What is wrong with incest?
Inquiry 19 (1-4):27 – 39 (1976)
| Abstract | Incest taboos should be seen as involving non?sexual objections to sexual relations, that is, objections based on who people are in relation to each other, rather than their activities. What is at stake is brought out by considering certain objections to father?daughter incest and certain features of taboos. The objections that matter do not depend on social ties and distinctions having a biological basis, but there is nonetheless a biological element in incest taboos. To see it, one must look to the nature of the Oedipus complex, and to the conditions for the development of the individual and of society. There may be prohibitions which are necessary (to morality, to society, to humanity) even though they may not be justifiable within a narrower conception (e.g. utilitarian) of morality and justification. And so taboos which are universal (occur, in one form or another, in every society), and absolute (allow no questioning), and impose strict liability (allow no excuse), may not be irrational: they may mark the boundaries that shape a way of life | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,701 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesJerome Neu (2000). A Tear is an Intellectual Thing: The Meanings of Emotion. Oxford University Press.
Jane Caputi (1994). Unthinkable Fathering: Connecting Incest and Nuclearism. Hypatia 9 (2):102 - 122.
Nancy Potter (1995). The Severed Head and Existential Dread: The Classroom as Epistemic Community and Student Survivors of Incest. Hypatia 10 (2):69 - 92.
Peter Morriss (1997). Blurred Boundaries. Inquiry 40 (3):259 – 289.
R. Makarius & E. P. Halperin (1960). The Incest Prohibition and Food Taboos. Diogenes 8 (30):41-61.
Jeffrey Sebo (2006). The Ethics of Incest. Philosophy in the Contemporary World 13 (1):48-55.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-30Total downloads86 ( #8,482 of 549,118 )Recent downloads (6 months)1 ( #63,361 of 549,118 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
