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incest |
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incestSexual intercourse between persons thought to be too closely related to marry; the exact relationships that fall under the incest taboo vary widely from society to society. A biological explanation for the incest taboo is based on the necessity to avoid inbreeding. Within groups in which ritual homosexuality is practised, for example in New Guinea, an incest taboo applies also to these relations, suggesting that the taboo is as much social as biological in origin. |
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| I mean those which are awake when the reasoning and human and ruling power is asleep; then the wild beast within us, gorged with meat or drink, starts up and having shaken off sleep, goes forth to satisfy his desires; and there is no conceivable folly or crime-- not excepting incest or any other unnatural union, or parricide, or the eating of forbidden food--which at such a time, when he has parted company with all shame and sense, a man may not be ready to commit. As if, when the marriage institution is abolished, concubinage, adultery, and incest, must not necessarily abound; when all the rights of humanity are annihilated, any barrier remains to protect the victim from the fury of the spoiler; when absolute power is assumed over life and liberty, it will not be wielded with destruc- tive sway |
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incest
