This is really ridiculous. Why isn’t the comparison to a heterosexual couple? How are they different from homosexuals?

“There is no distinction at all” is an incorrect claim, because here are two essential distinctions:

1. With a brother and sister, there is another way, since a person who is attracted to women and specifically loves his sister can still marry another woman. By contrast, for homosexuals there is no way to realize the inclination without a prohibition.

2. With a brother and sister, the prohibition exists for reasons that involve an opening for exploitation, because if members of the same family become potential partners, family relationships can easily deteriorate into exploitation (older brothers exploiting their sisters by force, fathers manipulating their daughters because of power imbalances, and the like).

There is no distinction at all.
1. Why does that matter? The brother loves his sister. What’s the problem with that? Whom does it hurt? You didn’t explain what is bad about it, only that there is another way. Chewing gum also has another way, so should that be forbidden too?
2. When both are adults and decide on it together, there is no reason to prevent them from doing so. There is room for exploitation among strangers too. Maybe we should forbid marriage between a rich man and a poor woman or vice versa, since there could be exploitation here as well?
And finally, even if for some reason you do think there is substance to these distinctions, you would surely admit that this is not the reason it is forbidden. So these are weak after-the-fact excuses.
But as I said, in my opinion there isn’t even the slightest distinction. Wasserlauf’s argument is excellent. It doesn’t show that gay marriage should be forbidden, but rather that the claim of someone who wants to forbid it on the grounds that it is immoral doesn’t hold water. There is a debate over whether this is a proper act or not, and that is how it should be left.

Of course there is substance to these distinctions.

As for the first distinction, “there is no other way” is a reason used to justify many shocking things, such as cutting off a limb from a living person (if that is the only way to save his life….). So there is certainly room to argue that with homosexuals one has to make a moral compromise because there is no other way. The distinction is significant and important even if, in your view, it is not decisive.

As for the heart of the matter, my view is that the second distinction is the source and core of all incest prohibitions. The moment family relationships potentially become sexual, we bring upon ourselves horrors of dreadful exploitation, fights between brothers over their sisters, daughters desperate for protection from those close to them with no one to protect them, distorted sexual education, and so on.

Are you even bothering to read what I write? I asked what is bad about it so that I can discuss the question of whether there is another way or not. Chewing gum also has another way.
Your explanation is completely disconnected both from what people actually think and from logic. And again, of course, you didn’t bother to address my arguments about this.
Fine, let’s leave it. I don’t see any point in this discussion.

Your view that a brother and sister should be permitted to marry has been made clear, and that was not what I was addressing. I was responding to your absolute statement, “There is no distinction at all,” which you repeated several times, even though there are clearly at least two distinctions.

My explanation regarding the incest taboo (perhaps together with the physiological explanation of hereditary diseases, which is less relevant to morality) is the most common and most substantial explanation prevalent among professionals for the social danger of incest. There is nothing disconnected from logic in it, and in any case it certainly constitutes a relevant and important distinction as compared to homosexuality, contrary to your statement above.

There are other distinctions too. “Brother” and “sister” are spelled differently, and they also have the same parents. I wrote that there is no distinction with respect to the prohibition, and indeed there is none. And your explanation of the taboo itself shows that this is not the explanation. Professionals can rationalize people’s feelings and point to the danger of exploitation, etc. But that does not explain why people themselves are so repelled. To attribute it to that is complete nonsense. The danger of exploitation does not create that kind of revulsion. And as I wrote, there are dangers of exploitation in other situations too, and no one even thinks of forbidding them. Therefore, even in a case where we make sure there is absolutely no concern of exploitation, the revulsion would be the same. In short, these are empty little homilies.

See also here: https://mikyab.net/%d7%9b%d7%aa%d7%91%d7%99%d7%9d/%d7%aa%d7%92%d7%95%d7%91%d7%95%d7%aa-%d7%91%d7%a2%d7%99%d7%aa%d7%95%d7%a0%d7%95%d7%aa/%d7%92%d7%99%d7%9c%d7%95%d7%99-%d7%a2%d7%a8%d7%99%d7%95%d7%aa/

Moshe Ratt wrote about there being such a thing as “moral aesthetics.” There are things we understand are not okay even without needing to explain. Just as a person with a basic aesthetic sense will understand that you don’t build a bathroom in the middle of the living room (even if they come up with something that neutralizes the smell..), and someone might say it’s more convenient to go there right after eating, etc. He brings Jonathan Haidt’s argument that morality is not measured only by “did I do something bad to someone,” but that there are several other kinds of morality related to repairing the world and conducting it in its proper order (out of a belief that it was created for a certain purpose), which have been eroded by the extreme liberalism sweeping the world.

Rabbi, a question about your position:
After all, you believe these acts are bad.
If so, why are you in favor of giving them rights?

I wrote about Haidt and about aesthetic values, and you can search the site.

I do not think they are bad. Not at all. They are against Jewish law, and a democratic, secular state should not intervene in matters of Jewish law or beliefs at all. It should intervene only when someone is harmed.

Rabbi, wouldn’t it be better altogether if the state just stayed out of the bedroom, period?
Why does the state need to recognize any couple as married?
Let them allow financial agreements for all types, sexes, and numbers, and let everyone else do as they wish.

And in case you do see a need for the state to keep track of who is married and who is not, why shouldn’t the state be able to determine, from its standpoint, what counts as a “legal couple for purposes of benefits” and what does not?

It certainly would be better. But every legal system in the world regulates matters of personal status. It is hard to live without such legal regulation. Indeed, it should determine couplehood on the legal plane regardless of halakhic marriage or any other kind.
But the fact that the state regulates our personal status does not mean that it is allowed, or that it is proper, to do whatever it wants. If it is unfair not to recognize certain couples, then it is not proper for the state to do so. Does the fact that it regulates people’s personal status allow it to behave unfairly? What does one have to do with the other? The state also regulates financial relations between people. Does that mean it can arbitrarily decide that in every legal dispute between two people, the winner will be whoever has a name beginning with an earlier letter of the alphabet?

Of course the danger of exploitation creates revulsion—just think about what the relationship between parents and children would look like if every touch, like a good-morning hug or a good-night kiss, could end in a situation where a parent has relations with his child, and how a 12-year-old brother and sister can grow up together during intense sexual maturation.

Human society has developed strong and deep defense mechanisms against such destructive situations, foremost among them the psychological revulsion from relations within the family, similar to revulsion from murder and from the sight of human suffering, which originate in the principle that we must avoid, as much as possible, taking life and causing suffering.

There is no reason to stubbornly refuse to understand this essential point or to call it insulting names like “empty little homilies.” I showed you that there is a fundamental distinction between homosexual relations and incest, and your statement that “there isn’t even the slightest distinction” is fundamentally mistaken, and a person with integrity would retract it.

I agree with “Critique.” A world in which there is endless promiscuity will dismantle the institution of the family into pieces and bring chaos and total confusion into sexual relations, social standing, and everything else. It may be that one isolated act is not perceived as a problem, but as such things multiply they will undermine the order of the world from its foundations. This is not a slippery-slope concern; it is part of the slope. Like the first drop on the rock.