[quote=PCinSD][quote=FlyerInHi]People in Kentucky marry their cousins all the time.[/quote]
Hi White Karen. Tell us more about Kentucky. Details please, with supporting citations.
Your cousin would like it if you kept your hands to yourself.[/quote]
it is interesting how much incest laws vary across the US. there are lot of small variations in what does and doesnt constitute incest.
19 states permit first cousin marriage, including Alaska, colorado, NY, massachusetts, hawaii, and others.
Certainly not stereotypically “backwards” states. :
apparently kentucky prohibits it, and wont even recognize sucha marriage if legally done outside kentucky.
Kentucky rule:
Section 402.010 – Degree of relationship that will bar marriage
(1) No marriage shall be contracted between persons who are nearer of kin to each other by consanguinity, whether of the whole or half-blood, than second cousins.
(2) Marriages prohibited by subsection (1) of this section are incestuous and void.
It’s also unclear whether this is a good or bad thing. It might be all right for first cousins to marry.
Historically, the pool of available mating partners has often been pretty small, with lots of “genetic bottleups” at various points in time, and lots of cousin marriage in all of our family trees.
I read recently that all ashkenazi jews may possibly be able to trace their lineage back to just 300 people. so there was by necessity a LOT of cousin marriage.
so it isn’t really necessarily a slur to say a state allows cousin marriage, or even that it is a bad thing. keeps assets in the family, better insight into marriage partner and family, family control of couple and offspring, etc.
immediate family members, however, should not marry. for instance, donald trump should definitely not procreate or be permitted to marry his daughter, even if he is the president of the free world, and he really really really wants to. Society has a right to draw the line there. the science, as well as the aesthetics are clear.
my personal feeling is that it was a good idea to get far away from my people, and mate with someone of a very very different genetic background. I don’t particularly have a scientific basis for thinking this will make the offspring healthier, but it seemed like the right thing to do.
however, i do believe that cousin marriage should be universally legal in the united states. i dont know that it has been challenged on constitutional grounds, but i think if it were, that there would not be enough scientific data to prohibit it.
some old data on genetic risks, and survey of state law:
the rate of cousin marriage has to be higher in states where the law recognizes cousin marriage than the rate of cousin marriage where it is illegal, as it is zero in the latter. whether or not its common, i have no idea.
when i actually think about marrying one of my first cousins, the idea strikes me as very very strange. but that feeling alone should not be enough to prohibit it. there should be significant increased genetic risk to offspring.
Indeed, in recognition of that issue, some of the states explicitly allow it in the case where sterility of the cousins is involved. However, there may be no rational basis to know whether the genetic risks is really necessarily significantly increased sufficiently to bar people in love from marrying.
