The Face of Evil and Modern Eugenics
When a layperson is asked “what is eugenics?”, the immediate answer will be anywhere between one of confusion (“is that some kind of cologne?”1) or something along the lines of controls on birth for the sake of the future (“...yeah, that”) – ultimately, it tends to mean exactly what the user wants it to mean, neither more nor less. As Diane Paul puts it in “Eugenic Anxieties, Social Realities, Political Choices”, it “is a word with nasty connotations but an indeterminate meaning” (Paul 99), and is generally understood to be so. She also notes that:
“Eugenics has been variously described as an ideal, as a doctrine, as a science (applied human genetics), as a set of practices (ranging from birth control to euthanasia), and as a social movement. The word has been applied to intentions and to wholly unintended effects. It has been defined expansively, to incorporate medical genetics, and narrowly, to wholly exclude it.” (Paul 95)
What she fails to mention2 is that eugenics has a life outside of the scholarly analysis she gives the word, especially in science fiction, a genre notorious for running on ideas more than careful characterization3, and what better media form than television to showcase it? Of course, once the conversation switches to TV and Sci-fi, there are only a few logical examples, chief among them the ever-popular “Doctor Who”, designed to be a show enjoyable by both adults and children yet also equipped with a built-in depth to the stories4 that not only allowed it to stand up to the test of time, but also justifies picking them apart as with fine literature. It even had a few turns with eugenics – for example, the Daleks religiously believe in any brand of “negative eugenics” that involves EX-TER-MI-NATing. Of the 26 original seasons, the Fourth Doctor serial “The Face of Evil”5 stands out for a few reasons, not the least of which being the portrayal of a mildly “successful” eugenics experiment. More than anything else, the word “successful” is extremely important, as eugenics as a whole has always been virtually impossible to implement on a wide scale, owing to human nature.
To summarize the story, the Doctor finds himself alone on an unnamed planet, where two tribes – the “savage” Sevateem and the “refined” Tesh – survive with the ultimate goal of freeing Xoanon, who each tribe believes to be their own god, all the while surrounded by technology neither can use to their full advantage. As it turns out, Xoanon is a sentient computer, formerly a colonization ship's main computer, gone “insane” (Dicks 101), described as having “acute schizophrenia”6 (Dicks 88) – the cause of which was a small error in assistance rendered by the Doctor years ago. As a result of its insanity, Xoanon began an experiment in eugenics, and split the colonizers into two tribes: the Survey Team became the Sevateem and grew a culture of strength and courage, while the Techs became the Tesh, adhering to a code of denying the flesh and gaining “paraphysical” powers7. It goaded the tribes, which had apparently never seen the other – the “invisible other” – into conflict in order to speed up the process, with bloody results. Had the Doctor not come back, it would have proceeded to somehow unite the two into a perfect race8 – but because he did, it set the colonization ship to self-destruct to kill him. When this is stopped in the nick of time, and the two tribes realize what has happened, a truce is finally set up and testy “peace talks” begin, with the ultimate goal of uniting.
The story, badly summarized above, is actually a canny satire of religious extremism – and beyond that, appears to draw on the Israel-Palestine debacle9 – more than it is a story of eugenics, but it does not ignore the issue. And it is eugenics – the Doctor suddenly realizes it as such at one point in the show, with a look of horror10, and later, a sane Xoanon confirms it. While it does not add anything scholarly to the debate – at least, nothing Diane Paul et al. would be able to use in all seriousness - it does give one method of bringing about a “successful” eugenic “end”. The biggest point The Face of Evil drives home, however, is that, given human nature, it really would take the daily presence of an omniscient god – albeit one who only speaks to a specified person in a specific setting11 – existing somewhere beyond a group of colonists to really get an eugenic society going, rather than a government attempting to do so in a large population, and even then cultural control would be required. Culturally, both tribes are based around Xoanon, which would allow for greater population control – the nature of their beliefs is not gone into, but the Sevateem can be thought of as more “promiscuous” than the Tesh for the simple reason that the latter's culture specifically revolves around physical denial12. So in the end, it is probably not a question of voluntary or coercive genetic control so much as it is a question of who or what is doing the controlling. Similarly, there is no objective standard for what counts as “successful eugenics” or not: the Sevateem and Tesh can survive as races of people, and they are successful in that respect only, but their past and origins have become a sort of religious story, even a myth – they are not the race, perhaps not even the species, they once were, and do not know it.
Bibliography
Paul, Diane. “The Politics of Heredity.” Eugenic Anxieties, Social Realities, Political Choices. Ed. Diane Paul. State University of New York Press, 1998. 95~115.
Dicks, Terrance. Doctor Who and The Face of Evil. London: Target Book(s), 1978
“The Face of Evil.” Doctor Who. BBC, UK. 1 January ~ 22 January 1977. (End-of-credits copyright is MCMLXXVI, apparently owing to a airing delay.)
Sullivan, Shannon Patrick. “The Face of Evil”. Online. <http://shannonsullivan.com/drwho/serials/4q.html> Accessed 4 June 2007.
1“Eau de Genics for Men and Women”: guaranteed to attract the best possible mate for the best possible offspring. $24.95 at Wal-Mart.
2“A host of television programs, trade books, and scholarly and popular articles express their authors' alarm at the prospect of a eugenics revival.” (Paul 97) – this is as close as she comes.
3Not an inaccurate description of eugenics, actually.
4Helped by the serial format – 4 episodes to a story seemed to be the average, with some far longer and more epic than that.
5All references will be to the televised version, available on video as well as YouTube: search for “face of evil part” (including quotes), and look for the ones posted by “ange728” - active as of 6/4/07.
6While the insane part is obvious – Xoanon believes itself to be the Doctor, having gotten a copy of his personality within it, and refers to him as “us” or “we” – both the show and the novelization describe it as “schizophrenia” and have in encompass both the delusions and the split/multiple personality disorder.
7This is the word used in the show; the book changes this to “mind control” and “telepathy” (Dicks 121). And in addition to all this, the Sevateem are portrayed as tan and muscular, while the Tesh are pale (from living inside the colonization ship?) and on the slender side – the somewhere-in-the-middle Tom Baker thus sticks out, but is amusingly identified as “The Evil One” by the former and “The Lord of Time” by the other.
8Physical appearances aside, they are never described as biologically incompatible, but how it would have done so is unknown.
9That Leela, the Sevateem woman who joins the Doctor after this story, is named for a Palestinian hijacker famous at the time, is one hint... (Web: Sullivan)
10The weight of this realization is not in the book – it would be on page 82 – even though he likely realizes just how mad Xoanon is at this point, and his actions become more frantic afterwards in the show. Additionally, in the book, the Doctor also refers to it as “selective breeding” before the realization – this is likely because the book was specifically written for a young audience, and paraphrases in general besides.
11Because of this, not everyone believes in Xoanon or the power the shaman Neeva wields over the Sevateem, as Xoanon only talks to him when he is in his Inner Sanctum – that Xoanon really does talk to him isn't obvious at the beginning, where it appears Neeva is doing whatever he wants under the guise of religion.
12The Tesh live on the colonization ship, and would be more likely to face issues with overpopulation – their self-denial beliefs would a) help to keep it from happening and b) make it more bearable if it did.
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