Time Rider : The Adventures of Lyle Swann (co-written by Michael Nesmith of the Monkees, you know, the one with the hat!)

THE SYNOPSIS:

Lyle Swann (man, he was a great receiver for the Steelers), a mild mannered motocross bike racer with an ultracool helmet is accidentally transported back in time to old west times.  There he meets a beautiful woman who he becomes involved with. As he is transported back to modern day, we realize that the beautiful woman was in fact his own great great grandmother!

THE DEBATE:

Consequences of altering the time stream aside (surely a topic for another day), is it morally acceptable to sleep with your great great grandmother?

Alan:

First off, I'd like to point out that I find the fact that he time-travelled into the past to be very important when considering the morality of his action.  Consider an alternate future where everyone lives for thousands of  years (say, through the magic of Twinkies) -- one would be well acquainted (barring accident and invasion by giant lobster aliens) with one's ancestors for many years back, including a great great grandmother or two.  Clearly in this case, there is a far greater ickiness involved, and much to be explained at the Family Reunion in the year 3535 (if man is still alive). This is NOT the situation we're presented with : The TimeRider (as his good friends call him) has been cast into a world where he understands little and he is even less understood by its inhabitants.  He knows no one.   He's lonely.  He wants a little nooky. And he wants to be born at some point in the future -- who could blame him?

Rob:

You bring up a good number of points, Alan.  I believe, however, there are three major factors that you forgot to mention:

Number one:  Lyle's great-great-grandmother was really hot.  I cannot stress this factor enough.

Number two:  (and you kind of mentioned this) He's never met her before, thus removing the chance that half way through "The Act" (alternately known as "Boinky-Boinky Horizontal Shadow Wrestling") he would suddenly find himself seeing his dearly departed Granny.

Number three:  Lyle is intensely stupid.  This is a guy whose entire adult life has been spent on a BMX track and has probably dated seventeen women named "Lurleen", many of which could have been his relatives already. Not only this, but if you'll recall, Lyle never realized while he was in "Ye Olde West"!  That's right, he traveled back in time a hundred years and, despite the complete lack of any modern amenities in the town where he shacked up with the good Granny (such as telephones, running water, microwaves, hula hoops, etc), never figured out that the fact that none of the people he encountered had ever seen a motorcycle was relevant.  In short, Lyle was already short a few spokes in the wagon wheel and wouldn't have cared if he knew they were related any way.

Let me recap.  Lyle Swan:  Hot Grandma, whom he had never met, and insanely stupid.  Let us not judge him lest we are prepared to walk in his incredibly dense head.

Alan:

Valid arguments all, but perhaps a bit naive.  I'll grant you the 19th century genetic ancestor in question was no one-legged dog in the looks department.  I'm not at all saying she would be easy to resist -- I mean, we are talking about a gorgeous woman who exists in one of only three time periods where it's perfectly acceptable for a woman to wear form fitting seude outfits as a matter of course.

(the second period being, of course, circa 1000 B.C. to 1050 A.D. depending on the mythology being ripped off in this episode of The New Adventures of Sinbad --ala the hot witch who replaced the busty witch)

AND the final period being:

(the Tom Baker years on Dr. Who when he gallifreyed about with that amazing British barbarian girl Leela who I wanted to dalek with my cyberman almost as much as Diana Rigg on the Avengers -- if you know what I mean!)

Still, attractive looks can be no excuse for sleeping with relatives, especially without the combined effect of alcohol consumption to dull the brain's patented "Jerry Springer Show Ickiness Sensor".

Your second point is largely irrelevant, ad hoc, and exceedingly pro bono. So what if he never met her in his time period and therefore won't picture her shriveled, gap-toothed, and smelling of Gold Bond medicated cream?  His experience might be more pleasant without that image (and ours too, should they decide to shoot that Ally McBeal style), but the action itself is what's at issue, and that's independent of what he's thinking about.  For all we know, he's one sick puppy who fantasizes about the Where's the Beef? lady (may her soul rest in peace and may her estate not sue us) handing him a square Wendy's water-gel burger -- he's still sleeping with his great-great grandmother!

Finally, yes, Lyle is stupid, but I feel you're doing him a disservice to suggest that he wouldn't have cared if he knew they were related. Obviously he cares very much -- so much that he has suppressed all rational thought about the issue to the point where he can not believe he is in the past!  This is no wayward theory.  How could any man, incredibly stupid notwithstanding, not realize from all the clues he is given that he has been transported into the past (and this with him overlooking the fact that his own title is "TimeRider").  The ugly truth is that to exist at all (I know, we said we'd leave out time stream issues, but this goes to motive) he MUST sleep with her, and his psyche needs to hide this fact in order to preserve his admittedly fragile sanity.  No matter what, it's going to happen -- and I have to say that relieves him of all moral responsibility. Two words, Rob: Octopus Sex.  I mean, Oedipus Rex.

Rob:

Fascinating.  You've brought up a great set of arguments, Al, and I must say that for a wiser man, your "Do Her And You Will Come" argument would be incredibly valid (not to mention kinky).  But for Lyle, a guy who probably needs somebody to explain to him why the Dough Boy doesn't jump out when he twists open a can of biscuit dough, this level of thinking just couldn't take place.  Sure, he may have gotten lucky in the Time Continuum Sweepstakes, but it's just that, Luck.  If there had been another single woman in the town, Lyle would have just as easily gone for her (and probably not only wouldn't have ever been able to figure out he was in the past, but would have wiped himself out of the future to boot).   Lyle's wandering (and not too bright) eye doesn't care a whit (a whit, I tell you!) about the time stream.  It cares about three things:  1) Motocross, 2) Dames, and 3) Monday Nitro WCW Wrestling on TNT.  (That's just his eye, mind you, the rest of him is still pissed that Hee Haw was cancelled.  Speaking of Hee Haw, I bet Lyle would've felt much more at home in the Ol' West if Ellie May had been there.)  Sure, I agree with your point that the common man, realizing his predicament, would've lied back, thinking of England, and do his great-great-granny just to ensure his own existence within his particular timestream.  But Lyle didn't need to justify his actions, he went ahead and did-the-deed with a woman in the past without even bothering to think about what could happen.  Sure, you can try and figure out his subconscious and whatnot, but if you ask me, Lyle's subconscious was much more concerned with nookie and perhaps getting a beer and perusing copy of Sports Illustrated on the toilet afterwards than the effects his actions would have.  Yep, Lyle was lucky he got with the right woman, plain and simple, and all of us in the future owe him in his luck and stupidity.

Alan:

Alright, I'm going to concede your point of his limited intellect. Your arguments have swayed me only barely -- the true reason I'm convinced of his utter mental ineptitude is his original decision to be a Motocross TimeRider, when everyone knows the real sport is 250cc Super Motocross. With his elaborate helmet setup he could routinely be defeating the immortal Craig McGrath, the scrappy Ezra Lusk, even the perpetually second Jeff Emit.  Clearly his stupidity has allowed him to be duped into the almost-as-exciting middle of nowhere desert Motocrossing where he can cross national boundaries/international date lines/quantum time fluctuations without a blink.  He does get good mileage, though -- 100 years into the past on one tank.  Must be the Premium stuff.

Let's get back to the original question.  Is this moral behavior for a non-incarcerated man?  Let's give the Lyle the benefit of the doubt and say he has no idea (all brain functioning aside) that he is about to jump his great great grand-mammy's bones.   How can we fault him?  If he truly has no foreknowledge about this event and hasn't bothered to read the script (easily confirmed by his facial expressions), then he cannot be held morally responsible, no way, no how, no diggity!

If he does know the score, then I still give him the shrug and the slight thumbs up.  After all, it's a sin to commit suicide too.  My guess is that he's covered all his bases in the confessional.  Now, wrap this bad boy up, Rob!

Rob:

Why, thank you kindly, good buddy!  I'm glad that there is at least one topic in the world that we can agree on, even if it is the thought that it's morally acceptable to "lie with" a great-great-ancestor if only to ensure your own existence.  Sure, 3 out of 4 major religions would condemn you for it, but I say, if you never actually did it, then you couldn't have any guilt about it in the future.  If that doesn't get the religions on the great-great-incest bandwagon, then I don't know what will.  Let's face it, kids, there's no way around the fact that everyone needs a great-great-grandfather.  If poor thick-as-a-brick Lyle has to be his own great-great-grandfather, then that's just the way it's gonna have to be. You can't expect him (or anyone else) not to!  After all, what if in the future one of his descendents was to father or give birth to the person who cured cancer, or made world peace possible, or killed the guy who wrote that damn Celine Dion song from Titanic.  If there's one thing I've learned from Star Trek (other than never to wear a red shirt) it's that messing around with the space-time continuum can be really spooky and make for a couple really goofy episodes.  Therefore, I ask you, who amongst you would take it upon themselves to change the past, present, and future and rob all others of the world they know?  So if you're ever stuck in the past and discover that you're your own great-great-grandparent, be like Lyle and do it for [insert your country of origin here]!

Please note:  The opinions expressed above are not the views of the Yakamura Corporation, its subsidiary End of Monkey Productions, or anyone above the age of fourteen.  Thank you.  And please remember our suggestions only count for those trapped in the past, you perverts!

 

From CaptDave:

Perception of morality is often manifested in legislative action, ie what is
considered immoral is made illegal. Ergo, if it is moral, it is legal.
Inversely therefore, if it is legal, it must be moral. Since it is only
illegal for first cousins to marry in most states (except those south of the
Mason-Dixon line, where it is encouraged), it must be legal to marry your
g-g-grandmother, since, genealogically speaking, she is outside of the
circle of relatives considered first cousins. Ergo, since it is legal, it
must be moral.

Did I mention that temporal physics give me a headache?

From Kurt Roeschlaub:

Nice arguments, both of you, but you seem to be unawary of the great
mysterious reason that sleeping with your relatives is considered icky.
This is one of those sneaky little things that biologists know very
well, but doesn't disseminate into the outside world too easily because
1) the subject is gross, and 2) most people wouldn't know a genotype if
it bit them on the ass (of course, if something does byte you on the ass
it almost certainly is not a genotype, but I digress).

The real reason sleeping with relatives is a major ick is because people
have not been doing it for millions of years (with the exception of a
few royal families who will remain nameless).  This, my friends, is
what's known as being exogamous.  Humans are seriously into it, to the
point where we have spread extreme exogamy throughout the population.

This means that if you have some bizarre mutation in your genes that
gives you a thrid arm growing out of your head, nobody would ever know
it.  You see, it will be completely smothered by the other half of your
genes and not be expressed.  Since humans are so exogamous, chances are
your future mate will not have this mutation, and so neither will your
kids.

The problem is you probably got this mutation from one of your parents,
so there is a 50% chance your sister has it.  If she does, there is a
25% chance your child will have no dominate
non-arm-sticking-out-of-the-head gene and so will be, if it is lucky,
only severely deformed.

The catch is that humans are so exogamous that we all have hundreds of
these bizarre little genes sitting in our cells with all sorts of
nastyness waiting to pop out unexpectedly.  The ick factor is really
just a natural instinct designed to make sure these genes never get a
chance to express.

So the real question is, how many genes do you share with your
great-great grandmother?  Well, it would be 1/16th.  With a 25% chance
of a particular nasty having nothing overriding it, that coumes out to
1/64th of any mutations she has beng expressed in their child.  Given an
off-the-cuff average of 400 or so mutations that gives about 6 expected
muatations.  Most will probably manifest as chemical imbalances or
defects in the most complex organ: the brain.  Sorry, this does not look
good for our hero.  On the other hand, this could explain why he's such
a drooling imbicile.