Posted on 02/11/2012 9:52:19 PM PST by Slings and Arrows
When your society has inhabited a small, remote island for countless generations and boasts a population of only 300,000, the odds of having sex with a relative are significant. Luckily, Icelanders now have a handy tool to avoid family-sex.
Íslendingabók—meaning "book of Icelanders"—is an online incest avoidance search engine. Plug in your name and that of a potential mate, and the site searches a genealogical database to see how closely you're related. It's likely that you'll have some overlap many generations back—in which case you're probably safe from mutant children. But if you share great-grandparents, you might want to reconsider your Nordic hookup.
But there's a twist! As GlobalPost reports, new research says sexing with a distant cousin is actually beneficial for fertility, as your genes are more comptable than someone from the other side of the planet. So, avoid creepy incest, but seek out good incest. Iceland—constantly at the top of quality of life lists, and an easy place to sleep with an attractive cousin. [GlobalPost via TNW]
LOL!!
This is hilarious!
Incest? There’s an app for that!
Who’s going to hack the site and redirect all searches to their own photo, captioned “Kinship too close; Alternative Suggestion:”?
“Hey baby, wanna...check the book?”
“Incest? There’s an app for that!”
A game the whole family can play!
Mark Zuckerberg.
I once was approached by an attractive woman, and we chatted for a bit as if she somehow knew me. Very friendly.
I simply assumed she wanted me.
Later on at a Thanksgiving party with a part of the family I had not seen for many years, I realized she was actually my second cousin.
Obviously she mistook you for me. ;^)
Hey baby, you’re too cute to be my cousin.
How does the “same-sex” crowd handle incest...or does it matter?
“How does the “same-sex” crowd handle incest...or does it matter?”
It doesn’t matter for them...nothing is produced by their ‘relations’.
Too bad the Naval Air Station at Keflavik is gone, it would of been safe to assume Americans with names like Willie Jefferson Brown, Sanchez, Garcetti or Chang were not even vaguely related. Oh well, there is always their cousin twice removed on their mother’s side.
“It’s your patriotic duty.”
That’s right. We don’t need no stinkin database!
So did the Navajo Nation. Most of Utah, parts of SW Nevada and the entire island of Samoa. Snark, snark and off to bed I go to rest my genetics. Nite, nite all
Nothing says lovin’ like doin’ your cousin!
A tourist industry could be built around this problem
From our Strange but True Department: West Virginia doesn't allow first-cousin marriages.
Yeah, and Illinois doesn’t allow political corruption.
It wouldn’t matter, unless they were making donations or withdrawals from a sperm bank.
I’ve heard that too. Probably a lot of folks named with the local equivalent of “John Johnson.”
Iceland could surpass Hong Kong...
I knew a couple in college that had two kids. I believe the wife took the husband’s last name. His name was something like Frer Thorson, and the wife’s name was Inga Thorson.
Their little boy was Thor Frerson, and the daughter was something Ingandaughter (or however one spells daughter in Iceland - dotter?) Pretty confusing.
Of course one first cousin marriage every 5 generations is about equivalent to a 5th cousin marriage every generation. The Pharaohs had dynasties of several hundred years based on sibling marriage. The recessive genes would be filtered out rather quickly by infanticide. The Hawaiian royalty also had sibling marriage. We are all pretty closely related, with our DNA being more than 99% common just by being human. It is likely that some of our visual diversity is due to a different corps of parasites living in/on us, and not so much our DNA variation.
Or Jane Johnsdaughter, as the case may be - Denmark only fairly recently dropped the practice themselves.
the Russians do something similar, with your middle name being derived from your parent’s first name, but with last names being inherited from the father.
Hmmm...there are counterexamples.
There’s two solutions to this. One is to be like the British Royal Family. Another is to learn 400 words of Icelandic, fly out to Iceland and celebrate diversity in a good way.
My dad had his dad’s name as a middle name, I have my dad’s as my middle, and my son has mine - but we ain’t commies! It is pretty odd (to me anyway) how they keep track of things what with changing last names and all. Although I guess back in the days of the Soviet Union that may have been a good thing!
Dang, where I come from, Iceland is a codeword for “Alabama”.
White crackers of the frozen north UNITE!!!!!
Obviously, the latter, since same-sex sex doesn't have genomic consequences.
Cousins are good for practice.
Yee-haw.
Wow! You learn something every day!
I didn’t know there is good incest, and I’m from Missippy! I need to ask around about that.
*face palm*
OT, but I flew over Greenland and Iceland a few years ago. Those ice bergs must be huge! They were very prominent at 40,000 feet.
Knew some Eritrean people. The kids take the dad’s first name as their last name.
Just ask a good Democrat.
The reason is because the number of potential ancestors doubles as you trace back every generation whereas the pool of available ancestors shrinks rather dramatically.
After 1670, all bets are off because it was about that time that the colonies became a convenient dumping ground for all sorts of people.
Some were petty thieves and debtors, sort of like the first Australian colonists, selected by the best judges in Britain. Most were just impoverished people.
It was common for a ship to show up off the coast of Ireland or Scotland. Officials would step off dockside and read the names of a list of families who were to report for transportation to America. Generally, they had a day to two to gather with their meager belongings, board the ship and leave. There was little chance of appeal as most of the names had been cleared with the local authorities in advance. Returning from transportation was a hanging offense.
“Just ask a good Democrat.”
*smack my forehead!
YES! That’s what I need to do! Ask a GOOD democrat!
Oh, wait..........
That’s why they need so much damn birth control.
What a brilliant idea!
The town I reside in could use a good online incest avoidance search engine. Everyone is related one way or another, almost does a full circle. It’s too disgusting. I didn’t find this out till I started researching the history of my house. LOL. I found out this town’s dirty little secret.
I’m very exited about moving out of here.
[Yes, I know I posted the link before. The poor guy just fascinates me.]
Gasp!
Thanks for the link. It sure is an eye opener!
good one :O)
Well, if a freeper came out of all that, its not too bad..:O)
De nada.
Thank’ee ma’am.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.