A father and daughter in South Australia have admitted to and been convicted of incest. They’ve had two children together – one died shortly after being born, and the other is now 11 months old.
Should incest be a crime?
I can’t think of many people who would argue that it shouldn’t be. Even in a culture that loves to espouse the importance of freedom of the individual, most would say that incest is wrong.
The Sydney Morning Herald report said:
Mr Deaves admitted that he “initially” thought having sex with his daughter was wrong.
“Emotions take over. As people no doubt realise, there are times during your life where emotions do rule the heart, it rules the head,” he said.
So should the heart (emotions) be the ruling body in decision making? Probably not, you might say, if incest is the result.
But let’s pick another topic. Sex before marriage. Is sex before marriage wrong? I would suggest that the majority of Australians would say that its perfectly ok, in fact, there’s something wrong with you if you don’t have sex before marriage.
So what’s the difference between these two moral questions? If you consider that incest is wrong, but sex before marriage is ok, what moral framework have you used to come to that decision that separates the two?
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I don’t see anything in that story about a child who died.
In this case, the father and daughter had been separated 30 years and have a healthy 11-month old child. I find it very hard to point at anyone who is worse off that these two are together; given the specifics – I would say that there isn’t anything morally reprehensible about it.
Incest is morally objectionable because it implies harm – a parent taking advantage, children born susceptible to horrible genetic conditions, etc. But really, without someone actually harmed, all you’re left with is a general distaste for the practise. In much the same way that I don’t believe hate crimes are any worse then regular crimes, I don’t believe incest should, in and of itself, be illegal. Sex with a minor is rape, if you change it to ’sex with a minor who is related to you is rape’ then you’re punishing people for who and what they are.
I believe there is nothing wrong with sex before marriage for much the same reason; without unwilling participants, you’re left with two adults making decisions and taking risks with themselves and a consenting partner. As much as you may dislike the practise, unless you can demonstrate that sex before marriage harms you any more then sex after marriage does, then you’re on some pretty shaky ground.
Here’s the link to the story about the child who died – I should have included it (http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/incest-couple-had-another-child/2008/04/07/1207420263586.html)
The child died of a congenital heart defect, which occurs in roughly once per 125 births (http://www.marchofdimes.com/professionals/14332_1212.asp) — given that, I’d agree that the child was put at unnecessary risk by virtue of who their parents were.
But then, I can’t make a very convincing case in light of the fact that we let people from places such as sub-Saharan Africa marry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sickle_Cell_Anemia).
I’m not arguing that incest shouldn’t be against the law, just that in this specific case, it’s hard to claim that anyone was really hurt.
I can see where you’re coming from, but it’s a tough line to argue that morality should be based on whether or not anyone is hurt as a result of the action. Some questions arise, including:
- how well equipped are we to judge the future impact of our actions on others. For example, will the child born out of incest be hurt as a result of her parents actions? We just can’t know.
- how do you know if your actions will hurt you or others? How many times have you (or ‘we’, as the human race) done something, even something out of good intentions, then later realised it was a bad idea. The stolen generation is a situation that comes to mind.
- the man in this relationship admitted that his emotions took over. Clearly this wasn’t a rational act (at least not in the beginning), and ‘hurt’ wasn’t a consideration, he had other faculties determining how he would act.
- lastly, this approach to morality fails to consider the impact of our actions on God, and whether God is ‘hurt’ by our actions. I realise you may not believe in God, or want to appeal to God as the source of morality, but this is an important consideration from where I’m standing.
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