Few Risks Seen To the Children Of 1st Cousins

In 2002 the New York Times had an article about children born to cousin couples:

Dr. Motulsky said medical geneticists had known for a long time that there was little or no harm in cousins marrying and having children. ''Somehow, this hasn't become general knowledge,'' even among doctors, he said.

Twenty-four states have laws forbidding first cousins from marrying, and seven states have limits like requiring genetic counseling. But no countries in Europe have such prohibitions, and in parts of the Middle East, Africa and Asia, marriages between cousins are considered preferable.

''In some parts of the world,'' the report says, ''20 to 60 percent of all marriages are between close biological relatives.''

Dr. Motulsky said many immigrants from cultures where cousin marriages are common expect to continue the tradition in the United States, and doctors and genetic counselors should respect their wishes.

Laws against cousin marriage should be abolished, he said. Even though longstanding ones reflect a view that such marriages are ''really bad,'' he said, ''the data show it isn't that bad.''

Dr. Motulsky said researchers did not know why marriage between cousins was viewed with such distaste in the United States. He said some of the revulsion might have stemmed from the eugenics movement, which intended to improve the human race by deciding who should be allowed to breed. The movement flourished in this country early in the 20th century.

It is not known how many cousins marry or live together. Estimates of marriages between related people, which include first cousins and more distant ones, range from less than 0.1 percent of the general population to 1.5 percent. In the past, small studies have found much higher rates in some areas. A survey in 1942 found 18.7 percent in a small town in Kentucky and a 1980 study found 33 percent in a Mennonite community in Kansas.

The report made a point of saying that the term ''incest'' should not be applied to cousins but only to sexual relations between siblings or between parents and children. Babies who result from those unions are thought to be at significantly higher risk of genetic problems, the report said, but there is not enough data to be sure.

Why not marry your cousin? Millions do

In 2012, The Conversation had an article about cousin marriage:

The topic of consanguineous marriage raises both interest and unease in Western societies. For those who are wondering, that big word means “marrying your cousin”.

But why would anyone want to marry a cousin when there are so many other potential partners out there?

In generational terms this mode of thought is actually quite recent, and until the middle of the 19th century first cousin marriage was common in most Western countries, in part due to the shortage of available unrelated spouses in many outlying areas.

Further, many of the ill-effects on health that have been ascribed to “inbreeding” are more probably due to a wide range of adverse non-genetic factors, including young maternal age, very short birth intervals, trans-placental infection of the developing fetus with organisms such as rubella and cytomegalovirus, and inadequate nutrition both during pregnancy and early childhood.

In assessing whether or not consanguinity is “good” or “bad” there has been a notable failure to take into account the social and economic benefits of close kin marriage, which is a particularly important consideration in the poorer sections of societies where consanguinity is more common. Or to acknowledge that wives in consanguineous unions generally seem to enjoy more equal status.

Alan Bittles is the author of "Consanguinity in Context".

11 State Laws About First Cousin Marriage, Ranked

On March 28th, 11 Points had an amusing article about cousin marriage.

All I know is that I thought cousin marriages could make for an interesting list topic. And my article on the practicability of marrying your third cousin was well accepted. So I started digging around the topic of first cousin marriages, and that brought us to now.

So here, my friends, are the 11 different first cousin marriage laws that exist across the 50 states. I’ve ranked the list from the places where it’s most difficult to marry your first cousin down to the places where anything goes.

And who knows? Maybe someone will find this list, realize that those taboo feelings they’ve been having every year at Thanksgiving aren’t that strange, and use the info gathered here to finally make true love happen.

Number 11 is called "Let it ride!" and includes all of the states where it is fully legal. Shelbyville is also mentioned, which I think is a reference to The Simpsons.

Why do Muslims marry their cousins?

In 2018 Medium had an article about Muslim marriage customs.

We are not brought up thinking up of our cousins as siblings. In fact, there is a certain “distance” we maintain with our cousins of the opposite sex once we grew up.

We don’t have to marry the cousins we have grown up with as brothers and sisters, and in my personal experience, we don’t. If someone does marry her or his cousin, it’s someone you are not really close to and haven’t shared a brotherly or sisterly relationship.

Almost 10% of the marriages in the world are consanguine. The practice is more common in countries with a predominance of Islamic culture but isn’t completely unknown in other cultures as well. There are many parts of the world — including China, Korea, and some states of US — where it is banned between first cousins. There are cultures which are okay with cross-cousins and then there are others where parallel-cousins are more accepted.

One major objection raised against cousin marriage is that it leads to birth defects in the offspring. Islamophobe pages have used this very insensitively in the past to crack jokes at the expense of the Muslim community. This is not entirely false — studies have shown that the risk of birth defects increases by two times. The risk of a baby having birth defects increases from 3% to 6% when the marriage is between first cousins. However, the same jump in risk is seen while comparing the children born of a 30-year-old woman and a 40-year-old woman. The exaggerated effects of inbreeding that have been played out in the media do not find favour with the scientific community any longer.