Incest a 'fundamental right', German committee says

[DontSayBanana]

Which is a huge mistake.  That's exactly what the state should be doing.

That's the crux of my primary argument against state-sanctioned marriages, actually.  The religious could have their way and force a one-man/one-woman definition, but the only way it would pass constitutional muster is if it's explicitly for purposes of procreation and has some form of mechanism for disincentivizing involuntary and voluntary childless partnerships equally.

[Berkut]

You knoow I started a reply a couple of different times, but I simply don't have the energy today to argue with the internet libertarian brigade, nor do I want it explained to me that because I don't think blood relations should have sex means "I don't truly understand liberty".

You, once again, perfectly exemplify why you don't actually understand what the word "liberty" means.

You don't think blood relations should have sex? Great, neither do I. But that has nothing to do with liberty.

You think YOU have the right to tell other people that they cannot have sex if it is in the fashion that you do not approve of, or between groups you think should not have sex.

*I* think what *I* think about who should have sex has very little bearing on whether or not the state should exercise its monopoly on violence to enforce what other people do in private that has no effect on me at all.

And yes - if in fact you feel that YOU have the right to use the power of the state to tell other people how to live their lives that has absolutely nothing to do with you, then in fact, once again, you make it clear you don't understand what liberty is actually about in any real, practical sense. Once again, as always, you come down on the side of "nope, those people should be forced to act in the fashion that *I* think they ought to act".

Your track record on every single question of personal liberty is, if nothing else, completely consistent.

[Zanza]

You knoow I started a reply a couple of different times, but I simply don't have the energy today to argue with the internet libertarian brigade, nor do I want it explained to me that because I don't think blood relations should have sex means "I don't truly understand liberty".

I also don't think that blood relations should have sex. There are lots of things that I don't think other people should do. That doesn't mean that I think it should be criminalized though.

[Berkut]

You knoow I started a reply a couple of different times, but I simply don't have the energy today to argue with the internet libertarian brigade, nor do I want it explained to me that because I don't think blood relations should have sex means "I don't truly understand liberty".

I also don't think that blood relations should have sex. There are lots of things that I don't think other people should do. That doesn't mean that I think it should be criminalized though.

...and that is the basic difference between people who actually pay more than lip service to the concept of liberty, and people who don't actually understand that freedom means the freedom to do things we may not approve of...

[Syt]

As Rosa Luxemburg said, "Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden."

(Freedom always includes the freedom of the ones who think differently.)

[Valmy]

With Germany's birthrate incest may be the only choice available in a few generations.  Glad they are thinking ahead.

[Martinus]

As Rosa Luxemburg said, "Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden."

(Freedom always includes the freedom of the ones who think differently.)

Of course she ended up being shot and thrown into a canal.

[garbon]

As Rosa Luxemburg said, "Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden."

(Freedom always includes the freedom of the ones who think differently.)

Of course she ended up being shot and thrown into a canal.

And she was a dirty commie.

[Valmy]

As Rosa Luxemburg said, "Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden."

(Freedom always includes the freedom of the ones who think differently.)

Remember how East Germany kept arresting people in Rosa Luxemburg Square for quoting Rosa Luxemburg?  Ah those were the days.

[Malthus]

If you take any two people anywhere, there is likely an imbalance of power between them of some kind or another. One will have more money, more charisma, be better looking, have more confidence, whatever.

So what? Why is there being an imbalance of power necessarily reason to suppose that the person on the short end of that measure suddenly doesn't have a right anymore to make their own choices? That just makes any theoretical imbalance that much worse - now we assume that people have even LESS power, because we take away their ability to exercise their own personal liberty by demanding that they now no longer even have the power to make choices themselves.

It is completely ridiculous. There are some power imbalances we recognize as being problematic and worthy of restriction to varying degrees because the exercise of that power can not only harm those involved, but it actually harms others as well. It isn't just about the power a boss has over a employee, it is also about how that destroys the work environment for others as well - there are other victims involved. But even at that we recognize that there are still situations where in fact it could be ok, and hence we demand that the particulars of each case be evaluated.

Not so in this case - we are going to ban it a priori, and the particulars do not matter. There are so many counter-examples that it is trivial to show that this is not about biology, or power, or anything other than people saying "Incest is yucky! It should be illegal because it is oh so very yucky!"

We tolerate all kinds of relationships between people who have varying levels of power over one another, and we routinely allow people to have children who will have radically increased chances of having a child with birth defects compared to the norm.

This is just standard societal immaturity slowly being weened away as humans slowly become more rational and less religious.

This is a true "conservative" issue.

What part of this rant would not apply to the laws against pedophilia? Yet you claim to support those.

I think I've made that very clear.

Pedophilia has a clear and obvious victim, and the definition of a child exists outside the crime in question, and the very nature of what we consider to be a "child" includes their inability to make adult decisions, hence this interference by society is of a completely different kind - indeed, as a actual libertarian I think protecting the freedom of children from being preyed upon by adults is an expression of liberal ideals.

That's a perfectly circular definition: "Child" = "someone incapable of making adult decisions". It is very easily disprovable in the case of age of consent laws - first, the age of consent is not constant across jurisdictions (indeed, in my own lifetime in Canada it has changed from 14 to 16), yet the nature if childhood is no different; and second, not all people who are legally "children" are the same - some 15 year olds may be fully mature, while sole 16 year olds may be child-like.

Similarly, not all incest may be coercive, not all incestuous relations may invalidate consent; yet enough do to make it worthwhile to have as a general rule- same as with age of consent. As an actual believer in the value of freedom, I think protecting the freedom of family members from being abused and preyed upon by others is an expression of liberal ideals.

Protecting adults from other adults when we cannot even define who the "victim" of the crime is does not even remotely compare.

Tell me Malthus, when two adult people have sex with one another, and they are cousins or something, who is the victim? Both of them? Who is the criminal? Both of them? Who is the aggrieved party?

Who is talking about "cousins"?

The "victim" is the person being coerced or pressured into having sex.

Interestingly, actual research has demonstrated that brother-sister incest is typically just as harmful as parent-child incest:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0145213499000587

The answer, of course, by the current law, is that they are BOTH criminals, and the "victim" is...nobody. It is the sense of moral outrage by society that defines the crime, there isn't any victim at all. They both should go to jail, or pay the fine, or whatever.

Is the law actually applied that way? I have my doubts.

I submit that anytime you have a law that defines all parties to an act as criminal, and no party to the act (even indirectly) as the victim, it is probably not a very good law, and is likely a direct affront to personal liberty.

If the law is actually applied that way, I would agree. The party having more coersive control is the "abuser".

[derspiess]

Remember how East Germany kept arresting people in Rosa Luxemburg Square for quoting Rosa Luxemburg?  Ah those were the days.

Broken clock.

[derspiess]

As Rosa Luxemburg said, "Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden."

(Freedom always includes the freedom of the ones who think differently.)

Of course she ended up being shot and thrown into a canal.

And she was a dirty commie.

[The Brain]

Of course incest should be legal. Takes more than a yuck factor to ban sex. Otherwise old people, fat people and Germans would never get to have sex.

[Valmy]

Well yeah if sheisse sex is legal I don't see how you can really justify banning anything.

[Martinus]

I know that if I had a hot estranged brother and he appeared in my life right now and wanted to have hot fetish sex, why should I refuse? 

Of course, I'm the only child of my parents and all my dad has from his previous marriages are daughters.