Love Shouldn't Be a Crime

This is a "guest post" by Friend of FME, U.N. Owen. In concerns the case we covered previously in this posting. I will have some comments after the contributed commentary below.

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Steven and Katie Plaidl fell into a biological trap. And for that, the state of Virginia and the tabloid press is now busily destroying their lives.

The biological trap is called Genetic Sexual Attraction, or GSA. GSA happens to close relatives who are separated during a formative time in childhood and later reunited. It is a frequent problem in children who are given up for adoption and later seek out and reunite with their birth families.

People experiencing GSA fall madly in love with each other. They can't help it. It's like an addiction, with love as the drug.

Scientists speculate that GSA children and their families fail to develop the so-called "Westermarck effect," which normally prevents children and their other family members from being sexually attracted to each other. Without Westermarck, the attraction becomes literally irresistible.

It happened to Steven and Katie. Steven is Katie's biological father. He and his wife Alyssa gave Katie up for adoption as an infant, after Alyssa became pregnant in her teens.

At age 18, as an adult, Katie sought out her birth family and met Steven and Alyssa. When they met, they had no Westermarck. GSA kicked in full force. Steven and Katie liked each other, then loved each other, then became sexually intimate. Neither could help it. They were literally addicted to each other.

GSA destroyed Steven's family. It turned Alyssa and their 11-year-old daughter against him. In her diary, the daughter described her father as "Satan." Alyssa turned the couple in to the state of Virginia, which arrested and jailed them. Their case became the material of a mawkish media. Katie is still in jail.

Neither Katie nor Steven wanted or deserved what happened to them. They did not do any deliberate harm to anyone. In a very real sense, Steven and Katie are the victims of a biological misfire that they never could have anticipated. The State of Virginia needs to show them its compassion, rather than its hatred.

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Thanks for U.N. Owen for that.

Whatever was or wasn't going on with his marriage with Alyssa, no matter who is disgusted by the thought of genetic relatives getting together, Steven should not be prosecuted for consensual adult sex, nor should Katie. Nobody should have spent any time in jail over this. They are all adults. Their sex lives should not be a matter for law enforcement or the criminal courts. Their child should not be kept from them or taken away.

Thankfully, the vast majority of people who experience reunion GSA and have a consanguinamorous relationship as an adult are never criminally charged or even arrested as a result. Many of them are continuing to love each other, including some people who are near you as you read this. It's going on everywhere, and trying to stop consenting adults from being together is destructive and unjust.

This is another example of why we need full marriage equality. Let's make it happen sooner rather than later!