Columbia Professor Charged With Incest

[hadespussercats]

She should follow Katherine Harris's example and write a creepy bestseller about the affair-- that should offset legal fees, anyway.

In Australia this wouldn't work. We have laws here prohibiting you from profiting from your crime. That includes money made from publications, interviews and so on. The government will simply confiscate the proceeds.

I think this is in most states in the US as well.

I wonder what state Harris was writing from. I'm not so certain that criminals can't profit from books, interviews, etc., written about their crimes. What if the book were written before the crime was prosecuted successfully, or after the time has been served? This warrants some research...

Son of Sam Law

Well, seek and ye shall find, Mai-- though it's clear there are still issues between this kind of law and First Amendment rights, and I'm still unsure how many states have that sort of law on the books. I think it's interesting that they point out, in the Amy Fischer case, that she used her proceeds to post bail-- not for personal amusement. The note ties into my earlier comment, for one, and for two, I'd have to say being out on bail is bound to be a hell of a lot more enjoyable than being held in a cell.

In the interest of avoiding rousing the Mad Hatter's ire, I may do some more research into this, for my personal edification. If I find anything interesting I'll try to post it.

[Blondie]

Инцест это игра для всей семьи играть.

[Warren Dew]

Adult children, whether "groomed" or not, are likely from a lifetime of loving, attention-seeking, etc., to still want to please their parent, to fear losing their love, admiration, respect, attention, care... These feelings have their roots in childhood, but they don't disappear once a child has passed the age of consent.

All of the adult children I've ever known have been more than willing to defy their parents on issues on which they disagreed. Adults are not incompetent to make decisions regarding what relationships they want with their parents.

In the case of a heterosexual incestuous couple, there is a reasonable argument to be made about public health concerns-- in the same way there are laws to protect a fetus from the actions of its drug-addicted mother.

I don't think this reasoning holds up when one looks at actual statistics. The chance of a serious birth defect in pregnancies from first degree incest - an additional 6-12% over the population average of 3-4% - is about the same as for women getting pregnant in their mid 40s. We wouldn't use that fact to prohibit women between the ages of say 45 and menopause from having sex, would we?

Like the "grooming" argument, this sounds to me like a rationalization for laws for which the real reason is simply a negative emotional response to incest itself that can't be logically justified.

[Trolldor]

The 'genetics' argument is invalid if you aren't willing to extend that to those with family histories of serious disability.

[hadespussercats]

hadespussercats wrote:Adult children, whether "groomed" or not, are likely from a lifetime of loving, attention-seeking, etc., to still want to please their parent, to fear losing their love, admiration, respect, attention, care... These feelings have their roots in childhood, but they don't disappear once a child has passed the age of consent.

Warren Dew wrote: All of the adult children I've ever known have been more than willing to defy their parents on issues on which they disagreed. Adults are not incompetent to make decisions regarding what relationships they want with their parents.

How many adult children do you know who have chosen to have sex with their parents? I'll grant your general point, but in a situation where sexual and sociological taboos are broken in such an extreme way, I think it might be reasonable to assume that the kinds of connections I was referring to are still powerfully in play, and that the resulting relationship is bound to be fraught with deep, dark emotional entanglements that aren't likely to be healthy for either party-- particularly the one in a submissive role.

Does this mean that incest should be illegal? Probably not. But I'll stand by my position that it's not a good idea.

Mad Hatter wrote: The 'genetics' argument is invalid if you aren't willing to extend that to those with family histories of serious disability.

True. But it has been the primary argument used to support anti-incest laws-- unless you consider Christian states and their (frequently self-contradicting) Biblical dictates against it.

That's why I found Dan Savage's commentary on the incest question so interesting-- moving it beyond issues of law or sexual taboos and into the arena of the family unit itself.

[Trolldor]

I suspect the inclinations for children to be attracted to immediate family members is likely to be there because their parents have the genes for such things and have passed them on.
Psychological grooming is not likely to affect them in adulthood without a 'genetic susceptbility', even if they were 'groomed' as children.


I did child psychology at Uni, genes are pretty much the 'be-all-and-end-all' of determining behaviour.

[hadespussercats]

I suspect the inclinations for children to be attracted to immediate family members is likely to be there because their parents have the genes for such things and have passed them on.
Psychological grooming is not likely to affect them in adulthood without a 'genetic susceptbility', even if they were 'groomed' as children.


I did child psychology at Uni, genes are pretty much the 'be-all-and-end-all' of determining behaviour.

People who like to keep it in the family come from people who like to keep it in the family?

[Trolldor]

Preeeeety much.
Barring extreme environments.

[Warren Dew]

How many adult children do you know who have chosen to have sex with their parents? I'll grant your general point, but in a situation where sexual and sociological taboos are broken in such an extreme way, I think it might be reasonable to assume that the kinds of connections I was referring to are still powerfully in play, and that the resulting relationship is bound to be fraught with deep, dark emotional entanglements that aren't likely to be healthy for either party-- particularly the one in a submissive role.

I certainly agree that relationships between parents and children, even adult children, or perhaps even especially adult children, are involved and complex. For example, the relationships my brother and I have with our mother is probably not the healthiest - she does a lot of emotional manipulation, and I'm sure she thinks our treatment of her leaves something to be desired, too. However, your former statement would have equal validity when modified as follows:

Adult children, whether "groomed" or not, are likely from a lifetime of loving, attention-seeking, etc., to still want to please their parent, to fear losing their love, admiration, respect, attention, care... These feelings have their roots in childhood, but they don't disappear once a child has passed the age of consent. And to add a financial relationship to that deep, complicated mix is likely to do neither party any good.

Yet, most people don't have a problem with other people's having financial relationships with their parents or children. In cases of consenting adults, we just trust that they are competent to judge when the benefits of the financial relationship are sufficient to justify the added complication to their emotional relationship. I'm happy to give them the same trust regarding their sexual relationships as regarding their financial relationships. Basically, it's none of my business.

I would also note that in general, parents tend to have a much stronger desire to please their children than vice versa, so I'm not convinced that your apparent assumption that the parent would normally be in the dominant power position relative to an adult child is correct.

But I'll stand by my position that it's not a good idea.

I'm certainly not arguing that incest is generally a good idea. I wouldn't dismiss the possibility that it might be fine in some cases, though. I certainly wouldn't engage in it myself, but then I wouldn't engage in homosexual sex either, and I don't have problems with other people doing that.

[hadespussercats]

Hm. I'm intrigued by your conflating of sexual relationships with financial ones, and somewhat troubled by your conflating of homosexuality with incest. The latter brings to mind unfortunately common expostulations like: "What next? A man marrying a dog?"

[Warren Dew]

I'm not conflating them. I'm analogizing them.

If someone thinks they are logically fundamentally different, they are free to provide logical reasons why. Otherwise, the cases seem parallel for the arguments provided, and their invalidity for the financial and homosexual cases demonstrates the invalidity for the incest case.

Indeed, I'm coming to the conclusion that the allegedly logical reasons to object to incest are just as spurious as allegedly logical reasons to object to homosexuality: the real reason, for those who object, is just 'it makes me feel icky'.

[Mr.Samsa]

I suspect the inclinations for children to be attracted to immediate family members is likely to be there because their parents have the genes for such things and have passed them on.
Psychological grooming is not likely to affect them in adulthood without a 'genetic susceptbility', even if they were 'groomed' as children.


I did child psychology at Uni, genes are pretty much the 'be-all-and-end-all' of determining behaviour.

So basically an "incest gene"? (I'm assuming your last statement was specifically aimed at incest behaviors because otherwise it's entirely wrong).. I don't suppose you have any references for it?

You're right about the example of people with genetic disorders breeding though, if we don't care about people with MS or autism having children, then we have no business interfering with incestual interbreeding. I'm not sure why that argument ever comes up, I imagine most incestual relationships don't develop out of a desire to have babies so it seems ridiculous to judge them based on an hypothetical future possible state that very few of these couples would probably reach.

And I can understand the wariness shown by some people regarding the possible "power abuse" in parent-child relationships, but surely this means that anyone using the "grooming" argument has no problem with siblings or cousins having sex? So in their opinion, it's not the incest that should be illegal, it's the psychological child abuse that has occurred which should be illegal.

[JimC]

I think you have a duty to refrain from incest with your children, even if they want it. You don't necessarily have a duty to prevent your daughter from relationships with older men. Maybe to give your best advice, and guidance, but people arranging marriages usually think they are doing that.

I agree that any duty to refrain from incest with one's children is different from any duty regarding grooming or advising children regarding their relationships.

My hypothetical was really more aimed at the people who thought incest should be allowed, but seemed to think that combining it with grooming made it worse, perhaps putting it in the category of things that shouldn't be allowed. That seems to be fuzzy thinking to me.

Personally, I'm somewhat on the fence about whether incest is bad. My emotional reaction is that it is, but I don't regard emotions as a good guide for morality, ethics, or law. I don't see a difference between an incest law based on such reactions and laws against homosexuality, for example.

I think my conclusion, given my libertarian leanings, is that it shouldn't be illegal; I suspect the cultural taboo is sufficient to prevent any negative impact on society, if there is any.

Well stated; I agree, with the proviso that the taboo may also involve some evolutionarily derived tendencies...

[hadespussercats]

I'm not conflating them. I'm analogizing them.

If someone thinks they are logically fundamentally different, they are free to provide logical reasons why. Otherwise, the cases seem parallel for the arguments provided, and their invalidity for the financial and homosexual cases demonstrates the invalidity for the incest case.

Indeed, I'm coming to the conclusion that the allegedly logical reasons to object to incest are just as spurious as allegedly logical reasons to object to homosexuality: the real reason, for those who object, is just 'it makes me feel icky'.

Fair enough.

The reason I was leery about your analogy between incest and homosexuality is that homosexuals have a history of being suspected of being more likely to engage in child molestation, rape, etc., as well as being marked in psychological texts as having a variant of mental illness, when in fact all that homosexuality means is that someone is sexually attracted to someone of their own sex-- nothing more nefarious than that.

Perhaps the day will come when people who want to sleep with Daddy will be redeemed similarly. I doubt it, but I don't have the scientific/psychological know-how to elucidate why. You're right: it does make me feel icky. I suspect there's more to it than that. but until I can come up with a better argument, I'll let you take the field.

[Santa_Claus]

interesting that incest (in this case) is not regarded as wrong for all participants.

2 adults and only 1 charged = ok for the younger? or is it ok for the female?