Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Garrick McElroy on April 30, 2010 at 9:28am

I have no issues with this, except that they are having a child. There is nothing wrong with a union so long as both individuals are mentaly mature, and they both consent. The child goes a little bit too far because of their unusual relationship. She probably won't live to see the child succeed. I find it morally reprehensible, but they have every right to do it.

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Permalink Reply by Jim DePaulo on April 30, 2010 at 10:04am

I don't know how I would rank this on my "Who Gives a Shit" list.
There is no increased genetic risk as the egg was donated by a non-relative and a surrogate is carrying the fetus.
It certainly wouldn't be my choice of a relationship - but really, is it something that's going to erode the social fabric?

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Permalink Reply by Rusty Gunn. on April 30, 2010 at 10:32am

The first thought that came to mind was "Appalachia"!

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Permalink Reply by Callie Bookman on April 30, 2010 at 3:46pm

My college is doing the regional premiere this show next year in collaboration with a local professional theatre. I'm very excited about seeing it, but I don't really know much about it.

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Permalink Reply by Sentient Biped on April 30, 2010 at 12:40pm

So mom is great-grandma to her own kid. Then the kid is his/her own... what? Aunt or Uncle? Im confused.

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Permalink Reply by Jennifer Nicole on April 30, 2010 at 2:38pm

I think great-aunt or uncle and also Grandma's sibling.

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Permalink Reply by Shelby on April 30, 2010 at 12:50pm

True about letting everyone know the details of their relationship exposes them to harassment. But maybe they live somewhere where people mind their own business. I'm not so much a 'yuk' person about their sex life as about the bringing a kid into the mix doesn't seem necessary in a world full of children with no families.

I say the grandma will be greatgrandma and the grandson will be dad to the baby to be.

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Permalink Reply by Sentient Biped on April 30, 2010 at 3:41pm

Just so you godless atheists know, the bible has god's answer on this, as in all things. Im having trouble reading the chart, but they might be OK, or it might be OK for him but not for her.. I don't know. Anyone have the Koranic answer?

Incest is a fun topic in the bible. Copying episodes here:
In Genesis 9:20-27, Ham sees his father Noah's nakedness. The Talmud suggests that Ham may have sodomized Noah (Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 70a). In more recent times, some scholars have suggested that Ham may have had intercourse with his father's wife.[19] (easy to see how smoeone could make that mistake - "mom, you have testicles!")

In Genesis 19:30–38, after the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot's two daughters inebriate their father and trick him into impregnating them.

In one of the tales of a wife confused for a sister, Abraham claims that his wife Sarah is also his half-sister, on his father's side[20]. However, in the rabbinic literature, Sarah is considered to be Abraham's niece (the daughter of his brother, Haran). (of course, if she was the daughter of her father's grandmother, it would cause even more confusion)

In Genesis 38, Judah, the fourth son of Jacob, mistakes his daughter-in-law Tamar for a prostitute while she is veiled, and has sex with her[21].

The biblical character Amram married his paternal aunt, Jochebed, the mother of Aaron and Moses[22].

In the Books of Samuel, Amnon, King David's eldest son and heir to the throne, rapes his beautiful half-sister Tamar; two years later Tamar's brother, Absalom, learns of the incident and orders his servants to have Amnon killed.[23]

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Permalink Reply by Stephen Moore on May 1, 2010 at 1:08am

Being technical here, offspring from incestuous parents are no more likely to be under risk of genetic malformation than are parents from the general population.

From what I understand — and it's been quite a few years since I studied the topic — but there is an increased risk, but it's only an 1%-2% increase in risk (eg, 0.5% risk in the general population is therefore 0.505% - 0.510% risk for a child born of incest). I've not really studied statistics, so don't know if that's statistically significant or not, but even though there is a slight increase in risk, I think the increase in negligible and, as you state, basically worth the same consideration as any parentage in the general population.

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Permalink Reply by Jaume on May 1, 2010 at 3:30am

I remember seing noticeably different stats (more like a doubling or trebling), although the risk remains very low (it would give 1%-1.5% instead of 0.5% with your figures.) Don't take my word on that, though.

There's a famous recent case of sister-brother incest in Germany. The couple has 4 children, 2 of them have both physical and mental problems, but it's not clear how much is due to the special nature of the parents' relationship. Since the mother herself is slightly mentally retarded, these problems may be hereditary. Although it's not at all impossible that incest was a multiplying factor in this case.

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Permalink Reply by Becca on May 1, 2010 at 1:43am

Incest avoidance is found empirically to be a cultural universal. We generally find incest to be "yucky" because our biology and evolution has programmed us to think it's "yucky" because incest is not advantageous in an evolutionary sense. Children produced from inbreeding (many incestuous relationships lead to inbreeding) really do have a higher rate of congenital birth defects than children produced from typical breeding conditions. Please keep that last sentence in perspective, it's a high enough rate to have helped produce a biological aversion to incest it doesn't mean that inbreeding couples are having tons of babies with congenital birth defects. It's also more advantageous for an individual of any species to have as much diversity in it's genetic code as possible.

Anyways... the above is the basis for my opinion. I think two consenting adults should be allowed to have sex even if they are grandmother and grandson, father and daughter, brother and sister. I also think it's icky and I'm not wrong to think that.

When children come into the picture is where I start having issues. There are a lot of situations where I think it is completely irresponsible to bring a child into the world. The couple in this article are one of those many situations for me. If you don't think of the children before you have them you are already starting off on the wrong foot as a parent. If I were in a relationship that was so far outside the current cultural norm as to be something that every culture on the planet avoided doing I definitely would be thinking of the children and not having them.

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Permalink Reply by Jim DePaulo on May 1, 2010 at 9:47am

There are a number of behavioral traits found in the human population that appear to be universal. Incest avoidance, some form of religion, music or rhythm (drums are pretty much universal) and of course a structured language are universal traits. When the same general behavior is demonstrated in widely separated (by time and/or space) populations it's strong evidence for a genetic component governing the behavior.

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