Just kidding, folks.
Posted on 12/15/2010 9:45:01 AM PST by wmfights
There are certain questions now pressed upon us that previous generations would never believe could be asked. One of these is thrust upon us by events in New York City, where a well-known Ivy League professor has been arrested for the crime of incest. What makes the question urgent is not so much the arrest, but the controversy surrounding it.
David Epstein is a professor of political science at Columbia University, where his wife also teaches. He previously taught on the faculties of Harvard and Stanford. Last week, he was arraigned before a judge in Manhattan, charged with a single count of felony incest. According to authorities, Professor Epstein was for several years involved in a sexual relationship with his adult daughter, now age 24.
Though the story was ignored by much of the mainstream media, it quickly found its way into the cultural conversation. William Saletan of Slate.com, who remains one of today’s most relevant writers working on the issues of bioethics and human nature, jumped on the story with a very interesting essay that openly asked the question many others were more quietly asking: “If homosexuality is OK, why is incest wrong?”
After reviewing the various legal arguments used to justify criminalizing incest, Saletan comes to the conclusion that genetics cannot be the fundamental basis, since incestuous sex could be non-reproductive. Similarly, the basic issue cannot be consent, since no one is arguing in this case that the sex was non-consensual.
He gets the liberal response just about right: “At this point, liberals tend to throw up their hands. If both parties are consenting adults and the genetic rationale is bogus, why should the law get involved? Incest may seem icky, but that’s what people said about homosexuality, too. It’s all private conduct.”
Saletan comes to the conclusion that the basic reason for the wrongfulness of incest is damage to the family unit. As an Ohio court ruled, “A sexual relationship between a parent and child or a stepparent and stepchild is especially destructive to the family unit.”
Now, remember that Saletan raised the issue of the morality of incest as related to the question of homosexuality. He argues that the family-damage argument against incest does not apply to homosexuality. In his words: “When a young man falls in love with another man, no family is destroyed.”
Saletan’s argument is easy to follow, and if you accept his fundamental premise, it can even make sense. But his fundamental premise assumes that there is no damage to a particular family unit if a homosexual relationship exists. That argument can be made only by ignoring the impact upon a family of origin. Beyond this, it limits the family-damage argument to an individual family, when the argument must be more broadly applied to the family as an institution.
This article is a very interesting window into the sexual confusions that lie at the heart of our age. To his credit, Saletan gets the conservative argument basically right:
The conservative view is that all sexual deviance—homosexuality, polyamory, adultery, bestiality, incest—violates the natural order. Families depend on moral structure: Mom, Dad, kids. When you confound that structure—when Dad sleeps with a man, Dad sleeps with another woman, or Mom sleeps with Grandpa—the family falls apart. Kids need clear roles and relationships. Without this, they get disoriented. Mess with the family, and you mess up the kids.
That’s a pretty fair summary. Of course, the Christian argument goes much deeper than the merely conservative argument, affirming the fact that, with exacting precision, God has spoken to the sinfulness of such behaviors — specifically condemning both homosexuality and incest. In other words, Christians move the question from mere wrongfulness to sinfulness and place all issues of sin within the biblical account of sin and redemption.
It is extremely revealing that, for many of our fellow citizens, incest may merely “seem icky.” And yet, all around us are folks who, with a straight face, deny the inevitability of this slippery slope.
Not enough teeth in the offspring!
Yep. That's where I said "False premise argument."
That’s so disturbingly wrong and right at the same time.
Here, let's legitimize incest.
Pictures or we don't believe it.
(lol)
Just kidding, folks.
Not advocating, only observing. If gay marriage ever passes then incestuous marriage also ought to be allowed. No sex need be involved but estate taxes could be avoided forever due to unlimited spousal exclusion.
Which could be aborted.
</WORMWOOD>
Orthodox conservatives just know that somethings, especially icky things just are not done. That they are wrong. That they are a stench in the nostrils of God. That to do them is to open up the chasm of hell beneath your feet. THEY ARE FLAT OUT, PLAIN AS DIRT, WRONG.
Liberal heretics who do their thinking with their naughty bits can not grasp this. As long as what they do ends with the log going over the waterfall it must be right and good. They live a lie, they enjoy a lie, they defend the lie. They demand others approve the lie. Pfft on them.
Just a few years ago we were asking pro-homosexual freepers if they thought it okay for fathers to marry their sons, mothers to marry their daughters and similar scenarios. Their reply was: that would never happen because of incest taboos... and here we are.
Precisely, they act like we're crazy for pointing out what the next logical step is on the road to Hell and then they seem befuddled when it actually happens.
“I got a cousin thats kind of cute, but she is really high maintenance.”
I’ve got several cute cousins but like you I’ve seen them in action (part of being in a family is that you see them without the “mask” that they show to potential “mates”). No way would I want to be involved with one of them, of course now that I’m married my wifes mask has come off and I’m wondering if there really are any women out there that I’d want to be involved with! LOL
In the absence of God, this is what passes for reason. It is a continuous spiral down the toilet bowel of humanity, with a predictable destination awaiting us. Now, I realize we don't live in a theocracy like ancient Israel, and that civil government isn't the Church. Even the Church isn't the Church anymore, but society really should consider deferring to a few morals left over from saner times and thinkers. If the philosophers of civil government can't figure their way out of the senselessness of godlessness, they should impose a few moral absolutes on themselves as a lifeline out of idiocy. "
When a young man falls in love with another man, no family is destroyed."
Only in our pop culture could thinking this shallow occur.
New from Mattel for Christmas 2010:
‘Incest’ -— A Fun Game the Whole Family Can Enjoy!
It just astounds me that they would even have this conversation.
You're not familiar with the *Naughty Teacher* ping list I take it.
ArrogantBustard is right. There are more than a few FReepers who think that way.
¨Welcome to The United States.¨
She's not a minor (24). I would say yes.
And they know it. Funny how certain phrases really ring true "misery loves company".
Wy is it NOT ok?
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