From: Walpurgis (walpurg@myrealbox.com)
Date: Wed Aug 07 2002 - 04:45:53 MDT
Hermit
> Baby making is (unfortunately) not a licenced activity.
How could it be?
> A while ago I was discussing (hypothetically) the possibility of
> creating a type selected child for a family member
> (husband/father/mother/sybling/child) with leukemia. The women had no
> problem with the idea. Including implantation of cross-generational
> babies (i.e. son-mother crosses), into the wife. Only one person at
> the gathering (16 people) reacted in a kind of "eeew" fashon.
An irrational response.
Incest of any kind has no clear rational, except that of problematic biological
consequences if sex leads to conception (which isn't an issue for homosexual
incest). But with contraception, abortion and (soon) genetic manipulation available,
the biological rationale supporting the incest taboos seem void.
There could be social reasons (keeping sex inside a family limits the possibilities for
reproduction/wider social relations), but I am sceptical that incest would be a
limiting social factor in a society where it was accepted or was a non-issue. Taboos
limit - by definition - so of course this "rationale" would be posited.
Very few taboos (sexual or otherwise) have good reasons behind them it seem.
Eating shit and human flesh are probably good taboos to adhere to however.
> Going
> further, about half of them said that if they had enough kids/didn't
> want the baby except as a life-saver, that putting it up for adoption
> would also be acceptable - there is always a market for babies
So would destroying them after use. Infanticide would be an option if there were
no/fewer people who wanted to adopt.
> Again
> all but the "eeew" lady had no problem with the idea of creating a
> zygote for termination and harvesting at the end of the first
> trimester - including doing so for a friend, never mind a family
> member.
Do you need to create zygotes to harvest stem-cells?
Walpurgis
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