Forget the way things have been.  If it's flawed, change it.  Language
evolves, so don't fight it.

> And considering the comma, I'm a 100% certain that placing a comma
> before "and" in Dutch is a grammatical error. I'm not entirely sure if
> that's the case in English as well, but I think it probably is. It
> doesn't seem logical to me, since 'and' effectively replaces the comma.

I think you're safer using a comma to replace the 'and' rather than 'and' to
replace the comma.  Do not use 'and' to separate any list items, even the
last item.

Instead of "To my parents, Ayn Rand and God." or "To my parents, Ayn Rand,
and God." use:

"To my parents, Ayn Rand, God."

The 'and' in this case is understood and does not need to be written.  It's
like the Latin method someone mentioned, but instead of 'and' we use a
comma.

Can anyone give one good reason why the 'and' needs to be there?  All it
seems to do is complicate things and doesn't really provide any meaning.

~Mike.