The actor — whom none of the sides would name — said that he had been directed to do so as part of the scene. Mr. Birch objected, saying that the back rub was unnecessary, and told the actor to stop. …When the actor tried to explain further what he was doing, Mr. Birch said, according to [director Paul] Alexander: “Listen, man, I’m trying to make this easier on you — don’t touch her.”

Her father denies making any threats and says he was just “trying to convey Thora’s discomfort” at the on-stage touching. He’s also been a “frequent presence at ‘Dracula’ rehearsals,” writes Healy. “At another point during Thursday’s rehearsal, Mr. Alexander said he noticed Mr. Birch peering through a window that was part of a library set while a scene with Ms. Birch was underway. ‘I couldn’t believe my eyes and turned to a crew member and said, ‘Is that Jack Birch looking through the window at Thora?’”

The director isn’t the first person in the business to insinuate that there is something a bit off about Birch’s father: As the New York Daily News reported in 2008, he “insisted on being on set during the filming of a hot and heavy sex scene” and “reportedly told the director where to put the camera so Birch would look her best, and gave the thumbs up sign through out the taping.”

Who knows how fair these particular characterizations are, but one thing is for sure: Creepy stage dads are having a moment — from Jessica Simpson’s father remarking on the singer’s “double D’s” to Billy Ray’s oddly intimate nuzzling with daughter Miley Cyrus to Amy Winehouse’s dad complimenting her “fantastic” breasts to Hulk Hogan slathering up his little princess in suntan oil (and dating her doppelganger). Just as with the more familiar archetype of the scary stage mom, creepy stage dads attempt to build their own fortunes and fame on top of their children; unlike the scary stage mom, creepy stage dads seem to also want to be on top of their children, literally. But is one actually creepier than the other? I’m not so sure. After all, both tend to live through their daughter’s sexuality — because that’s how most young starlets achieve their fame.

Marriage between second-degree relatives (aunt/uncle, niece/nephew) is already legal in Switzerland, but the new measure would overturn the ban on consensual sexual relationships between siblings, and between parents and their adult children. (Sexual relationships with underage children would, of course, remain illegal.) The text of the bill has yet to be released, but skeeved-out opponents have heard more than enough. Barbara Schmid Federer, a member of The Christian People’s Party of Switzerland, told the Telegraph that the proposal was “completely repugnant” and that she “could not countenance painting out such a law from the statute books.”

As I reported Friday in response to news about a Columbia professor’s arrest on incest charges, some U.S. courts prosecute incestuous adult relationships on the grounds that the government has a legitimate interest in preventing inbreeding. Other courts view children as forever-and-always minors when it comes to sexual relationships with their parents: Law professor J. Dean Carro, told me, “Regardless of the age of the child, there’s still a theory that a parent is always a parent, a child is always a child and, as a result, there truly can’t be a consensual sexual act.”

The Switzerland measure rejects that thinking and allows for the possibility that an adult can meaningfully consent to sex with their parent or sibling. The Swiss would hardly be the first to allow for this: According to a 2007 report by the Max Planck Institute (via WRS), China, France, Israel, the Ivory Coast, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain and Turkey do not have any prohibitions on consensual incest between adults. The report also notes some interesting legal and philosophical tangles in prohibiting consensual incest on the grounds of “genetic dangers”:

[T]he genetic risks associated with incest are not necessarily greater than other existing genetic risks, because treating the conception of handicapped children as “damage” or “harm” negates these children’s right to life, because the risk of conceiving malformed children is not punished under other factual circumstances, and because this risk can be more successfully addressed by means of education and contraception than by means of a general criminal prohibition of sexual intercourse.

You can bet that similar arguments will be made in the debate over the Swiss measure — but they’re gonna have to be exceptionally strong to successfully take down the all-powerful incest taboo.

It has all the sordid ingredients to supply tabloid headlines for days, but far more interesting — at least in my nerdy universe — are the laws behind this case and others like it. After all, the relationship in this case allegedly began after Epstein’s daughter reached the age of consent. It isn’t a clear-cut case of child abuse, and there are no allegations that the three-year-long relationship carried on without the daughter’s consent. Although, as we saw with Mackenzie Phillips, many argue incestuous relationships between parent and adult child can never truly be consensual. I went to law professor J. Dean Carro, who defended a noteworthy case in which a man was convicted of incest for having sex with his 22-year-old stepdaughter, to better understand how our legal system tackles this near-universal taboo.

Generally, in cases like this involving “consensual activity within the home,” it comes down to the question of whether the government has “a compelling state interest” in regulating the activity. “Some courts recognize that the government does have an interest in regulating incestuous conduct because of the risk of pregnancy and the heightened risk of genetic defect,” he says. Other courts will convict even without such a risk: In Ohio, a sexual battery statute states that a stepparent should never have sexual contact with a stepchild (and that is regardless of age). Most courts are concerned about parents preying on their children, he said. “Regardless of the age of the child, there’s still a theory that a parent is always a parent, a child is always a child and, as a result, there truly can’t be a consensual sexual act.” That explains why the daughter isn’t charged in this case. “The idea is the perpetrator is the parent and the victim is the child. We don’t normally prosecute a person falling within the protected class, and you remain a member of the protected class even above age of consent.”

The prosecution of “consensual” adult incest is relatively rare because most cases often don’t come to the surface. “Unless somebody becomes aware of it, it occurs and people never report it,” he said. When it is reported, it’s usually because the other parent finds out about it, he said. And, if it involves someone in any way connected to fame or prestige — an Ivy League school, say — you can guarantee the media will find out about it.

Now, county officials, who have long been at war with the industry over it’s refusal to mandate condoms, are telling performers to go to county clinics instead. Public Health Director Jonathan Fielding told the Los Angeles Times, “All the places that we’re involved with are certainly places where people can feel safe — the privacy and confidentiality are maintained.” That’s of little comfort to performers like Lorelei Lee, who wrote me in an e-mail, “What makes me feel safe is self-determination, and being treated by health care providers who have some respect for, and understanding of, the work I do. Those were the providers found at AIM.”  

More critically, AIM maintains an easily accessible database of performers’ current test results, which can be checked before shoots. As for how this absence will be addressed, Fielding told the Times, “I don’t know the answer to that — you’ll have to ask them. Our feeling has been that that is not sufficient to fully protect the performers. They need to use condoms so that these workers will not be put in a position where they are exposed to potentially life-threatening diseases.”

Understandably, that position, ehem, is not popular with porn stars. Performer Madison Young tweeted her frustration today: “So upset about AIM being shut down. This won’t make things safer. This just puts us at greater danger. We need knowledge & choice for safer sex.” On a similar note, Lorelei asked, “What kind of sense does it make to take away the one tool we actually have? I am so completely bored of the impenetrable condescension of health care workers who pretend to know more about my experience than I do.”

No surprise here. We’ve been following the rumblings over the trend of lady bingers for some time now, and the question often seems to be, as a 2008 New York magazine article put it: “should gender equality extend to drinking?” My answer is: yes and no. I’m more likely to order a beer and a shot of whiskey than a cosmo. I like to go against stereotypes like that. It is cocky and perhaps foolish — but, then again, the same can be said for my male friends when it comes to drinking. I might be driven by some vaguely third-wave feminist desire to “keep up with the boys” — but plenty of “the boys” are driven to keep up with each other, lest they appear unmanly. This is binge culture, and it isn’t strictly male or female anymore. We’re all full of bluster and far too much booze.

That doesn’t mean the impact is equal, though. A female friend wrote to me in an e-mail, “I’m of the opinion that, yes, gender equality means you get to drink however the eff you want and you don’t have to be confined to ‘dainty’ drinks and expected to drive the boys home or whatever. But with great binge-drinking comes great responsibility, you know? I’ve had to do a serious gut check in the past year about this because excess drinking affects women differently.” It’s true: Women’s bodies are not only generally smaller than men’s but they also metabolize alcohol differently. I’ve boasted that I could drink my male friends under the table, and I have at times through sheer force of will. Not even my iron will can force my liver to process booze differently, though.

Of course, it isn’t just physiological sex differences that raise concern here, it’s also sex, as in sex. The researchers find binge drinking troubling for many reasons, but especially so because hard-boozing women experience “more sexual-assault problems,” Michelle Berlin, an associate professor at the Oregon Health and Science University School of Medicine, tells the New York Times. These are the unfun facts: Alcohol is processed differently by women’s bodies, and it’s associated with higher rates of sexual assault. We should be able to be real about this without blaming women who are raped while intoxicated. (Unfortunately, this continues to be a really tough concept for some to grasp.) We should also be able to acknowledge the simple fact that women, like men, can make dumb sexual decisions while drunk.

If we must talk about binge-drinking in terms of feminism, it seems to me that a real victory would mean recognizing the impact hardcore boozing has on both sexes, and with a little more perspective. After all, binge drinking is much higher among men than women. Men are more likely to drive drunk (although young women are increasingly driving under the influence). Boozing college-age males are more likely than women to: land in the hospital, be physically assaulted, be involved in an accident where someone is injured, and break the law, according to a U.K. study. As I wrote in response to the New York magazine piece a couple of years back, “young women’s sometimes confused struggle for equality in their day-to-day lives … can result in their acting the part of stereotypical men, in ways that don’t seem particularly healthy for either sex.”