TV Star Mackenzie Phillips Reveals Incest

Do you remember watching that show One Day at a Time?  I was young when it came out but I do remember watching it.  Mackenzie Phillips was a pretty popular television star at the time and her father, John Phillips, was one of the members of the 1960s group, the Mamas and the Papas.

In her new book, High on Arrival and in an interview on Oprah, Mackenzie revealed that her father raped her as a teenager but then they developed a “consensual” sexual relationship.

She explained that her siblings “definitely have a problem” with her talking about this and Oprah read a statement from Genevieve Waite, John Phillips’ wife at the time of the alleged abuse that said he was “incapable, no matter how drunk or drugged he was, of having such a relationship with his own child.”

Mackenzie explains in her book that she found herself having sex with her father on the night before her wedding after awaking from a blackout.  She and her father would do drugs together and she started using cocaine at just 11 years old.

The relationship ended when Mackenzie got pregnant and had an abortion (which was paid for by her father) since she didn’t know who the baby’s father was.  She said that she never let him touch her again.

This is so horrifying that I couldn’t help but wonder why she would publicly reveal something like this but she explained that she wants to put a face to “consensual incest” since other people must have had the same thing happen to them.

image: Zuma Press