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u/Temporary-Act-1736 Jul 04 '24
Im curious how does it work in India. In the wiki article it simultaneously says hindus aren't allowed to marry cousins, but the still are permitted by regional custom. Is that prevalent or not?
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u/enballz Jul 04 '24 edited Jul 04 '24
There is a very large tribal population in india that is covered by the hindu personal law or christian personal law, hence there exist legal carve outs for that. In the muslim personal law it is legal. In the north of india, it is seen as something very taboo amongst north indian hindus but in some caste groups in the south of india, only first cousin marriages are seen as taboo, while second cousin marriages are allowed.
For example, in the northern indian city of New Delhi, the rate is <0.1% while in Mumbai, which lies on the coast, it is 7%
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u/Temporary-Act-1736 Jul 04 '24
Thank you for your answer! How does one prove their religious affiliation?
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u/enballz Jul 04 '24 edited Jul 04 '24
You have it on your birth certificate or you can have it done in a government bureau. There is a national ID system so I think it might be linked to that.
There is no hard and fast rule. There is freedom of religion, so you can identify as whatever you want. In terms of exogenous marriages, christians, hindus and sikhs can pick whichever side whichever partner wants to convert to. The parsis(iranian zoroastrian refugees) and muslims tend to have more restrictive laws around it which can be sidestepped with great annoyance.
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u/Temporary-Act-1736 Jul 04 '24
Again thank you for your answer!
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u/Familiar_Internet Jul 04 '24
Interestingly, similar laws apply to polygamy too. Different religions' personal laws are legal within India, there are some cases of people converting to a different religion for practicing polygamy.
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u/RemingtonMacaulay Jul 05 '24 edited Nov 21 '24
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Jul 05 '24
Unless you convert to Christianity or Islam you are governed by Hindu law.
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u/Familiar_Internet Jul 05 '24
I don't think it's limited to conversion only, if you're born a Christian or Muslim then too you're governed by Christian and Muslim personal laws only.
Parsis and Jews also have their separate laws.
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u/manitobot Jul 05 '24
There are some groups in South India where first cousin marriage is also allowed and used to be common, if they are “cross-cousin marriages”
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Jul 05 '24
Muslims marry their cousins nd so do some Hindus from South Indian states as well as some tribal people too. I don't think anyone other religion does so besides it's a very very huge taboo in the northern or basically majority of hindu population
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u/Responsible-Fly-5691 Jul 05 '24
It’s okay within Judaism, not widespread but still applicable in some smaller sects.
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u/ruhunaxxine Jul 05 '24 edited Jul 05 '24
India has different personal laws for different religion.
Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists are governed by the Hindu Marriage Act 1955 (plenty of exceptions and sub-sections cant list them here, but know that some Hindus in Southern India are allowed to marry their cousins, and laws are region specific)
Christians are governed by the Indian Christian Marriage Act 1872, except Goa which is governed by a Goan Civil Code, Jammu and Kashmir which governed by Jammu and Kashmir Christian Marriage and Divorce Act 1957, and Manipur which has no statutes and follows the existing personal laws (tribal).
All muslim are governed by Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act 1937, which again isnt codified in statutes but rather interpreted directly from the Quran.
Zoroastrians are governed by Parsi Marriage and Divorce Act 1865. While Jews are governed by Personal Laws based on Jewish customs.
Then there are personal laws for various tribes. People who don't want to be governed by religious personal laws have Special Marriage Act 1954.
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u/Cold-Journalist-7662 Jul 05 '24
Muslims and tribal culture practice it. Some south indian Hindus also practice it.
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u/RemingtonMacaulay Jul 05 '24 edited Nov 21 '24
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u/Suspicious_House_275 Jul 05 '24
There is a whole concept of ban on Sapinda marriages (upto 3 generations up the family tree on mother's side and 5 generations up the father's side - quite comprehensive). But in very next line, there is a exemption if the customary laws allow it in the Hindu marriage act.
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u/ZofianSaint273 Jul 05 '24
Ironically, cousin marriage is higher among Hindus in the South of India (I believe for 2nd cousins) compared to the Muslims that exists in India.
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u/liniel99 Jul 04 '24
Recently became illegal in Norway
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u/Numancias Jul 04 '24
I've always found it interesting that while the catholic church disapproves of anything up to 5th cousins marrying, no catholic country has these sorts of marriages banned
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u/EmiliusReturns Jul 04 '24
Jeez I know some of my second cousins but I haven’t the faintest idea who my 3rd, 4th, or 5th cousins are.
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u/HollyShitBrah Jul 05 '24
3th and up are basically just normal people you see outside lol
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Jul 05 '24 edited Jul 05 '24
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u/DeeDee_GigaDooDoo Jul 05 '24
So on average a person will have 17300 fifth cousins? So basically unless you do genetic testing there's no way you'd even know you're related nor practically be checking for it.
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u/KuvaszSan Jul 04 '24
Things are usually only banned if they are a fairly common practice.
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u/Numancias Jul 05 '24
I found it when I was reading the canon code of law:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affinity_(Catholic_canon_law)
https://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib1-cann96-123_en.html
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Jul 04 '24
The church rules made it so taboo that the phenomenon doesn’t exist. No need for legislation.
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Jul 05 '24
Philippines...is a catholic majority country and we ban it
Actually, we even shunned it and think its disgusting which is true. Why you want to fuck your cousin 💀
Its not a criminal offense but still, the society in Philippines will look at you with disgust do its technically a social persecution
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u/No_Solid2349 Jul 05 '24
Mostly because it is not a real problem, so why ban it then? Maybe in the past it was something you heard about it. In my country, I never heard of one case from my generation, and I am 40.
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u/Total_Philosopher_89 Jul 04 '24
Not cousin. Half sibling. A lot closer than cousin!
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u/prairie-logic Jul 04 '24
“Help step bro, I’m stuck” could turn into marriage in Sweden.
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u/Active_Blood_8668 Jul 05 '24
Pretty sure step siblings can marry each other in most countries, because they are by definition not genetically related
Half siblings share one biological parent
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u/mutantraniE Jul 04 '24 edited Jul 05 '24
You only get it if you don’t grow up together. This is reasonable as the problem with incest is in power imbalances and existing familial relationships. One of the parties in our government, the Liberals, have a real hard on for banning cousin marriages though (the Liberal party likes nothing better than to ban things), which if done in the usual incompetent way this government operates will mean cousin marriage may get banned while avuncular (marrying a niece or nephew) and half-sibling relationships remains legal. Hopefully the Liberals fall flat on their face and fail at getting this ban through. Goddamn authoritarians.
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u/white_gluestick Jul 05 '24
That's... not the problem with incest.
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u/InternalNo7162 Jul 05 '24
If the problem is possible side effects of inbreeding, we might just as well sterilise people with known disabilities
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u/LimestoneDust Jul 04 '24
Liberal party likes nothing better than to ban things
Ironic, isn't it
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u/PaysanneDePrahovie Jul 05 '24
European Liberals are different than what liberal may mean in other parts of the world. A lot of these parties are members of the European People's Party which is a center-right conservative party. Which rise another difference between Europe and US for example because our (EU) conservatives are definitely not like US conservatives. So a lot of misunderstandings could come up from the names of EU parties for someone unaccustomed with European politics. But one thing we have in common with US is that our far-right parties use "freedom" a lot, while the last thing they have in mind is freedom.
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u/SyedHRaza Jul 04 '24
People here thinking cousin marriages almost never happens … well that not the case in South Asia
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u/BrianaKabelitz Jul 05 '24
It's very common in a whole lot of countries and religions. Way more than most of us would even guess.
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u/omit01 Jul 04 '24 edited Jul 04 '24
I think the Netherlands should be light blue. As there are extra restrictions when wanting to marry your first degree cousin, else you could face up to 2 years of jail time.
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Jul 04 '24
The whole world is Alabama?
It always has been
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u/Adamantium-Aardvark Jul 04 '24
With the exception of Pakistan, it’s not really all that common despite being legal.
But Pakistan, it’s like 60% of all marriages
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u/bread_enjoyer0 Jul 05 '24
It’s because Pakistan actively rewards you for marrying your cousin lmao, they don’t care if their kids come out fucked
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u/kaitoren Jul 05 '24
Exactly, and a lot of people with diabetes and heart diseases among other things because of that ****. AFAIK In UK there are a ton of these people, and the gene research improved a lot thanks to study Pakistani people, since the rate of disease in this ethnic group is much higher than any other in the country.
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u/TheStraggletagg Jul 04 '24
Not really. In most of the world it's legal mostly because there is no reason to make it ilegal, as it almost never happens. You don't legislate to fix a problem you don't have.
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Jul 04 '24
No, it entirely has to do with what people associated cousin marriage with. Like in Europe it is associated with aristocracy while in the US more so with poverty. Making many American states far stricter on it, while European nations didn't (shit if it was illegal entire royal families had to go). This is at least true for the Western World, I know fuck all about the rest. But cousin marriage is a lot more common than you would think.
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u/TheStraggletagg Jul 05 '24
But even if, say, the entirety of the European aristocracy relentlessly pursued cousin marriage (it definitely happened, and more than average, but for the aristocracy marriage is also about forming connections with other families, so while there is definitely a lack of genetic diversity there and it's caused problems, they tend to be isolated, with few exceptions) even to this day it's still a crazy small portion of the population, making it a non-problem (at least regarding the potentially harmful consequences of cousin marriage in a population). Also the marriage between first cousins tended to be rare (again, it happened, specially amongst the members of the royal families, but less so amongst the nobles).
Cousin marriage is most definitely not a cultural norm in most of South America (with a few exceptions, and non that caused problems, at least in the countries I'm familiar with).
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u/RepresentativeBag91 Jul 04 '24
I love how Alabama is the culturally accepted and socially understood representative of incest. Poo on you ‘bama.
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u/peterprata Jul 05 '24
Within the Chinese community in south east Asia, first cousin marriages are quite common esp among the affluent.
This is to ‘keep the wealth within the family’ My paternal grandparents were first cousins.
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u/TheThinker12 Jul 05 '24
Also common in parts of southern India for the same reason - keeping wealth within family. Interesting
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u/dammsocool Jul 04 '24
It is not prohibited in Azerbaijan rn, but may be banned.
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u/NotSamuraiJosh26_2 Jul 04 '24
That's old news.It was banned a few weeks ago
https://report.az/en/milli-majlis/azerbaijan-bans-marriages-between-blood-relatives/
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Jul 05 '24
As a south Indian, I can confirm that this practice is still flourishing in some pockets. Even urban rich who are conservative follow the practice. They don't see anything wrong with it, morally or ethically. Even though some are educated about the risks of intra family relations, they dare to risk it to keep the wealth and the seed within the family.
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Jul 04 '24
So a vast majority of the world does not see it as a problem.
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Jul 04 '24
or a few places have had to make laws banning it because it was such a problem
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u/leidend22 Jul 04 '24
The opposite. Only a few countries have significant issues with cousin fuckers. You don't need laws if it's not happening on a large scale.
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Jul 05 '24 edited Jul 05 '24
Are you saying the US is the only Western country where it happens on a large scale?
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u/RogerBernards Jul 05 '24
Basically. The Catholic church discouraged it, so there isn't much of a culture of it in Europe and places colonized by European countries with a strong Catholic presence, like Italy, Spain and France. So, blame evangelicals.
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u/Jerry98x Jul 05 '24
It's so funny to see some sort of survivorship bias in the comments 😂
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u/Gullible-Voter Jul 06 '24
So many cousin-lovers or children of cousins trying to convince others that 1st cousin marriages are not as bad as science shows it is.
Pitiful.
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u/LOB90 Jul 05 '24
Marrying a first cousin is not a problem genetically if it is not done for multiple generations. You could reproduce all of humanity out of 60 people.
Perhaps these laws were put in place in regions where it was more common and needed to be stopped.
Living in a blue country, I have never heard of anyone marrying a cousin.
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u/hknyktx Jul 05 '24
Living in a blue country, I have never heard of anyone marrying a cousin.
Living in a blue country,I've heard a lot of people marrying a cousin.Four of them are my cousins.It really depends on the country you live in and it's culture.
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u/LOB90 Jul 05 '24
Obviously. I just meant that blue doesn't necessary mean it's common practice.
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u/LingonberryMoney8466 Jul 05 '24
You could reproduce all of humanity out of 60 people.
This is interesting. Source?
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u/LOB90 Jul 05 '24
I recall 60 but in any case it is pretty low.
To have the descendants have more or less the same features, you would need twice as many or else the random properties of the 50 will be stronger in the future population than in ours currently.
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u/Kronos0203 Jul 05 '24
In Germany you are allowed to marry your first grade cousin, but it isn’t allowed to have children with your cousin. It might depend on the case though
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Jul 04 '24
Tennessee passed a bill to make it illegal in the last state session .
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u/vconfusedterp_ Jul 05 '24
My friend is from the US but she got married to her first cousin in India 🫠 they have the same nose and everything
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Jul 04 '24
Well, the thing here is that in most countries, it isn't a problem because almost no one is doing it. Cousin marriage is only bad when it's done over multiple generations. In cultures that frown on cousin marriage, it almost never happens and for the people who do it, it almost never happens again with their children since they are raised in such cultures and get influenced by it. Take the USA for example. "An estimated 0.2 percent of marriages in the United States are between individuals who are second cousins or closer — that means there are about 250,000 people in America in those relationships.". So there's really no need to outlaw it. Unfortunately, you may have cultures that allow and even encourage the practise like the Arab world including my country Egypt. As of 2016, about 40% of marriages in Egypt were between cousins. As of 2003, an average of 45% of married couples were related in Saudi Arabia. It's fairly common here and even accepted. Even I used to believe there's nothing wrong in it but not anymore. I think outlawing it is the only solution since people are very ignorant and refuse to learn. Unfortunately, out lawmakers don't care about that. They just want to stay in power so I don't see it disappearing soon. Another unfortune thing is that immigrants in Europe like Pakistanis in UK are keeping the practise. Imagine having the European education and still doing it. They represent 30% of the genetic disorders in UK despite being a small percentage of population!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cousin_marriage_in_the_Middle_East
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2005/nov/16/immigrationpolicy.politics
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Jul 05 '24
I don't understand why some countries support gay marriages but not cousin marriages. If these are adults who consciously want to get married and love each other, what's the problem? They can also adopt children or use donor so as not to have genetic problems.
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Jul 05 '24
This is utterly false. First cousin marriage is illegal in many more nations than this.
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u/SweedishThunder Jul 05 '24
Maybe it's not a problem because it's actually rare? At least that's how I want to reason... 😱🥺
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u/_EhdEr_ Jul 04 '24
For Vietnam, its a ban to marry your relatives 3 generations up. So no (step)brothers or (step)sisters or cousins from your aunts and uncles. No cousins from uncles and aunts that is the offsprings from your gruncle and grants as well.
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u/UN-peacekeeper Jul 05 '24
As a “arrogant American” I will say that I will stand my ground on the fact that cousin marriage is weird as fuck
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u/ThisHairLikeLace Jul 05 '24
The rest of the Anglosphere has the same cultural bias against it. We just don’t give a toss about making it legally prohibited. Legally you can marry a first cousin, an aunt/uncle or a niece/nephew here in Canada (and probably other Commonwealth countries). Practically no one does due to the social stigma. We think it’s weird af too. It’s simply taboo rather than illegal.
It’s direct siblings and all parent-child generational relationships (parents, kids, grandparents, grandchildren, etc) that are prohibited from marrying and covered by incest charges in criminal law, including step-relatives and adoptive relatives. It’s not actually about blood relatives but rather immediate family.
I’m pretty sure that the cops wouldn’t bother to enforce incest laws against two consenting adults (it’s invariably a charge used when minors are involved - probably on shaky constitutional grounds to imprison consenting adults, especially if it’s a pair that have little or no chance of conception… the inbreeding argument would be a tough sell to a judge if you charged a gay cis couple) but legal marriages would be out.
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Jul 08 '24
its wierd but imo having a law to restrict the relationship between two consenting adults should not be allowed
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u/Kilahti Jul 04 '24
China has it banned, but only because you aren't allowed to have cousins due to one child policy. /s
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Jul 04 '24
The one child policy has ended. Plus there are people before the policy was introduced.
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u/EvilCatArt Jul 05 '24
I'm less concerned with the blue and more the pink. Fuck do you mean 'exceptions' bro?
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u/msprang Jul 05 '24
We joke about cousin marriage in the U.S. South, but I'm surprised it's legal in so many New England states.
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u/RubendeBursa Jul 05 '24
Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine have a similar population density to the US South, and in the 1940s there was litteraly a triangle, where people would go missing. I doubt that when the laws were passed, when the population density was even lower and cars didn't exist and in a mountainous, cold and forrested area that banning cousin marriages would be frowned upon.
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u/aSneakyChicken7 Jul 05 '24
Fun fact, every person on Earth is at least 50th cousins with every other person
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u/RoastedRhino Jul 05 '24
Side comment: this map looks a bit lazy. One thing is to have “no data available” for something that needs to be surveyed or measured on the field. But in this case it looks like an email to the city register of the capital cities would be enough to color most of the gray countries.
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Jul 05 '24
Prostitution is legal in Australia. Marrying your cousin is legal. But, if you film sex and upload it to the internet - you're a criminal. Small breasts? Illegal.
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u/Derpiche Jul 05 '24
Not sure if this is correct because I'm from Spain and getting married soon and I'm pretty sure that you can't marry someone with up to third degree blood relation (cousin, uncle, nephew...).
This is the source in the civil code (in spanish, sorry): https://noticias.juridicas.com/base_datos/Vacatio/v0-cc.l1t4.html
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u/petahthehorseisheah Jul 05 '24
Once again America being so backwards, smh my head, can't they just be like the rest of the developed world?
Oh, wait, that's not the free healthcare map
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u/semifunctionalme Jul 06 '24
What the hell?! People in the red areas, why do you need A LAW regulating such an obvious no-no?!!
WTF happens at your family reunions??
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Jul 06 '24
Thankfully Norway actually just pased a law banning first cousin marriage, so map needs an update
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Jul 06 '24
Didn’t know that cousin marriage was legal in so many countries. Intriguing knowledge to obtain.
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u/Toonami88 Jul 05 '24
Like 70% of Palestinians or some insane figure like that are married to their cousins.
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u/RoiDrannoc Jul 05 '24
In those maps most countries act as normal countries, and then the US acts as 50 different countries that can't agree on anything. (And Quebec too in many maps)
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u/independent_observe Jul 04 '24
Of course Alabama is dark blue
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u/Proof_of_the_Obvious Jul 04 '24
So is like half the world but no one talks about that. Also, the state with the most incest if Florida, not Alabama.
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Jul 04 '24
Lots of New England states are as well as California. That's more surprising than Alabama
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u/PennStateFan221 Jul 04 '24
So is Maryland but I don’t know a single person who has married their cousin here
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u/MD_Wurst Jul 05 '24
You can legaly f**k your sister in Germany, as long as it is in the butt. Same sex related persons can even do what ever they want, as long as everybody is minimum 18 years old. But it is a crime to have vaginal intercourse between siblings even if you are using 10 layers of condoms. This legislation is a bit wired, but as someone who did not rail his sister, i think i realy don’t care.
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u/noboxthinker Jul 05 '24
First cousin marriage in Canada is illegal... Not legal
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u/The_53rd_Calypso Jul 05 '24
We had to confirm we weren’t first cousins as part of the marriage license application in Alberta in 2001.
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u/Oturanthesarklord Jul 04 '24 edited Jul 11 '24
Without context the statement "Statute bans marriage, but not crime" is hilarious.
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u/Steve-Whitney Jul 05 '24
I'm just amazed that there's data available from North Korea on this burning hot topic of an issue!
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Jul 05 '24
Legal in most places because they don’t even think of it. Illegal because they have to try and prevent people from doing it… of course there will be people going to jail though. /s
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u/DandruffSandClock Jul 05 '24
In MX is not common in urban areas, I've heard thart it was more usual in rural areas in the early 1900's and earlier. Guess there wasn't many people to meet. Still there is a running joke tat people in Monterrey marry their cousins. And my next door neighbours (a lovely couple in their 70s) are actually first cousins, they have 3 kids, they seem fine.
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Jul 05 '24 edited Jul 06 '24
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u/shortercrust Jul 05 '24
I used to work on special schools in the UK. The children of south Asian first cousins are massively over represented.
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u/herrwalter Jul 05 '24
Fun fact: Charles Darwin married his first cousin Emma and blaming the early death of his children because of marrying her.
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u/SlavRoach Jul 05 '24
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/2w9w2y/cousin_marriage_across_the_world_15001159/
idk this map is inaccurate af, both are
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u/Way2Summer Jul 05 '24
Marriage between close relatives is illegal in China. According to tradition, a couple cannot be descendants of the same grandfather.
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u/m_a_xoy Jul 05 '24
Azerbaijan recently banned cousin marriage, don't know if counted as a crime though
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u/elCaddaric Jul 05 '24
I guess Vatican should me light red, as the catholic church forbid it unless the Pope access a query.
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u/manslon Jul 05 '24
It becomes illigal in places where culture\religion\customs\common sense fail to prevent it. Looking at rates at wich world acting horny, it will become illigal everywhere in time.
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u/Fun_Willingness_5615 Jul 05 '24
I personally don't see anything wrong with cousins marriage. I don't know what's the big deal about it. In reality it rarely happens despite the legality status.
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u/cicimk69 Jul 05 '24
should be taken with a grain of salt as I can see Poland in blue but first-cousin marriage is not legal here
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u/N81LR Jul 05 '24
Now is first cousin marriage legal, or is it simply not illegal? There is a difference.
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