I asked this question a while back on Gupshup but never got a proper answer.
What do you guys think about some Pakistanis marrying their first cousins, specially blood related.
My brother recently got engaged to a cousin in Pakistan and I thought it wasn’t right.
Is it just a western thing or marrying cousins is actually immorally wrong. I really want views from the guppies who actually grew up in the west specially USA.
Well religiously, there is nothing wrong with marrying your first cousin. However, personally I can never do that. It's just too weird to me.
I have an Iranian friend who's brother in-law, a doctor, fell in love with his first cousin. He spent a while researching medical journals, and concluded that once all the hype was stripped away, there was an insignificant risk of anything going medically wrong with one's offspring as a result of mating with one's first cousin.
So he married her and lived happily ever after....
scientifically - nothing wrong with marrying a cousin. However, if there is a serious disease running in the family, your kids have increased chances of inheriting the disease. But then again, you could marry someone who's genes are even more messed up and end up with genetically damaged children...and in a way, we're all genetically damaged individuals.
Its okay in itself, but when you've got a lot of cousin-marriages in the family over a long period of time - it causes severe problems. It depends on your family. My family has intermarried a lot -so im looking for someone to add variety to the gene pool. :)
Nothing wrong in cousin marriages. However if it goes on for several generations, it might increase medical risks.
So if your family had a "tradition" of marrying first cousins in the past more than 2 or 3 generations, you should look to marry an outsider. Otherwise, it's perfectly right from a religious point of view as well as morally. Btw, my parents are first cousins.
My parents were not related to eachother before marriage, nor I was related to my husband before marriage !
I think that in some cases when families only marry inside the family e.g. first cousins some problems may arise which are of genetical causes. In my extended family, cousin her husband's family (family has been praticing this) some of their kids are deaf. My cousin who married her first cousin was scared of this but fortunately the kids are okay. It all depends on so many factors. We cannot decide what will happen before hand. IF you are comfortable of marring a cousin then go ahead but if not you cannot be forced.
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Originally posted by PyariCgudia: *
**Its okay in itself, but when you've got a lot of cousin-marriages in the family over a long period of time - it causes severe problems.*
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it's the other way around: if a lot of cousin-marriages have taken place then the chances of disease actually decrease, because over generations a selection has taken place whereby actualy the 'better' genes survive and the disease genes vanish.
marrying a cousin means that ur child has 1/16(= i think) of his genes homozygotous. so the chance of recessive diseases is a bit increased........however if cousin-marriages is normal over a lot of generations the disease-genes have been selected out of the population......and cousin-maariage only gives a very slight increase of chances on disease.
I always was against it.....but have since changed my opinion.
Marrying a cousin is not all that strange to me now....as long as I have had very little or NO contact with that person over the previous years.
I mean......if we are living in the west and the cousin is in Pakistan, and you grew up totally seperate.....then you dont really have brotherly feelings for her, do you?
But on the other hand, if we grew up in the same locale and played/grew up together....THERE IS NO WAY I COULD EVER CONSIDER IT.
But, alas, each to his own.
assalamoalikum 
this has been an ongoing reoccuring trend in pakistan to marry ur cousins, personally i’m against it as i am so close to my cousins and they are my cousins as well as my friends and brothers/sisters, then i can’t really let that stage turn into a matrimonial stage.
cos i am so close to them i can’t think about marrying them, it is morally wrong.
:yukh:
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*Originally posted by insolent mods': *
cos i am so close to them i can't think about marrying them, it is morally wrong.
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Which standards of morality are you applying to come to that conclusion?
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*Originally posted by Umer: *
Nothing wrong in cousin marriages. However if it goes on for several generations, it might increase medical risks.
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Has this been proven? I mean, why would Allah allow it if it were a medical risk?
I dont think there is anything wrong with it (and i live in a western country, UK)
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If cuz marriages were wrong/bad then we would not have the greatest example of the outcome i.e Hasan and Hussan
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*Originally posted by Majestic: *
If cuz marriages were wrong/bad then we would not have the greatest example of the outcome i.e Hasan and Hussan
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and on top of that ALLAH must have forbidden it. Period.
U know the thing is that my father & mother were first cousins...
My fianse father & mother are so too..
MY chaha has married with first cousin...
I think there is nothing wrong in it...
hahahaha 
In my family also .There has been so much marriages among cousins and also few in inter-generation that anyone can call anything and can get away with it.
Example : My father called one gentalman A as Bhai.
A's son calls my father bhai.
I calls A's son as Bhai.
and A's grandson calls me bhai.
**
Kya BhaiChara hai khandan me!!!!! **
So... I simply refused to marry anyone in family. !!!!!
I dont know if it is medically right and wrong but I really find it difficult to switch from Bro to hubby's role within a night. :(
Nothing wrong with marrying family HOWEVER in the Quran it says:
** And we made you into tribes and nations so you can get to know one another! **
Cousin marriages are acceptable in Islam and the roots of this tradition make sense, considering the tribal history of Islam and Saudi Arabia at the time of The Prophet (PBUH). However, personally, I don’t like the tradition as it’s too outdated.
