Who made up the rule that you can marry your first cousin?

Question

I'm not saying that I want to, I'm just wondering. Because my roommate looks like he likes his cousin from Guatemala, and it's his first cousin, so that got me to thinking about who made tha rule up. :)

Answer 1

In Canada and in almost half the States it is legal to marry your first cousin.  

The chance of birth defects is slightly raised, but not by much.

Answer 2

The cousin's brother who did marry her.

Answer 3

To my understanding, there is no "rule" that allows you to marry a first cousin. I think that is still illegal. You may, however, marry a second cousin.

The relationship between first cousins is genetically too close and could produce genetic aberrations and/or pass on recessive traits.

Answer 4

um, genetics. retardation. in breeding

nature made it up.  too close in family blood line

Answer 5

Tell your roommate that it is wrong and if they have a child, the child will suffer severe birth defects and maby Downes Syndrome.

Why?? Well, when I was living in Detroit, Michigan cleaning houses for my aunt, we went to this one house in a very prestigious neighborhood, and the houses around it were lovely, but before I got out of the car, I looked at this house and it was spooky, and grey stones, and just "cold" looking.

We went inside and cleaned it, it looked normal from inside, thank God, but when we got to the kitchen, there was all these syringes on the counter and all these "medical supplies" for the baby, we were told that the owners had a baby girl.

Well, we got done cleaning and we were looking at this pitcher of this "family" and in walks the nanny and the baby.

And we asked the nanny if she was the mother, (we had no idea she was the nanny), and she said she was the nanny, and not the parent of the child.

She showed us a pitcher of the parents, and she said that they are first cousins and that is the reason why all of the medical supplies were on the kitchen counter and in the baby's room.

So, tell your roommate to think twice about what he or she wants to do.

Answer 6

Marrying cousins has been the rule and not the exception for most of human history.

However, there are serious considerations.  Your first cousin shares approximately 25% of the genetic material thatou do. Genes come in complementary pairs, one from the father and one fromt he Mother.  Now usually if there is a defective gene in your makeup, it's not a problem, because your offspring will likely inherit a good copy from your mate.  However if that gene is defective and your offspring in herits THE SAME DEFECTIVE GENE from your first cousin mate (25% chance of this happening. . . .more if your grandparents were closely related), then severe problems can develop in the child, including mental retardation, deformities and severe health problems.

In order to keep the royal bloodline perfect, hawaiian royalty were not allowed to marry anyone but their siblings.  This did create a very strong bloodline, at the cost of ruthlessly disposing of the many defective offspring.

Answer 7

Some guy in Kentucky.

Answer 8

I don't think you can marry your first cousin.  I think it has to be at least your second.  Either way it is wrong.

Answer 9

Some nasty people tried it and their baby was born cross-eyed with a soft head.  They figured they should make a rule against it.

Answer 10

Mrs. Robinson gave some reasons why it is considered taboo.  

It's probably been common law for quite some time in an effort to keep order within families.  The risk of birth defects is quite small, 2% to 6% unless there is a family history of cousin marrying.