[Boondock Saint]

It does happen in humans, all the time. All one has to do is travel a bit through small isolated towns...

Yea thats what I figure JT but I thought maybe the dog breed thing might be better known to more people ... who knows ...

Scientific proof is nice and all but when the real world smacks me in the face with a brick I dont need scientists to do a study to find out if getting smacked in the face with a brick sucks ...

[Maxim Litvinov]

If I might summarise the arguments thus far, with brief counter-arguments.

Pro-Incest:
1] It is the moral right of humans to decide who they can have sex with. As the matter doesn't directly effect other members of society, it's none of their business.
{counter-argument: society constantly fulfils the role of making somewhat arbitrary moral decisions to assert the morality of the masses on minorities}
2] It can't hurt, so if people want it, then you should let them. Especially if you are legalising other practices like gay marriage at the same time.
{there are risks with inbreeding, and accepting gay marriage does not mean accepting everything else too}
3] If they are in love, who are we to decree that they can marry a first-cousin, but not a cousin, a step-sister but not a sister?
{society accepts that while there might be a spectrum of 'badness' when it comes to incest, there have to be some cut-off marks, no matter how arbitrary}

Anti-Incest:
1] It is an abomination.
{Meaningless}
2] It degrades social values, in that it encourages families to stick together to the detriment of societal interaction.
{We, as a society, are often lamenting the breakdown of families, so families brought together by even more children should perhaps be encouraged}
3] The effects of inbreeding mean that it is scientifically unwelcome.
{These effects are limited. It would be a problem if many families were in-bred, but having 1 in every 1000 families inbreeding is not really going to be taxing on the genetic line of man}
4] Society doesn't approve of it and sets social mores according to public consensus opinion.
{Society is not justified in degrading individual human rights according to current 'popular opinion'}

[Eggie]

I also like to point out European nobility as further proof.

ZING!

Too funny.

Max pretty much summed it up, we could go back and forth on the points for ages, but we would end up at the same place we started (most likely).

[Goranhammer]

2] It can't hurt, so if people want it, then you should let them.

Wasn't one of the points of the thread that it CAN hurt, as far as the blending of genetic deformities?

[Attila The Nun]

Ok, ok, maybe I'm a little biased because I think anyone who would think of commiting incest on a serious level is a sick fuck. But I think that it should still be illegalized. It increases deformities, if you lookback in European nobilitiy, you would find even cousins getting married could screw up a baby (Sir Nicholes Czar II had some defects, along with many others, I believe). And look at hicks. They're not right, in any aspect.

[Maxim Litvinov]

*sigh*

Goranhammer, couldn't you at least read my last post in context? I was outlining about 3 pro and anti incest arguments, all with attached counter-arguments. So, it should be fairly evident that there are indeed counter-arguments to *everything* I posted.

There are obviously arguments on both sides of the spread. But if you want to adopt 'deformities' as your overwhelming argument against incest, I would think again. As I said in another counter-argument: "These effects [of deformities] are limited. It would be a problem if many families were in-bred, but having 1 in every 1000 families inbreeding is not really going to be taxing on the genetic line of man"

If you talk about inbreeding families, then there are high possibilities of preserving any genetic mutations - desirable and undesirable (mostly undesirable). But, if you talk of incest being a lifestyle choice of about 0.1% of the population if it is legalised, then the deformities argument is pretty poor. Because a state programme of stopping disabled people from having children would be much more effective a programme to stop 'deformities', and yet people wouldn't accept this programme due to community outrage and it limiting the rights of the disabled.

In the end, I think the anti-incest people just have to rely upon using the fact that incest is such a taboo in society that it would somehow be fractious and unnecessary to legalise it.

Sir Nicholes Czar II

Cool. Never knew he was knighted.

[Eliamar]

If it wasn't for the genetic defects problem, I'd have nothing against incest. But since there is a problem with genetic defects being significantly more present among children of incestual relationships, I am against it.