Mother and son in New Mexico face jail time for incestuous relationship

[TheRealJoeFish]

I would argue that, even with the general principle that two consenting adults should normally be allowed to engage in whatever behavior they want, laws against same-household parent/child incest are important even if they extend beyond the child's age of majority. This is because a parent (or aunt/uncle, or teacher, or coach, but especially a parent) is in a relationship of extreme influence and control over the child from a young age, and could certainly use that influence to "groom" or otherwise entice the child to desire to engage in a sexual relationship, even if it doesn't actually start until 18.

This is the same sort of principle behind laws in many states that set certain general ages for sexual relationships but modify them for people in positions of influence over children.

There was a case in Ohio, recently, that highlighted this. In Ohio, as in many states, you can have sex with everyone over a certain age (I think 18) or with someone 14 to 18 as long as you're not more than 4 years older than that person (so, a 19-year-old could legally have sex with a 16-year-old, but a 22-year-old couldn't). As is often the case with these kinds of laws, the "or four years younger" part is removed with regard to people in positions of power over minors (family, teachers, coaches) and the minors they have that power over. So, a just-turned-21-year-old just hired as a teacher could have sex with an 17-and-a-half year old who's a freshman at the local community college, but not one who's a senior in the high school he works at.

The particular Ohio case was about a provision that said removed the "or four years younger" provision for police officers (a twenty-year-old police officer was arrested for statutory rape for having sex with his 17-year-old girlfriend). The Ohio appellate court (I think it was Supreme but it may have been intermediate) ruled that this was a civil rights violation and invalidated the law, essentially saying that "whereas teachers and coaches and parents exert a particular interest over children, which justifies the additional restrictions, police officers are not in the child-rearing business. They deal with the entire population, not only or even primarily with children."

Of course, the media reported this as "Ohio court says police can have sex with minors," prompting something of a firestorm. I'm convinced the case was rightly decided on legal principles, although reasonable minds can differ of course.

Edit to add: although I can understand (though not endorse) the imposition of criminal sanctions on the parent in an incest case like this (up to and including some jail time, but certainly not a decade or whatever), I don't think such penalties should be applied 1) to the child in a case like this, or 2) in cases of incest where there is clearly not an undue influence exerted. This gets murky with different-aged siblings. What I mean is, if two people who are related but did not grow up together and were not in a position of power over each other want to have sex, let them. The touchstone should be the potential for coercion/abuse of a power dynamic that comes with family life, not actual genetics.