[ SECRET POST #3791 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #3791 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.



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02.
[The Americans]


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03.
[veep]


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04.
[Elementary]


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05.
[Ben 10]


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06.
[World of Warcraft]


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07.
[Shane and Ryan, Buzzfeed Unsolved]












Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 38 secrets from Secret Submission Post #543.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

comment below

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

Okay, I understand that incest is generally bad because of the power dynamics usually involved and I'm not interested in screwing my sister or what have you, but how overstated is the whole birth defect thing? The biggest example is European royalty and that only happened after generations of inbreeding. Wild animals sometimes inbreed and there's rarely an issue.

So is the only bad thing about incest the power dynamics?

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

Well I will tell you growing up we had barn cats that would have kittens every year. They started out as various random cats, but over the years they ended up basically being all related to each other in some way, and with that came a lot of messed up kittens that often didn't make it too long. Anecdotal, I know, but it struck kid!me as concrete evidence of inbreeding.

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

well studies have been done (in India iirc) which have shown that it only takes about 2 generations of first cousin marriages for birth defects to start cropping up and intellectual capacity to start decreasing, so Imma have to say that it seems likely that closer relations (eg siblings) would have a much better chance of it showing up much quicker. Also, if you think "there's rarely an issue" with animals inbreeding, you don't know jack about animals, because a) inbreeding is literally the reason that some specific types of animals eg purebred dogs are having serious genetic problems and b) anecdotally (though I am sure I am very, very far from having seen the only examples here) I've seen birth defects crop up in the first generation of inbred cats. My parents actually owned a cat which was the result of a male cat mating with its mother and although it lived to be 9, it had internal organ abnormalities that may have directly contributed to its eventual death. Feral/barn cats inbreed all the time and things like that are always appearing in the resulting offspring.

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

I specifically mentioned wild animals because purebreed animals are from years of human selected inbreeding, not an occasional thing. I imagine there's issues with endangered animals as well due the limited gene pool. I meant rarely an issue in the way of that inbreeding occasionally happens but since it isn't usually sustained, birth defects aren't an issue for a one off thing. I should have phrased my post better because rereading it makes me sound like I don't think sustained inbreeding causes birth defects.

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

Keep in mind when talking about European royalty that typically they weren't trying to inbreed either and it depended on the political climate at the time. They still weren't marrying off brother and sister most times, mostly it was marriages between cousins and if it was possible they would choose a distant cousin. Health issues typically happen a lot faster the closer family members are, so yeah it is possible for cousins to have children and for issues to not crop up right away.

Birth defects and other health issues definitely happen as a result of inbreeding though, and it's one of those things where even if it doesn't, who in their right mind would want to risk it.

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

I know when you get to cousins it's ridiculously low, something like it jumps from .02% chance with a total stranger to .04% which of course means people interpret it as IT DOUBLES which makes it sound scary.

I think it's one of those things if there is a hidden genetic issue then inbreeding is going to greatly increase the chance of it appearing. You might want to narrow it down by what species you're specifically talking about, and what kind of inbreeding.

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=studies+on+inbreeding+and+genetic+abnormalities&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjW4fGju4LUAhWi2YMKHUmcB70QgQMIJTAA

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

My take is that, from a genetic point of view, it's mostly fine in small doses, but if it takes place on a large scale and repeatedly over time, it does start to have systemic effects on the gene pool. Also, from a social point of view, there does seem to be some kind of negative effect of cousin marriages on social cohesion, trust, and egalitarianism. So while it's usually fine on an individual level (barring the power-dynamic issues you mention), it's also probably better on the whole that it be discouraged and slightly taboo.

Re: A question about incest

[(Anonymous)]

It, in part, depends on what the people involved are potential carriers of. If there is some rare recessive disease or condition in their past that both a brother and a sister are carriers of, odds of them having issues with other people are slight, but odds of them having issues if they had a child with each other are huge.