Poll: Is incest wrong if it's consensual?

[Kargathia]

Spoiler

The reason it is banned is not because there is influence within the relation, it is because there is influence outside the relation, which will still be there even if the relation were to break up.
The problem with that is that often when it is abused, and because the victim will have to live with the perpetrator afterwards they'll lie about their consent, or have convinced themselves already they are consenting.

Why are you bringing up consent issues when the topic specifically mentions that this topic applies to consensual instances only? Obviously nonconsensual or coerced incest is bad, but the "badness" has nothing to do with it being incest. There are already rules against those types of relationships. As for the rest having to deal with people after breaking up with them is a fact of life for most relationships. Dating someone you go to school with, roommates, a coworker, whatever. Relationships are risky and can end badly, this isn't news to anyone, it's not unique to incest, it's not relevant, it's not a reason to ban it. People are generally free to make potentially bad decisions if it isn't going to hurt anyone else.

I'm not entirely sure though what your point is about legislation not preventing all perpetrators. Has it ever, for any crime?

The point is making incest illegal doesn't stop abusive relationships between family members. Obviously because they're still happening. To bring up the gun example again banning guns doesn't stop people from murdering other people with guns because the kind of person who would murder someone with a gun doesn't care if what he does is illegal or not. Abusive relationships are already illegal/highly frowned upon depending on severity, an incest taboo/ban isn't really going to help with stopping abusive relationships. If they're already doing something despite it being wrong making it "double wrong" isn't going to matter.

The main difference between my examples and yours is that mine are banned because the the negative chances far outweigh the positive sides.

Good luck proving that. Due to it being, you know, illegal, it's pretty much impossible to get unbiased statistics on incest. The only instances that get reported or any sort of media attention are the ones where it goes wrong/was never consensual to begin with. Finally, people are free to make whatever stupid decisions they want if it won't hurt other people. It's perfectly legal to juggle chainsaws despite it being VERY likely to end badly. Even if you could prove that incestous relationships were more likely to end badly it wouldn't mean anything.

I bring up the consent issues because when it comes to legislation "consensual incest" is rather hypothetical - unless we'd be able to say we can always confidently tell that there, in fact, is mutual consent.
Until that point it is not akin to juggling chain saws, it is akin to convincing your little brother to juggle along with you - you are not the only one who will have to face the consequences if it goes bad. (Nor are you when juggling on your own, but that's another discussion)

Actual legislation draws the line in the middle: sexual relations between an adult and a child are classified as sexual child abuse. When it comes to adults there does not seem to be full consensus, with countries having laws that fall into one of three kinds: Fully prohibited, fully allowed, and distinguishing between linear and non-linear relatives.
The first two are fairly obvious, and the last one means anyone related in a direct line (parents, grandparents, and theoretically further back, and siblings).

The laws prohibiting incest are based on the social stigma, the potential harm done to offspring (chance of defective genes), and the reasons I just put forward. It of course is impossible to tell what weighted heavier for the legislators drawing up laws prohibiting it.

In the end this all is a sliding scale of how bad an idea should be before you want to start legislating or stigmatising. My point mainly is that "consent" is far from being a yes/no equation - especially so in the often extremely complicated relations between siblings and other close family.

Or to put it in plain English: everyone has the right to make themselves unhappy, but I've really seen a few too many examples of very subtle coercion and domination of spouse and family to not be very skeptical of "consensual" incest.

 

[DoubleTime]

I don't think an incestuous relationship can be 100% consensual.

That's absolutely nonsensical. Sibling relationships are as varied as friendships, or any other kind of relationship. It's absurd to say "there will always be [X] dynamic at work corrupting one or the others consent to the relationship".

I've got a 23 year old sister. I'm 26. If I tried to pull rank on her, I'd be laughed all the way to the doorstep, and the same is absolutely true in reverse. We respect each other, but we take no shit from each other. The idea that I could pressure her into anything is hilarious.

It actually bothers me that you seem to believe all sibling interaction comes out of one mold.

First let me say that I NEVER think anything "comes out of one mold." There are exceptions to everything. It's dangerous and inaccurate to assume things are always the same. That statement was in relation to the rest of the facts laid out in my post, not an end-all-be-all assertion.

What I was saying was that in most cases - since the dynamic of "family/sibling" is different from that of "lovers" - is that there is too much of a potential for the subtle established hierarchy to affect the sexual relationship. For example, parents often have the elder sibling care for the younger sibling, creating a "caregiver/dependent" relationship that affects the hierarchy. This hierarchical dynamic doesn't even have to be visible (such as one child is seen as closer to a parent than a sibling) to be there.

The younger sibling could look up to the elder and always take what they say as the truth and morally right, even if the elder has hidden abusive intentions. You can flip the age and have a similar thing, the younger is more privileged so the elder thinks there must be something better about them but in reality the younger is just entitled and manipulative as a result.

No, I don't think this is always the case. Yes, I agree it is entirely possible to have a truly equal standing with your sibling. What I'm trying to get across is that even if most sibling relationships are mostly equal by virtue of being in a structure that relies on hierarchy it makes it very difficult to distinguish which relationships are truly consensual and which are abusive. It's this fact that makes it taboo and against the law, exactly the same reasons there are such strict rules about doctor/patient or boss/employee relationships. Too much potential for abuse despite the fact that occasionally it really is consensual.

Also, "pulling rank" is a very obvious attempt to dominate and only relates to a small percentage of the types of situations I was talking about. This discussion is about subtle (possibly not even conscious, sometimes) manipulation of hierarchy to get something that someone wants.

 

[Xanadu84]

SNIP

Incest is a bit more controversial than blood transfusions. Yes, SOME religions see blood transfusions as unnatural, but incest is almost universally disliked by all, save it's practitioners.

But now you're down to the old chestnut of common opinion makes rightness, and I don't need to patronise you with examples of how insane that logic is.

It's not just about common opinion, incest can lead to birth defects, which is why I also said that it's not natural.

So can 'normal' cest. And of all the afflictions someone can be afflicted with, birth defects from genetic causes are amongst the most natural of them.

Your kids riding in a car can get killed in an accident whether or not you make them wear a seatbelt, but you still get your kids to wear a seatbelt because cutting back on the odds of hideously deforming or killing them is a damn good practice. Same logic applies to incest.

Shall we go back to banning people with mental disorders from having kids? Many of them have a MUCH greater chance of passing on their problems to offspring. While we are at it, let's just ban anyone with an inheritable disease from having kids, the risk is there!

Honestly, that's not all that bad of an idea. Harsh and unpopular sure, but probably true. But evolution didn't instill that sort of natural selection in us, while it does understand incest.

I can't figure out what you are saying here. Are you suggesting evolution discourges you from having incest? That's not born out by nature. Look at apes, cats, dogs, wolves, etc, and you will find incest is common. The anti-incest laws are strictly cultural.

No, it is born out of evolution, there is a strong genetic component. A very strong one actually. I can't find the complete article, but heres a not too bad summary

http://www.anth.ucsb.edu/faculty/tooby/classes/anth7/incest.htm

Long story short, the base unit of evolution is an individual genetic trait, not the individual organism. If an organism lacks an avoidance mechanism trait that enforces an incest taboo, then that trait will pass on to a child that ALSO lacks the incest taboo trait, etc. After a few generations, this lack of incest taboo instinct will be paired primarily with a series of undesirable, oftentimes fatal, traits exponentially faster then the genetic trait that gives an incest taboo. For many animals where incest is unlikely, such as birds that travel over great distances or animals that have countless kids, each individual child not counting for very much, incest isn't a big issue. But for animals where each child is a large investment of energy, particularly close knit, social, tribal animals like humans, where the odds of encountering a sexually viable member of the opposite gender who is also a family member are large, lacking a trait that inspires an incest taboo is a devastating blow to a bloodline, and in the long run, an evolutionary dead end filled with deformity and miscarriage.

 

[Slayer_2]

Funny, a few days ago, one of my second cousins was over, she's 21, and I haven't seen her since I was 3. She seemed to be flirting with me and I'd always catch her staring at me when I wasn't looking. She seemed to be giving off signs that she was attracted to me, and she kept making strange comments, I was a little weirded out.

More often than not a second cousin has no blood relation to you it is by marriage. So if she's hot, go for it.

I was thinking the same thing, but I'm a teenage guy so I just blamed it on my second head trying to "reason" for me. She's pretty attractive, though.

 

[Zyxx]

This actually strikes me as a completely normal dinnertime conversation. (Not sarcasm - you should hear some of mine.)
It's a knotty question, and like most things it really depends on how you define "wrong". I believe a lot of the religious/social/cultural aversion to it results directly from the biological consequences of such close inbreeding. Most animals won't do it with relatives if there are other options available, and I think the willingness to act on the desire, if not the desire itself indicates that something is awry (through something being biologically off and morally wrong are, to me, two different things.)

Of course, if you're taking care to not actually reproduce, the biological issue becomes less of one. I cannot say with certainty that it is morally wrong, but it is at least ethically questionable.
And even if the couple in question is completely fine with it, the social consequences should the relationship be discovered will almost invariably be EXTREMELY negative.

 

[ripdajacker]

While I oppose to the notion of something being morally "wrong", I must state that this issue gets close to earning that title.

Incest is unlikely to happen consensually between a brother/sister due to a number of reasons:
1) One of the two will very likely be opposed to the idea
2) Women have a built-in "failsafe", that makes it hard for them to be sexually attracted to siblings/their father/other closely related males. Women can unconsciously sense if the mans immune system (therefore his genes) is like her own by the way the man's sweat smells.

Is it wrong? Hmm. Is it wrong to kill a man if he asks you too? Same dilemma, different question.

 

[Professor J. Luvwitt]

I think it's been thought of as morally wrong for so long, that people who say it is wrong don't even know any arguments against it and simply say it's wrong because it disgusts them. Can anyone give me a good argument as to why it is wrong (other than the children thing)? In my opinion it is not a wanted action, nor a wanted discussion, but if it's consensual, I really see no problem with it. I mean, I find it odd and gross, but I'm not going to let my personal opinion of it's appeal cloud my judgement of it's morality. If both parties consent, and are old enough to know what they're consenting to, it's not really wrong...

Your family is as random as mine, talking about the first thing that pops in our heads. We talk about anything and everything... however, it may have been more wise to leave the fact that your family was talking about this out, causes a lot of thoughts to come up in others here that I'm sure are not true, but they come up anyways.

 

[Conza]

Well in this case, nobody should be in the unfortunate, uneducated situation, not to know the dire and horrible consequences of two people of the same blood, fornicating, and the laws make sense to prohibit such behaviour.

Well frankly that makes one of you.

Firstly, reported, you're spamming this thread.

Secondly - wow. Were you trying to insult my straight A English skills, or... What? I mean, that sentence has perfect grammar. Let me reconstitute it to fully show you, and anyone else reading, how I am correct.

"Nobody should be in the unfortunate and uneducated situation not to know the dire and horrible consequence of two people of the same blood fornicating." I think I can end there. For your convenience, I even removed any punctuation that might confuse you. Oh I'm sorry, I've used punctuation in this sentence, ooo, what a pickle, hopefully after a few hours, you'll understand what I'm saying.

Let me try and keep it simple for you.

I mean to say I feel sorry for people who are too stupid to not get that the results of sleeping with your brother or sister will make a bad baby. How's that? Getting through yet?

Oh just in case you've forgotten you've been reported for spamming.

Can you report someone for a fallacious report? I feel like all of Loop's posts have contributed something, and they do not fit the definition of spam. Spam is typing the same word over and over again or posting images or posting with almost no content. Sorry that you had to resort to improperly reporting someone to feel better about yourself.

You've been reported for slander. I won't into an argument with you, but to clarify for anyone else, still reading, I do not support incest at all, the outcomes of it in a hetrosexual circumstance are obviously more vile and dangerous than the simple act, when accounting for possible reproduction.

 

[AdeptaSororitas]

Provided they're old enough to understand the ramifications, and there hasn't been consecutive inbreeding, I see nothing objectionable about it, the issues typically associated with incest typical only occur more then the normal amount in cases of REPEATED generations of incest. Love is as love may.

 

[Kanatatsu]

If my family started talking about incest at dinner... I'd be very worried.

and yes, it is wrong, irregardless.

Damn it, I hope you were using the word "irregardless" ironically. Holy crap, the computer doesn't register an error when I type that word?

OT

Well.......I would stay away from those people who actually do it.

just fyi "irregardless" is not a word. you mean "regardless".

I'd say it's just genetically wrong. but not as wrong as saying "Irregardless"

Oh, I'll think you'll find it is a word [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/irregardless].

I think I might have used it wrong, I did mean regardless, but a real word it is. And now you know. And knowing is half the battle.

Dictionary,com LOL?

Also note even that crap site states: "adverb Nonstandard"

It's really not a word. Trust me.

 

[PatrickXD]

I must be honest, I've never seen the massive deal with incest. Obviously it would have to be consensual, anything in that area that is not consensual is clearly wrong, but incest as a consensual activity doesn't bother me at all.