Incest and children.

[KUSA]

So, to start... What's everybody's thoughts on this?

Dude if you want to bone your sister you don't need our permission.

[MTL]

Do we really need three threads about incest going on at once?

yes!  Silly!  Of course!
oh wait no we don't.

[Pyrrho]

---

Rather than asking people's opinions on the subject, it would be better to do some research.  Here is a place you can start:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inbreeding

To give a specific example, in the case of first cousins breeding, it doubles the chances of genetic disorders compared with unrelated people breeding.

---

Well, I was hoping to do a combination of both. So that I can hear the sides of people here as well as research. That's something that's been helpful with me for a while now. The whole point was to research and discuss what I've learned with others to better understand the subject. One of the sources I found on the subject was: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/ani...lem-incest

Clearly, the claim of the title of that other thread, "Homosexuality is wrong, the same way incest is wrong," misses out on an important difference in that homosexuality cannot lead to an increased risk of genetic disorders in offspring (as it produces no offspring), whereas incest can lead to an increased risk of genetic disorders in offspring.

We all know that many people try to divorce sex from reproduction, but there is no perfect birth control and the two are not completely separate in practice, however different they may be conceptually (the pun is intended).

The question might be, how much genetic risk is acceptable?  Or should the government stop people from breeding if they have a high risk of passing on genetic disorders?

For my part, the question of "allowing" homosexual activity is an easy matter, whereas incest can and does in practice involve offspring who are affected by such activity, which makes it far more questionable.


By the way, your link is to an interesting article.  This, for example, is quite interesting:

This raises an interesting question: just what’s so bad about incest? Sure, having sex with your dad or your sister seems gross — but why? Some anthropologists have argued that incest taboos are learned social conventions. This explanation, however, doesn’t make sense to me as it does not explain the widespread existence of anti-incest mechanisms in creatures ranging from cockroaches(link is external) to chimpanzees (). Second, the incest taboo is about as close to a universal law as human moral rules get.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/ani...lem-incest

[Losty]

So, this thread is based off of:

Responding to "Homosexuality is wrong, the same way incest is wrong" - http://atheistforums.org/thread-33548.html

The reason I'm starting a new topic is because I don't want to derail the original thread since it's about Homosexuality and Incest, not incest and children. As noted here:

It's not as dangerous as most people think it is.

there's obviously a disagreement as to how dangerous incestuous sex is to the offspring... so I felt this is a great topic to discuss.
I'm going to take a neutral position since I don't know both sides... just what I was told... and that is that incest is dangerous to blood related offspring.

So, to start... What's everybody's thoughts on this?

I don't think quoting me is considered calling me out but I could be wrong.

I've actually discussed this a few times on here. 1 incestuous couple having children isn't all that dangerous. Their children are highly unlikely to end up being incestuous as well. It takes a number of generations of incest before the danger of birth defects outweighs the danger in a couple that might pass on a gene for an inherited disease or defect.

Honestly a simple google search should give you all the information you're looking for.

[IanHulett]

So, this thread is based off of:

Responding to "Homosexuality is wrong, the same way incest is wrong" - http://atheistforums.org/thread-33548.html

The reason I'm starting a new topic is because I don't want to derail the original thread since it's about Homosexuality and Incest, not incest and children. As noted here:

there's obviously a disagreement as to how dangerous incestuous sex is to the offspring... so I felt this is a great topic to discuss.
I'm going to take a neutral position since I don't know both sides... just what I was told... and that is that incest is dangerous to blood related offspring.

So, to start... What's everybody's thoughts on this?

I don't think quoting me is considered calling me out but I could be wrong.

---

I've actually discussed this a few times on here. 1 incestuous couple having children isn't all that dangerous. Their children are highly unlikely to end up being incestuous as well. It takes a number of generations of incest before the danger of birth defects outweighs the danger in a couple that might pass on a gene for an inherited disease or defect.

Honestly a simple google search should give you all the information you're looking for.

---

Well it was a tough decision for me. I felt by leaving your name in, I was "calling out" and by removing your name, I wasn't giving credit where credit was due. I wasn't sure which route to take, so I just picked one... and that happened to be it. That's why I changed it to "(%% Trying to avoid calling out %%)" so that my intentions were clear.

[Losty]

It was a smart choice, better safe than sorry. I wasn't offended.

[robvalue]

I think that if we stopped siblings having children on the grounds of risk of defects, we would also have to stop anyone with a similar or higher risk of passing on serious problems. Otherwise, we're just picking on this issue.

I haven't done much research, but I would guess that allowing this would not be much of a threat given the size of populations we now have. I'd love to see more parents taking responsibility and not having kids when they know they could easily pass on medical problems (one of the reasons I'm not having kids) but singling this issue out seems wrong. I think it's a dumb thing to do, but I don't think it should be illegal.

Having kids is a pretty unregulated business, you don't have to pass any aptitude or medical tests. You don't need anyone's permission. It's ironic to me that it's the biggest, most impactful decision anyone can make yet it's the one that least gets any sort of policing.

The alternative is to run tests on parents, for parenting skills and medical stuff, and disallow certain people. This is pretty totalitarian, so what we have is the lesser of two evils I think.

[Pyrrho]

I think that if we stopped siblings having children on the grounds of risk of defects, we would also have to stop anyone with a similar or higher risk of passing on serious problems. Otherwise, we're just picking on this issue.

I haven't done much research, but I would guess that allowing this would not be much of a threat given the size of populations we now have. I'd love to see more parents taking responsibility and not having kids when they know they could easily pass on medical problems (one of the reasons I'm not having kids) but singling this issue out seems wrong. I think it's a dumb thing to do, but I don't think it should be illegal.

Having kids is a pretty unregulated business, you don't have to pass any aptitude or medical tests. You don't need anyone's permission. It's ironic to me that it's the biggest, most impactful decision anyone can make yet it's the one that least gets any sort of policing.

The alternative is to run tests on parents, for parenting skills and medical stuff, and disallow certain people. This is pretty totalitarian, so what we have is the lesser of two evils I think.

I am not so sure it is the lesser of the two evils.  Some of the children with genetic defects may have a different opinion on the matter.  I would be pretty pissed if I had a genetic defect due to idiot parents breeding when they should have known better.  It is bad enough that they caused me to exist without my consent, but making me when they knew (or should have known) that in doing so, there was a significant increased chance of terrible problems, I would want to fucking kill them.

[robvalue]

Yeah, you could certainly make a case for regulated parenthood. I just cringe at what that would entail to enforce it. We already have way too many children in care, and removing any "illegal" kids would make this worse. To stop people actually doing it would require stiff penalties, and even then, accidents are going to happen. Agreeing on what is and isn't needed to be a competent parent, or a medically suitable parent would probably cause some sort of war.

The only realistic way I can see this happening is people having some kind of implant/injection at birth which renders them sterile. They then only get this block removed when they have passed a parenting test.

[Losty]

That seems like a terrible idea.