If you don’t want the word degeneracy associated with scientific racism you’re going to need a time machine to the 1700s, because the idea of social degeneracy started then. This was the first stepping stone to eugenics as practiced by the United States against minorities, which in turn was the foundation for Nazi race “science.” There is a straight line through those points that are all united by the idea of degeneracy.

If you want words to mean things then you can’t ignore their history.