Incest.

Not to offend you, but I believe incest is wrong.

Why? Well, if a guy were to have sex with his sister gets her pregnant, there is an extremely high chance that the baby will have some form of a physical or mental defect because the genes are so closely related. The DNA that gets copied will have more defects because if someone is missing a gene, and they have sex with their sibling and they are also missing the gene, the child that will be born will have a severe problem because of said missing gene.

It's wrong because of that. Two people are producing a child that as severe mental/emotional/physical problems, which causes that child to suffer. It's not fair, that kid hasn't even had a chance to live life to the fullest, because his/her parents are really brother and sister or cousins.

Normally, I support love, but in the case of inscest, I don't. I know I might sound like a hypocrite, but if a faulty gene keeps getting passed around, then so many people in this world are going to have defects and problems that it won't even be funny.

Plus...The thought (for me, dunno about anyone else) of hooking up with a family member just grosses me out, because..well, we're closely related.

 

im normally open minded but you cant really be serious?

 

I'm not saying that's a reason for it to be outlawed. My reason is the entire defect thing I had talked about before.

I was merely stating my opinion on incest. I don't think it should be outlawed because it grosses me out, but, I do have the right to my opinion. I respect your opinion that it shouldn't be outlawed.

Plus, this thread is about my views on it, right? My reasoning for making it illegal is the entire birth defect thing. My personal opinion is that it's gross. There is a difference.

 

I don't even want to think about it, but on principle, I do actually agree with you, Zoiek. It's a fair point, even if I really don't want to consider the reality of it.

 

I'm sorry, I have to go with Trumpet on this one. Incest just has to many ramification, to many things could go wrong. While love should be permitted, which I believe you are trying to make a point of, incest has been outlawed for a reason

 

I'm with Zoiek here.

I did a project on human inbreeding not too long ago and the major risk of close relations having children is the child is more likely to have a recessive disease. But for the most part, people are not attracted to their fathers/mothers/siblings. That is because of some child psychology thing where if you knew a person before the age of six (lived with them and saw them on a regular basis), you are not supposed to sexualize them in your mind. I tend to think that sibling relationships may have to do with a mental trauma, but I'm not a doctor so it's not my place to say no to those who want to be together.

Also, in many other cultures, cousin-cousin coupling and uncle-niece couplings are very popular. It is just a societal tabboo here.

I'm going to include some genetics research projects/books/articles to this post so you can read about the effects of inbreeding (It is NOT the end of the world, honestly):

1. Centre for Human Genetics, Genetic epidemiology in consanguineous populations, http://www.chg.ecu.edu.au/research/consanguinity.php , 29.01/2008, Edith Cowan University, 2002.

2. Consanguinity, Inbreeding and Genetic Drift in Italy, Cavalli-Sforza, Moroni, and Zei, Simon A. Levin and Henry S. Horn, Princeton University Press, 41 William Street Princeton New Jersey 08540, 2004.


3. Human Biology, Inbreeding In Gredos Mountain Range (Spain): Contribution of Multiple Consanguinity and Intervalley Variation, http://muse.jhu.edu/demo/human_biology/v073/73.2fuster.html , 29 /09/2000, 29.01/2008, The Wayne State University Press, 2001.

4. Incest: A Biosocial View, Joseph Shepher, E. A. Hammel, Academic Press, Inc. 111 Fifth Avenue, New York 10003, 1983.


5. Inbreeding and the Genetic Complexity of Human Hypertension, Igor Rudan, Nina Smolej-Narancic, Harry Campbell, Andrew Carothers, Alan Wright, Branka Janicijevic and Pavao Rudan, 19/11/2002, Genetics Society of America, http://www.genetics.org/cgi/reprint/163/3/1011.pdf, 2003.

6. Inbreeding Effects on Fertility in Humans: Evidence for Reproductive Compensation, Carole Ober,Terry Hyslop, and Walter W. Hauck, Am. J. Hum. Genet. 64:225–231, 1999


7. Jocasta’s Crime, Lord Raglan, Horward Fertig, Inc. 80 East 11th Street, New York, N.Y. 10003, 1991.


Saying that the world will be populated by incestuest marriages and all the children will be deformed is nonsense. It's like saying that gay marriage will cause everyone to suddenly realize they are gay.

 

True, true. Yes homosexual couples use alternatives so I guess it could work.

 

No...Um, I don't support Social Darwinism.

There's a difference between a child born through incest (the parents are making a concious choice to have a child when they know that doing so [because they are related] will cause him/her to have birth defects), then a child born to two parents who are not related at all. They just happen to have a faulty gene. They have no way of knowing the child will have problems until he/she is born.

People with Down's Syndrome are born with a trisomy. Meaning they have an extra chromosome 21.

My cousin has Down's Syndrome...Even though you had no prior knowledge of the fact, I'm still slightly offended.

I mean, I respect your opinion, because you have the right to an opinion. I may not agree with it, but dude, you have the right to it. We will reach an impasse if we keep arguing, which isn't going to help anything and one of us (or potentially both) will get banned. Not a chance I'm willing to take. So, I'm walking out of this conversation *walks out of an imaginary door that says 'exit from this conversation'*

 

I think it defeats the purpose for someone to make an exception with incest in mind when you say they "just want to have sex". What the hell is that? That's wrong to just want to have sex.. with someone related to you. That's stupid, disgusting, and ignorant. Normally, I am also open-minded, but I don't agree with incest.

Considering the proven fact that it increases the chances of premature births and birth defects, it shouldn't be allowed. Since when was this an issue either? I hear most people think it's disgusting anyway, which I agree with.

 

It's a tough call, in my book. The taboo came about because it was considered desireable to mate outside your family. This brought new DNA into the bloodline, and usually strengthened it. European royal families often married within a very limited pool, which ended up making hemophilia a "royal disease". Breeding outside that pool would've greatly lessened that.

But then again, we're moving to a part where "marriage", "sex" and "breeding" aren't necessarily all one thing. Should two gay sisters be allowed to have sex? It's not like they're going to be "breeding" in the standard sense, so that rationale isn't going to hold. I still would argue against it - not outlaw it, necessarily, but I think it's a bad idea. Why? Because for most people, bringing sex into a relationship alters it in unfathomable ways. We've all known (or been!) friends who "screwed things up" by bringing sex into the relationship. It's one thing to mess up a relationship, or a friendship - as blase as it sounds, you can always get more friends. But you only have so many family members, and quite often, the relationship is very unique. Bringing sex, and quite often, heartbreak into that relationship is going to change it, and it won't ever be the same.

Lex

 

I could be wrong, but I believe that most people with Down's syndrome don't end up having children. And if that is the case, then they obviously won't be passing their genes on. I agree with Trumpetplyer- there is a huge difference between procreating with full knowledge that the child will probably have a defect and procreating otherwise, where there is a relatively small chance.

I personally find incest disgusting, but that's not the reason I think it should remain illegal. As for homosexual incest- do you really think that a law would pass legalizing gay incest and not straight incest? Think realistically. That's not going to happen any time soon.