lutherans in Finland. Many are thriving as seculars and moderates have transitioned to below-replacement fertility.[20][21]

[appalachiablue]

5. TY, very disturbing and spreading.

[Judi Lynn]

7. Thank you, so much for this information. Good grief! So ugly in every way.

Such an unpleasant name they chose for themselves.

They are twisted beyond redemption.

[IronLionZion]

8. Many American racists believe only whites can be US citizens

regardless of documentation or birthplace, US citizens need to trace ancestry back to Europe and nowhere else to remain "pure".