Incest. Then and Now. What Attitude Is Correct?

Great Debates
61

Wow, well said.

I especially like the note that it is the amount of pleasure derived that makes the difference.

As far as the cat thing goes, I would like to say that I have no opinion on bestiality, except that the animal has far less cognative abilities than a child. I read a whole page from a guy who had sex with dolphins all the time and explained it in detail. As strange as that sounds, (and if anyone shudders over the thought of their sister I can only imagine what that did) the dolphins were surely willing partners. Finding the human body infinitely more attractive than a dolphin’s (or any other animal) I cannot relate to those feelings at all; and yet, I cannot show that that action is philisophically immoral (i.e.-as reasoned out, not because you read a line from a book that says so) or, equivalently, any of my business.

So the question becomes, if something less intelligent can do it, and if someone more intelligent can do it, than why can’t the middle one?

And the answer is…?

62

I think I’m the only poster in this thread that is actually dealing with incest in the family. They are older…Uncle and Niece. They are in love. Some family members have disowned them, some accept it, and some tolerate it. It still strikes me as bizarre behavior, but that being said, they aren’t hurting anyone and I remain close to both of them. Creepy, eh? It creeps me out at times, but other times, I’m ok with it. They are both alcoholics and they reside in an urban area. The drinking problem is probably what allowed them to cross the line, in my opinion. THey’ve lived together for 10 years this time, and had a 3-year thing about 25 years ago.

63

To be flip about it - Dijon, if you think that sex is fundamentally the same thing as cuddling then you aren’t doing it right.

To me there is a fundamental difference. A cuddle is… nice. Friendly. Warm. A kind of “Aw, how sweet” feeling. Sex though makes you about as close to your partner as you can be. There is trust, vulnerability, absorption. Material difference. You may as well say that a playful punch and a right royal kicking are the same thing.

The trouble with this discussion is that it’s now getting down to the pleasures and pitfalls of casual sex and whether sex is special or just another act. This is a much more personal area - YMMVH. I think however that due to the reasons I’ve outlined above, incest (with a minor) is wrong outside of these considerations.

Maybe we should have a “casual sex - yes or no?” debate, though I can’t say whether it would interest me or not to contribute. Can you see though why I’d say that incest is a problem, regardless of such a debate?

pan

64

Kabbes…how can I say this? The difference between a light(not playful) punch and a holy-hell beating is degree and degree alone, objectively speaking.

The difference between cuddling and sex is the amount of pleasure derived. True, you get different emotional responses from the acts, but I maintain that is because of conditioning, not because of anything inherent in either act. Similarly, you would feel different from a light punch as opposed to a beating emotionally but the act itself is only differing by degree of pain delivered.

There are a thousand more examples to this point, from scratches on a door to dents, and so on, and so on.

When another person is performing a sex act on yet a third, no meaning can possibly be ascribed to me other than whatever I create from it. They did the act for each other, and since I was not part of that loop I cannot possibly tell them what to do about it.

Remember, I am speaking of things consentual.

The issue remains, can a child consent to sex? Clearly, I feel the answer is yes because any number of creatures lower than human children (animals) can do it and humans are considered to be more advanced, and thus better equipped to deal with reality. The damage that comes from consentual incest is external to the persons involved: it comes from ridicule of friends, other family members, people on the street, etc. A similar situation occurs in drug use, where the user tends to withdraw from contact. OF COURSE, because the user knows others will disapprove!(sorry, that always bothered me)
The guilt and pain associated with consentual sex between any two people can only come externally. Thus, by condemning incest you support your own reasons for condemning it in the first place: a self-fulfilling prophency.

65

I disagree that creatures lower than man consent to sex. I think that the whole concept of consent is flawed when it comes to animals. To consent you have to be able to understand the proposition, consider the consequences, alternatives and other issues. You have to be able to think, reason and have a concept of self. I could go on - but I hope you’ll concede this point.

I would suggest that whenever my criteria above (in my reply to Arnold) are not satisfied, there can similarly be no consent. Either the individual in question is not capable of making a rational decision, or they are not capable of persuing their decision.

Why, in a societal vacuum, would anyone refuse sex? They may not desire the other. They may not like the idea of being quite that close with another human, that they may love as a parent or sibling - but not as a life partner. They may feel that they are not ready to experience that particular part of growing up just yet. A child might not be in the position of maturely deciding any of these things - but parental pressure can be a hell of a thing.

Above all, a child should have the right to be Daddy’s Little Angel without having to worry about him ogling her or plotting how he might get her into bed.

Children these days have so much pressure on them to grow up fast. Do we really want to lessen childhood even further?

pan

66

Even ignoring the fact that there is a biological basis for the emotional response to sex (there is one from what I’ve read, but I cannot remember where I read it or the contents of the article, so I will not rely on it. Although “oxytocin” remains stuck in my mind.), why discount conditioning as causing a qualitative difference between cuddling and sex? Environmental factors play just as vital a role, if not more, in developing a person and a personality. If a child is conditioned to view sex with a relative as wrong, incest will be an attack on their preconceived notions, and therefore an attack on the child. Conversely, if a child is conditioned to view sex with a relative as acceptable, they will be maladjusted to deal with the vast majority conditioned to see it as ‘icky’.

::blink:: Animals have offspring and raise them. Are you arguing that 8 or 9 year-old girls (who, these days, often have gone through menarche) are equipped to raise a child?
Next, looking at it from an animal/human POV, animals generally reach maturity at a much faster rate than humans. Humans only reach maturity at the end of puberty in the late teens. Only mature animals have sex.
Third, “reality” for those randy animals is much simpler than for humans. Animals are concerned with survival, feeding, and reproduction, and their “reality” revolves around meeting those goals. Humans have a few more issues to deal with.
If all this isn’t enough, just read some works on the emotional and mental development of human children. Piaget should be enough to inform you that human children are, in the main, not mature enough to make certain decisions.
Sure, there are exceptions, but I think the damage done to child prodigies by forbidding them to have sex with Mommy is overwhelmed by the good done by protecting us normal types.

Not true. There are enough people (even discounting recovered memories) who have suffered continuing mental and emotional disturbances from the trauma of incest, even when no third person ever found out about the incest. While vulnerable, they were taken advantage of/attacked by someone they trusted. I have enough problems with that as a “mature” 31-y.o. A nine year old doesn’t have my emotional and mental resources to deal with the trauma, and is correspondingly more affected.

Sua

67

Ok, so if you are unable to consent, as animals are, it is ok to have sex. If you are able to consent and are old, as adults are, you can have sex. If you are able to consent and you are young, you cannot have sex. Am I missing something here?

I still have a bad taste in my mouth (though it may be the coffee) from reading the difference between parental love and life-partner love. Mainly because it has never been explained what that difference is. I find no difference at all; I expect to love my mother forever, I expect to love my life partner forever. I enjoy pleasing my mother, I enjoy pleasing my life partner. Without you explaining your position, I can only conclude that sex itself is what differentiates family love from partner love. If you feel this is true, then I suppose we shall never come to agree with each other on this topic. Otherwise, I would really be interested to know what the difference between loves are that sex cannot be a part of one but can be a part of another.

68

If you’ve ever known anyone who is sleeping with a relative (and is open about it), you won’t forget it, because just hearing the words come out of their mouth will scar you for life. Brothers, sisters, fathers, whatever. Someone admitted it to me once and I wanted to slap them, or run, or yell, or react, but all I could do was stare in disbelief. There are some rules that shouldn’t be broken.

69

So which is it? Is incest wrong inherently because of society or because of itself? You seemed to waiver on the point.

I agree that animal sex is deffernt than human sex; I do not agree that humans are not animals. Humans are better than animals, are more than animals, but in the end we are biological creatures with more thrown in. To live, as a human, you must accept what both the body and the mind require.

Incest in no way attacks either of these. It actually supports them. Sex is good between to lovers but not betwen two people that lover each other? Negative. I maintain that it is society which creates the self-fulfilling prophecy of incest=bad.

The abuse issue, I feel, is relevant to the discussion in general but not to the point I am trying to make. Abuse occurs even between otherwise consenting adults as many police officers would be happy to explain and yet this does not make a case against marriage at all.

Children’s development is not something I am schooled in but I am somewhat informed in. As an earlier poster pointed out, “experimentation” between young children is not uncommon. It seems children have a need to know what their bodies are.

When I was a virgin, I trusted the person I lost it to to show me certain things about sexuality. I was a child by all rights when this happened. I have yet to abuse a person sexually, or objectify anyone. I find it hard to believe that were I to have done this with a sister that anything would be different EXCEPT that I must either keep quiet about it for fear of ridicule (external guilt) or accept ridicule and admit to it.

Potential for abuse is great, and the family structure is very important to a child’s development. But to say that having sex with a child will make that child believe that it can only please sexually is a stretch. Are people fat because, as a child, they pleased their parents by being a member of “the clean plate club?” Are game designers in that position because they could only please their parents by playing Gin Rummy? Are phD’s so devoted to their positions and fields of study because the only way they felt they could please their parents was through academic acheivement? Clearly, the matter of sex is as relevant inherently. Only when we, as a society, hush up about sex, gloss it over, and create a feeling of revulsion about it do we create the incest=bad trait.

70

I can tell you that our family’s “happy couple” has hurt both the parents (one is the uncle (brother) and one is the neice (daughter), their ex-spouses, and both sets of children. But I still don’t consider it something they should be disowned over. But it is very creepy at times. Especially when the woman and I get into sex discussions. I JUST DON’T WANT TO HEAR THE DETAILS! And she invariably brings it up. The holidays are totally screwed up…some of her sisters won’t show up, some will come but won’t speak to her or “uncle,”. And to make matters worse, we congregate at “her” mom’s house and “his” ex-wife lives next door. I think I hear banjo music…

71

Me neither! Why? Because it isn’t any of our business! :slight_smile:

72

No no no. Adults can consent. Children can not consent, because they don’t have the maturity required to make the decision. And the whole concept of consent is irrelevant when considering animals. You may as well ask it about a bus.

OK. I find a material difference between the love I have for my mother as her son and the love I have for my partner. The trouble is that language breaks down at this point. There is no “explain”. I want to please them both, certainly. I’m comfortable kissing them both on the cheek or cuddling, certainly. I’m comfortable dancing with them both (actually more comfortable with my mum, 'cos she’s a great dancer). But my mum brought me into this world, nursed me, nurtured me and brought me up. She’s known pan the boy and kabbes the man. The bond is not the same as with my SO, who knows kabbes the lover. Sex is certainly part of the difference, but there’s more than that. I think that in part it’s due to meeting a total stranger and falling in love with them for who they are, not because they are a family member.

Hmm. I can’t do much better than that for now (It’s getting late and I want to go home - sorry!) But I’m sure many others can relate to this. After all I can’t imagine loving anyone else in the way that I love Ms kabbes - especially not at the same time. And yet I do love my mum. That would seem to indicate a difference right there.

pan

73

I can’t imagine how you go about telling your mother that you’re in love with her brother and are doing the deed, so to speak. And your CHILDREN, for chrissakes! What do you say to them? I have a difficult time discussing it with her (although we can talk about almost anything else), because she has to justify everything, and I can’t reconcile it in my head anyway, so it’s rather pointless. But they are beyond child-bearing years, they pay their bills, and whose business is it anyway, right?

74

I really don’t have time to get into the whole discussion, but

Uh, sorry, no. Animals have sex when they reach reproductive maturity, i.e., achieve puberty. This is usually before (sometimes long before) they reach physical maturity. (For what I hope are obvious reasons, I’m going to leave emotional and intellectual maturity out of this particular point.)

In general, most animals do indeed reach maturity at a faster rate than humans. Depending on the breed, dogs reach physical maturity at 10 months to 2 years. Most bitches have their first heat at approximately 6 months; they can and will breed and litter from the first heat. The same is true for cats, except that they’re on a shorter time scale. Horses don’t reach physical maturity until approximately 4 years. However, fillies will jump fences to get bred when they reach reproductive maturity at age one&one-half or so. (For the life of me, I can’t remember for sure the male ages, but they are fairly similar.) The fact that animals are quite willing and able to breed long before physical maturity is a constant problem to competent and ethical breeders.

This is exactly analogous to adolescent human girls. No, they are not physically mature at menarche and therefore are not physically completely ready to bear children. It is a problem, because bearing children at early ages (whether in humans or in other animals) can have serious physical side effects to both mother and child(ren).

The difference is that humans are also still immature emotionally, financially, intellectually, and so on. While these are certainly serious impediments to competently rearing human children, and while these can definitely cause societal problems due to the mother’s inability to support and nurture her children, they have absolutely nothing whatsover to do with animal offspring, since none of these conditions apply to other animals.

Often, possibly, sometimes.

According to research I’ve read, there is a fairly high causal relationship between negative parental attention to children’s eating habits and weight problems in later life. The guilt and emotional load that many ‘clean plate club’ kids associate with food can often cause eating and weight problems later.

I don’t know any game designers, but I have noticed a serious correlation between people who played games as a family when they were kids and people who didn’t. The adult game players I know belonged to families that played games together. Most of the adults I know whose families did not, do not play and do not enjoy playing games. I would suspect that most game designers enjoy playing games and therefore would tend to think that their parents encouraged them to play as children. This is not exactly what you said, but I think there is a good chance of causality here in at least some cases.

Indeed, some phD’s do select their careers, including fields of study, in an effort to gain parental approval through academic achievement. Is that the reason for ALL phD’s? No, of course not. But it’s not all that uncommon either.
That is all. Back to your debate! :slight_smile:

75

So many things to consider about sex…wow!

Animals cannot consent because they do not have the ability, children cannot consent because they don’t know all the details yet. In either case, consent is absent, and yet sex for the former is acceptable and sex for the latter is not. I still find this to be relevant, and indeed strange.

I was going to make the animal point (puberty and overall development) myself, but could in no way have made it as clearly and efficiently. thank you.

I like the differentiation of loves that is coming out, even if it is coming slowly. However, I do not feel that I love my mother because she is family; I love my mother because of who she is and what it means to me. There are members of my family that I know well and yet would not have the audacity to tell them I loved them. But, we are getting somewhere.

If we were to try to desribe the “falling in love process” as compared to the “growing to love process”, the latter involving close family members, we find neither has sex as a prerequisite. Long time friends (who love each other) can later “fall” in love, albeit a different kind. Or so we think is a different kind.

If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and flies like a duck, we must at least consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic animal of the family Anatidae on our hands (courtesy of Douglas Adam’s Dirk Gently character, to whom I am eternally grateful).

So we either come up with three kinds of love, now (friends, family, partners), one kind of love (whereby the deeds themselves are arbitrary and set by society), or two kinds of love (sexual and non-sexual). I lean toward the last of the three.

consider, for a moment, all the people you “love” and what your relationship with them has in common. What are the differences? Clearly this is a tough topic that words do not lend themselves to easily.

And yet when we come to a topic like incest, which is clearly an application of this line of thought, we find opinions mainly on the extremes, not–as might be expected–clustered to the middle. This shows me that it is very much only society that contributes to incest=bad and “mom love”!=“partner love”…we are conditioned to think this why. Maybe I’m missing something, but I haven’t seen a reason why we are conditioned to think this way. As long as pregnancy is not the goal and is avoided…I dunno, guys. I’ve never been a supporter of incest but now I’m starting to convince myself, hahaha.

Blondie, I am vindicated by your final sentence. :slight_smile:

Redtail

And yet there is nothing socially wrong with a phD or with being a game designer (especially a successful one!). Being overweight is, by some, considered terrible, but I think society is kind of split on that now that it isn’t only the rich who are fat. :slight_smile: But there is something socially wrong with incest. This does not show me there is something inherently wrong in it, however.

I’d like to thank everyone for participating in this post with me before it fades into obscurity, I’m having a hell of a time :smiley:

76

i just wanted to mention because i don’t think anyone has yet that incest is forbidden in the Bible (i think its in Leviticus, if i have time I will find the right verse and chapter.)

so a christian should not commit incest and other people shouldn’t either because of the potential for child abuse

bruce

77

Righteous, Leviticus mentions many taboos and laws. Is there some special reason that this one springs out at you? Could you tell us which ones you obey, and which ones you ignore?

78

Um, aynrandlover-I take it you support something like NAMBLA?

Ugh. I mean, he’s my DADDY. He’s NOT supposed to have sex with me. That’s just gross. SEX is not the end all and be all. And besides, love and sex are not always the same thing. You can have sex without love, and you can have love without sex.
Let me ask you this-would YOU have sex with one of YOUR parents?

79

As posted by me

80

Who said I even supported incest? I’m trying to find out if there’s a defensible position for the taboo or not. I have none, and so it is an undefendable position in the general case for me. I am looking for someone else to provide that information, and we’ve come up empty.

We don’t think murder is immoral because its “icky,” but why incest? Especially in light of birth control, and in believing there is something that is still nobody’s business.

This is a tough topic to reason out. I’m playing Devil’s advocate to a group of people who, in two pages, have yet to show me what is fundamentally wrong with it, apart from
[ol]
[li]gross[/li][li]taboo because it’s been taboo[/li][li]it allows dangerous situations to occur (what doesn’t?)[/li][/ol]

I am not attracted to my mother. But if I was, could you tell me why I shouldn’t be? When all is said and done here it must be concluded that it is a worn taboo no longer applicable to a society as enlightened and technologically advanced as ours clearly is.