I'm not trying to be combative but did you respond only to the title of the question or was this your response to the whole issue below the title?

You're not being combative, and yes I'm guilty of not fully reading the post. It's just that I know many good people whose lives were ruined due to incest, so it tends to put me in the red zone. I guess if you use protection, and want to have relations w/a relative, it's a person's individual choice, but you know, sometimes contraception fails.

I need to add, there ARE those people (and there seems to be quite a few) who are predisposed to incestuousness. Freud, Klein, Fairbairn, Winnicott, would say those people were "arrested" in their development and did not get past the pre-oedipal or the oedipal stage of childhood. ("The Primer of Object Relations" by David and Jill Scharff)

WTF? What? I don't understand?

@paul1967 I think she is saying she is against it LOL. I would ask her but her profile says if you are not a level four she will block you. WTF? That doesn't sound like anyone I'm interested in communicating with.

Well, when I first started school back in 1959 there was still that archaic ' push' ( religion based of course) that left-handed people MUST be FORCED at all costs to become Right-Handed.
I've lost count of the numbers of knuckles that I had from Teachers wielding wooden rulers fitted with thin metal strips in the edges of them that they repeatedly lashed my knuckles because I refused and was unable to learn to write with my right hand.
I still have, somewhere stored away, a letter sent home by one particular Teacher, a True Dragon-Lady in every way, shape and almost form btw, to my Dad stating that " Your child is little more than a terrible, sinful, sinister Imp of the Devil himself because he resists our kindly(????) efforts to help him mend his defective ways."
Later I found that the word ' sinister' was derived from the Latin - sinistera/sinisterii meaning anything LEFT of the normal ( recto - RIGHT, socially acceptable, etc, etc,) and that Catholicism had altered the meanings to imply that ' sinister' should mean ' sinful,' evil,' or ' in league with the forces of Evil.'
Guess what, I'm still left-handed when writing and using various tools, etc.
So, YES, tying your left shoe first was once classed as being an Immoral person and should religion ever get its way as it once had, we may, very sadly, see the old attitudes rear their ugly, disgusting heads once more.

@Triphid I'm left handed too and I was never subjected to that kind of abuse (I went to grade school in the 1970s and 80s). I have never read anything in the Bible condemning left-handed people either.

@DaleHusband_HS But you went to ' Grade School in America I presume whereas I went to Primary School ( Grade School) in Australia in the late 50s and early 70s.
In the ORIGINAL transcription of the Goat-Herders Guide to the Galaxy, aka the bible, you will a passage in Exodus ( Chpt. 2, verse 11 if memory serves me correct) that states, " Thou shalt smite off the hands and heads of those whom with their sinister ( left) hands cannot change to the ways that are those the Lord, thy God and be of the Recto ( right) handed ones."

If that be your opinion then I feel sorry for both you and any future generations that hold to your principles for most surely there will be some possibly horrific malformations/deformities occurring in your genetic lines of the future.

@Triphid who said anything about procreation?

@Ktruin Well, unless precautions such as a Vasectomy for the males and a total Hysterectomy for the female are undertaken prior to any sexual relations taking place, somewhere sometime and somehow Nature will have its own way and suddenly procreation has become a reality.

@RobLawrence Typically, this interaction happens when an adult pedophile sexually abuses a child. That is definitely damaging and psychologically harmful.

I agree completely.

What an informed response you provide. Thank you.

@NFAguy53 it takes multiple generations of inbreeding for serious abnormalities to manifest. Perhaps this guys parents and/or grandparents were also closely related? Or they were just stupid people in the first place. I don't personally know anyone who has married a close relative. You apparently know two pair. It must be more common where you are from. (My mom is from Arkansas, and my dad, from Texas.)

actually there is often a great deal of trauma involved in sibling relations. Anyone who has grown up with brothers and sisters knows all to well the power differentiation and coercion of a sibling just two yrs senior, let alone 5 yrs.

There are other biological indications that incest is not intended in the evolutionary process. Did you know a girl is likely to defer onset of her period if she lives with her father. On the other hand if she lives with a stepfather she is likely to start her periods early (a potential genetically compatible mate)

Today's birth control methods , while good , are not 100% effective , but most especially so , if one member wants to have babies , and tampers with the control methods .

@MsDemeanour sounds very interesting. Do you have a good source you could share?

Incest only becomes a problem, after multiple instances in a family tree. It was common in royal families. If there is no history of incest in a family, and I'm sure that family's particular set of gene flaws is also a factor, there is unlikely going to be a problem.

@novoxguy You're saying incest is not a problem UNTIL genetic deformities occurr. Incest is a problem to the gene pool at the beginning of the behavior. Royalty married one another. Yes. Marrying first cousins was common also. In early roman society incest was rampant among the powerful. The fact remains that because of genetic anomalies, incest became "immoral". However, the "kind" of immorality is still associated with biologic and evolutionary needs.

And what if it is not a child but an adult with an adult?

Incest is not necessarily the same as pedophilia any more than pedophilia being incest.

Why is it wrong if it's two consenting adults that take responsible measures to not get pregnant?

Are you saying that other cultures which allow it are indecent?

I agree completely and you explained it so well

Yes, well said.

Good point.

Most religious people do not get morals from scriptures, they get them in spite of scriptures. The christian bible is all for women as objects, slavery, racism, and the death penalty for all sorts of nonsense. The reality is religious extremism is actually just sincere interpretation of scriptures, moderates are just more evolved in their thinking without realizing that it is in spite of following a god.

Atheists are more prone to openly examine a moral question and in doing so open ourselves to ridicule. As this thread demonstrates nicely.

Yes, most theists completely ignore their holy book. make up whatever they want to believe, and maybe find a phrase out of context in their holy book to support it. It's called Eisegesis. The funny part is that it's a GOOD thing that they do that. The evilest people are the ones who actually read their holy book and try to do what it says. It makes them want to torture gays or fly planes into skyscrapers.

@RobLawrence could be

“I’m sorry honey, but I’m booked for the night with our daughters.” That’s sounds just mildly repulsive.

In that world the daughters would be the honey & outsiders more than mildly repulsive.

If you think it does then, it does.

@paul1967 Then I'm good.

Look at president Trump how he goes on about his daughter. So it might be beyond you but...

@PontifexMarximus Oh yes I agree. But I am saying that to have that desire is not an issue of morality, it is a perversion

Moral relativism is more easily understood in comparison to moral absolutism. Absolutism claims that morality relies on universal principles (natural law, conscience). Christian absolutists believe that God is the ultimate source of our common morality, and that it is, therefore, as unchanging as He is. Moral relativism asserts that morality is not based on any absolute standard. Rather, ethical “truths” depend on variables such as the situation, culture, one's feelings, etc.

I have to disagree that if a society sees some thing as acceptable, then it is.
Western society deemed slavery as acceptable. It wasn't.
Some arab countries believe it acceptable to prevent women from driving or stone them for adultery - it isn't.

Well, the Egyptians were civilized. The British were civilized. The French were civilized.

I don't think he said that civilized people DON'T do it, I think he just said it's not GOOD for them. I think he is wrong, but he is entitled to his opinion.

LMAO - I'll put you down for a write-in for weird.......Done got it

The parent and the child is a very good point considering a child being raised for the purpose loses the ability to consent due to power imbalance. I did not consider that.

Sex without informed consent from both parties on an equal playing field is rape.

It's an attitude that has cost me a few opportunities, but I believe it has also avoided a lot of regrets.

A couple of my cousins are cute, I have no sister, I doubt my brother would be up for it even if I was.

Condoms are only 98% effective at preventing pregnancy, and while my sex drive is slowing down a bit, and a partner is only fertile some of the time. Safe sex is just a phrase for less risky sex.

I imagine you're right about what you said about women not agreeing, but that is the difference between what is legal and what is actually practiced.

yeah, the question was siblings.

Still, incest is not okay, It's abuse and hurtful, and how is that even a question. All the same objections!

But the question was phrased to rule out genetics, just to ask an opinion on the morality of the act.

@Benmonk

Safe sex does not rule out the possibility of offspring, is the problem with the question as phrased.

What you have described here is child abuse, aggressive manipulation of unwitting victims. This is rape, not consenting sex between people who understand what they are doing, It is not the only form of incestuous relationship, nor would such behavior be acceptable in any of the modern/western societies. However, there is a culture in which the daughter's first sexual experience is with her father, and in that culture it is not only accepted, it is part of community life. There are other cultures with interesting sexual behaviors that might turn the head of the average westerner, but are part and parcel of everyday life.

That would be considered child molestation, incest or not.