Incest – the act of having sexual relations with a family member. It’s a taboo that has lasted through the ages, and prevalent across the world. A taboo so strong that the law makes it illegal.

But recently, the debate on whether it should be decriminalized has arisen again. In early March 2008, a German man, known as Patrick S, had appealed to Germany’s highest court of appeal for his conviction on having an incestuous relationship with his sister to be overturned. His appeal failed.

According to the court, incest should be outlawed as it “do[es] not affect them exclusively, but also can have an effect on family and society and have consequences for children who arise from the relationship”. However, one of the judges dissented, arguing that the law “is based exclusively on moral beliefs rather than with the objective of legal protection”.

Is incest such a despicable act? History has shown that it is. For example, when the cruel King Henry VIII of England wanted to rid of one of his many wives, Anne Boelyn, he concocted a heinous crime against her – that she was sleeping with her brother. The only known civilization that ever accepted incest was ancient Roman Egypt, where relationships between brothers and sisters were common. Arguably, this has a lot to do with the idea of maintaining the purity of a bloodline.

There appears to be strong sociological reasons to oppose incest. According to the famous anthropologist Claude Levi Strauss, the incest taboo is an integral part of the advancement of human civilisation. This is because by compelling man to find a mate outside his home, separate rivals clans are united, and society has flourished.

From a biological perspective, the incest taboo is part of human evolution, as it prevents defective genes from being passed down. Thus, health risks to children born from an incestuous union is a real danger. Nevertheless, the counter argument to this is that banning incest is discriminative; the law does not ban those with hereditary diseases from having children.

Psychologists suggest that humans already have a natural aversion towards hooking up with their family members, no matter how physically attractive they may be. Yet, the recent trend of cases show that distance may make the heart grow fonder. In the German case, Patrick S was adopted, and only met his sister in 2000. In another famous case in the US which reached all the way to the Supreme Court in 2005, Allen and Patricia Muth was convicted of incest. The sister was raised separately, and only met her brother when she was 18-years old.

Unsurprisingly, many liberal European countries has led the way to relax the ban on incest. In Holland, consensual incest is no longer prosecuted, though the status of the child from such a union is uncertain. Sweden allows for marriage between blood siblings. France lifted the incest ban as early as 300 years go, during the reign of Napolean.

Nevertheless, even if incest is decriminalized, the next hurdle would be for incestuous couples to exert for the same rights as enjoyed by normal married couples.  Homosexual couples in many countries have long gone down the same road, and yet such rights still remain beyond their reach.

It may be that the law’s perspective on incest needs to be changed. But to foresee such a change happening in Malaysia, when it already encounters stiff opposition in liberal Western countries, is perhaps a bridge too far.

Also, Malaysian culture and society doesn’t even tolerate homosexuals, or anal sex. It’s a crime to lead an exciting sexual life. And having a incestuous relationship is certainly far too exciting for our vanilla standards.

(News Source: BBC website)

(This article is contributed by Raphael Kok, the law student of University of Malaya)