1y ago

DNA Tests Are Uncovering the True Prevalence of Incest

www.theatlantic.com

The geneticist Jim Wilson, at the University of Edinburgh, was shocked by the frequency he found in the U.K. Biobank, an anonymized research database: One in 7,000 people, according to his unpublished analysis, was born to parents who were first-degree relatives—a brother and a sister or a parent and a child. “That’s way, way more than I think many people would ever imagine,” he told me. And this number is just a floor: It reflects only the cases that resulted in pregnancy, that did not end in miscarriage or abortion, and that led to the birth of a child who grew into an adult who volunteered for a research study.

Most of the people affected may never know about their parentage, but these days, many are stumbling into the truth after AncestryDNA and 23andMe tests.

Hacker News @lemmy.bestiver.se

RSS Bot @lemmy.bestiver.se

BOT

1w ago

DNA tests are uncovering the true prevalence of incest

www.theatlantic.com /health/archive/2024/03/dna-tests-incest/677791/

Health - Resources and discussion for everything health-related @lemmy.world

MicroWave @lemmy.world

1y ago

DNA Tests Are Uncovering the True Prevalence of Incest

www.theatlantic.com /health/archive/2024/03/dna-tests-incest/677791/

33 comments

One in 7,000 people, according to his unpublished analysis, was born to parents who were first-degree relatives—a brother and a sister or a parent and a child. “That’s way, way more than I think many people would ever imagine,”
Now I'm not walking around thinking I'm living in a porn movie, but a rate of 0.014% is not what I would call shocking.
- And this number is just a floor: It reflects only the cases that resulted in pregnancy, that did not end in miscarriage or abortion, and that led to the birth of a child who grew into an adult who volunteered for a research study.
  Either way, what number of parent raping and impregnating their child or sibling raping and impregnating their sibling would be shocking to you? Because to most people it's probably "anything that isn't zero".
  
  It's shocking to you that rape exists? Clearly its a bad thing and shouldn't happen, and it's upsetting, but I would disagree that most people would be shocked if you told them "more than zero rapes happened this year".
- And this number is just a floor: It reflects only the cases that resulted in pregnancy, that did not end in miscarriage or abortion, and that led to the birth of a child who grew into an adult who volunteered for a research study.
  Meaning that this could be an indication of a wider incest....problem?......trend?.....idk....
  Edit: it was literally the next sentence....
I’ve been thinking it’s pretty common for a while, just because of how common a version of it with plausible deniability for the downsides (step siblings, etc.) is in porn. I know people say it’s just to appeal to people who really like it and the rest can just mute, but that’s very unconvincing. I always have porn muted, because the sounds don’t do much for me and just about every person I talk to about this (not a lot, so grain of salt) is surprised that anyone would mute as a rule. Secondly, I don’t think you really need words to pick up on the incest vibe.
- My theory about all the step sibling porn is that they’re trying to get you to pay for the “normal” porn. “Yes you can watch it for free…but wouldn’t it be better if it wasn’t so weird?” I don’t think most people find those story lines appealing.
  
  Sibling or other incestuous roleplay is super common actually. The step sibling stuff on porn sites afaik was once again enforced from their payment providers or advertisers. Because people who aren't related, but acting like they are, are apparently turning the world into Sodom & Gomorrah, and based on some of those weird virgin or conspiracytard comments here it seems that some people actually do believe this too.
- Wait, there are people who don’t mute?
  
  Ai, papi!
- Incest porn is so disgusting. I don't care if it's fictional, it's still disgusting.
  I have no problem with porn in general, but I'm just glad I don't know who gets off on the incest porn.
  
  It’s 100% not my thing, but, y’know, neither is scat. I’m just assuming someone likes it because it’s everywhere. Another user suggested it’s to get people to pay for non-incest porn, which sounds possible, though the porn companies would have to be willing to collude about that. I’m not sure if that’s likelier than that people are just ashamed about it.
- Fellow muter
Given the number of blathering idiots there are, I'm kinda surprised inbreeding isn't even more common.
Well there's 8 billion humans and 331 million Americans so
Over a million humans and almost 50k Americans.
Rad
If 1/7000 kids are the product of incest, I'm guessing that 1//500 have been lied to about their biological father; looking at you royal family of England.
A bit off topic but, here is the latest episode from the podcast Citations Needed. They talk about the Atlantic's shitty politics. It made me not want to give them any views.
https://citationsneeded.libsyn.com/episode-198-how-the-atlantic-magazine-helps-sell-austerity-and-war-to-middlebrow-liberals
What's the equivalent to take me home country roads in UK? I think it deserves one.

33 comments