Henry Roth had one of the most anomalous careers in modern letters: a brilliant novel at age twenty-eight, the incomparable Call It Sleep, lost for thirty years but never quite forgotten, then a torrent of words let loose in his seventies and eighties. ... Roth continued to resist any single explanation for his catastrophic writer's block, but it became evident that it was the incest, and the self-loathing that accompanied it, that threw the biggest roadblock across his path. [more inside]
posted by Joe Beese
on Jan 12, 2011 -
7 comments
Three years after the failure of his recklessly ambitious Marxist epic
1900, Bernardo Bertolucci returned to directing with
La Luna - a story of opera and
incest featuring a Golden Globe-nominated performance by Jill Clayburgh, then at the height of her late 70s fame. [Also appearing in small roles were Fred Gwynne and an up-and-coming Roberto Benigni.] Writing in The New York Times,
Vincent Canby described it as "one of the most sublimely foolish movies ever made by a director of Mr. Bertolucci's acknowledged talents."
Roger Ebert wrote, "Bertolucci has sprung his gourd this time."
[more inside]
posted by Joe Beese
on May 30, 2009 -
4 comments
I both loved and resented that wealth of warmth which Elisabeth brought to me in those unexpected hours of the night. I was usually in the midst of a sound sleep when she got into my bed, and thrilling as I found the ministrations of her fat little fingers, it also meant my being kept awake for hours and hours. Besides, though in my conscious nature I knew nothing about what was going on, I must have had a feeling that my sister was bringing to my life as accomplished facts sensations whose real value to a boy was in their being discovered as part of the experience of growing up. She was presenting me with triumphs I should by right attain only by my own efforts in a much more restricted world… [more inside]
posted by Joe Beese
on Mar 20, 2009 -
11 comments
I had sex with my brother but I don't feel guilty. An interesting article in The Times written by a woman who'd had a sexual relationship with her brother that started during their teenage years and continued through to their twenties. Many societies have an
incest taboo, but anthropologists have differing views as to how the taboo arose.
Claude Lévi-Strauss believed it to have arisen as a method to encourage the practice of marriage outside of one's immediate social group, so that unrelated households or lineages would form relationships through marriage, thus strengthening social solidarity.
posted by electricinca
on Jul 15, 2008 -
131 comments
Late Night Shots is an "invitation-only" social networking site for elite GOP youth of Washington, DC that the late
Steve Gilliard mockingly described as
"the best and whitest." The Wonkette blog has devoted an
entire section to the site that documents Late Night Shots'
racism,
date rape,
anti-Islamic prejudice, and
incest with second cousins, at least until
Wonkette's editor started getting invited to their parties. The founder of Late Night Shots,
Reed Landry, plans to take his networking site to other cities, but even though Wonkette has lost interest, the Washington City Paper has attracted scrutiny to the site again with a juicy new
exposé.
posted by jonp72
on Jul 12, 2007 -
83 comments
Peruvian Gothic. "Don Benigno Aazco carved his way 36 years deep into the green heart of the Andean forest, founded 14 settlements, abandoned his wife and many children, married his daughter, slew his son-in-law, fought drug peddlers, tamed the wilderness, and reclaimed, as best he could, the Inca Empire. And now I was going to find him." [
via]
posted by Sticherbeast
on Jul 16, 2006 -
23 comments
xFamily Values. A collaborative work by former members documenting
The Family/
Children of God religion/cult. Uniquely reflecting the
sexual revolution, they encouraged
prostitution as a means of gaining
converts and
offerings (
Flirty Fishing).
Plus they had
comic books for the
kids. But in concordance with other cults,
abuse,
incest,
mind-control,
secrecy,
charismatic leaders and
leaderettes,
insanity, and
irreparable harm were in
full swing. (No more inside. There may be PDFs involved. Please note that much of this material is not safe for work, or anywhere else.)
posted by cytherea
on Feb 10, 2006 -
34 comments
If all men were brothers, would you let one marry your sister? Think advocates for
gay marriage and
group marriage face a lot of social prejudice? Try campaigning for legalizing
adult consensual incest. It’s an idea that seems equally distasteful to those on both
the right and the left. But what about, say, the very real situation of adoption and sperm donation resulting in meetings between adult siblings
who aren’t even aware of the relationship? (Previously discussed
here and
here.) And then there’s the earnest
cousin marriage movement, which makes a lot of people reassess their views on the laws. In fact, the adult consensual incest movement has picked up support from some
surprising quarters. Of course, most people are opposed to it, often citing the - quite
overexaggerated (PDF) - dangers of inbreeding. (But, of course, this doesn’t explain why they’d still be against adult gay incest, or incest after, say, a tubal ligation.) In the meantime, it is happening, and people are genuinely
being
arrested
for this. Should Montana be sentencing people for up to
100 years for a tryst with a pretty cousin?
posted by kyrademon
on Jan 29, 2005 -
91 comments
A new brand of incest. "You're 40, happily married - and then you meet your long-lost brother and fall passionately in love. This isn't fiction; in the age of the sperm donor, it's a growing reality: 50% of reunions between siblings, or parents and offspring, separated at birth result in obsessive emotions. Last month, a former police officer was convicted of incest with his half-sister - but should we criminalise a bond hardwired into our psychology?"
posted by Hildegarde
on Jan 12, 2004 -
51 comments
ATTENTION: brothers and sisters. Does the thought of your siblings naked send a shiver up your spine? Well, according to psychologists and people who study adoption, siblings and other close kin who reunite after being separated at birth often experience 'Genetic Sexual Attraction', a potent and embarrassing lust for the estranged relative. You may have heard that 'opposites attract', but scientists have long known that people are, as a basic rule, attracted to physically similar people. Now let the chorus of 'ewww' commence...
posted by dgaicun
on Oct 29, 2002 -
42 comments
