Bill to make marrying your first cousin illegal in Tennessee passes but not without a fight
Bill to make marrying your first cousin illegal in Tennessee passes but not without a fight
Two Republican lawmakers voted against making marriage between first cousins illegal in Tennessee.
“Is there a public health issue with a male marrying a male first cousin? Obviously, I think the answer is no,” Bulso said, adding the enhanced risk for birth defects would also not be present for women who marry their first cousin. “A female and a female cannot conceive a child.”
Guy has a valid point about the justification given for the bill, not to mention that not every couple that gets married will be having biological children between them. Not just limited to gay couples, infertile people and people who choose not to have kids get married too.
I'm good with socially discouraging cousins who grew up together getting married, but legal restrictions based on flawed logic is not a good idea.
What about extended family members that you've never met in your entire life? Obviously procreation is still insanely gross here and we should outlaw it, but like you said not all relations between a heterosexual couple lead to children.
If your family doesn't have a history of consanguination then first cousins marrying every few generations is no big deal, genetically. You share about 5% of your genes with any random first cousin, compared to 2.5% with any random stranger. You should still seek generic counseling, you never know what secrets you might find
Republicans sure do seem to think you have the right to marry who ever you love when it comes to incest and pedophilia but not LGBTQ.
if both are consenting adults it shouldn't be illegal. maybe there's benefit to genetic counseling if there's intent or possibility to have children, but it shouldn't be illegal with or without that.
There are 8 billion people on this planet now. Surely you can find someone other than your cousin.
It really shouldn't need to be illegal, but I guess residents of the volunteer state require a little more incentive to find dates before the holidays, rather than during them.
wasn't talking about myself, which shouldn't need to be pointed out, but here we are.
Honestly, it's not that big a deal unless it happens for multiple generations. There is enough genetic difference between first cousins for it to not count as inbreeding.
I would recommend against it if there is a significant risk of genetic diseases being passed down, but that's true even for any two random people.
Honestly, if it’s consensual I don’t care just let women have control of their own bodies and keep their damn religion out of government. They can have cousin-fucking just leave minorities and LGBTQ+ alone.
The bill as amended by Rep. Gino Bulso, R-Brentwood, would prohibit first-cousin marriage unless the parties to the marriage contract received counseling from a genetic counselor licensed by the board of medical examiners. Bulso argued during a House floor session on Thursday the bill – as written – could violate the Obergefell v. Hodges U.S. Supreme Court decision, which made same-sex marriage legal across the country.
Bulso, while explaining his reasoning, said the bill was introduced as a public health-related matter, adding the law needed to be passed to prevent cousins from getting married and conceiving a child that could have an increased risk for birth defects. Bulso argued two men who are first cousins could get married without the risk of conceiving a child with birth defects.
This is just another bigoted conservative with an agenda. He's using this no-brainer anti-cousin-fucking law to push anti-LGBTQ rhetoric. Gino Bulso was a lawyer for just shy of 40 years before joining the Tennessee House of Reps in 2022. He knows this isn't a reasonable argument and he doesn't care. He's just trying to attack Obergefell v. Hodges. He's basically saying "See what *the gays* are making me vote against?! I don't want to allow cousin-fucking but Obergefell v. Hodges says we have to! Trust me, I'm a lawyer!"
Edit: JFC nothing brings out the weirdos as quickly as an article about a ban on cousin-fucking.
He's a Tennessee Republican so I'm sure he's terrible. But you don't think there is a legal argument of a law being overly broad that restricts the rights of same sex couples where the legislative history shows it was based on increased risk of genetic mutations in pregnancy?
Maybe (probably) he's saying it to beat on LGBTQ people, but a broken clock and all that.
Maybe (probably) he’s saying it to beat on LGBTQ people, but a broken clock and all that.
I am not willing to give republicans the benefit of the doubt when it comes to their invocations of Obergefell v. Hodges to defend cousin-fucking. If you'd like to that's your prerogative. But doing so is completely unearned on their part and suggests naivety on yours.
I know everyone is like "haha cousin fuckers."
But really, do we want the government to pass laws restricting who we can and cannot marry?
I can't help but notice the overlap with LGBT rights. I'm pretty sure I'd prefer them to not pass this law.
Like, from a legal and philosophical perspective, why is it OK for the government to restrict this? Why wouldn't that same argument apply to gay men getting married?
Can you elaborate a little? Like do you mean that if LGBTQ is accepted, first cousins are meant to be accepted as well?
I've noticed people on both sides are cool with laws that hurt others.
Ex: We see plenty of pot smokers supporting banning nicotine products.
Liberals aren't immune to this just like conservatives. Most people are shit :(
nah dude. one thing hurts you and has severe impacts on your health. Inbreeding and lung cancer don't have "both sides" of an argument. they're bad.
I feel like this is just an extension of the "my child, my property" mindset that republicans have. Sure, like others have argued, there might be cases of 25 year-olds genuinely falling in love with first cousins and the whole goverment-shouldn't-regulate-love thing; but the vast majority of these cases are going to be home-schooled together groomed kids who parents fear having romantic relations outside the family might introduce them to non-conservative or non-religious viewpoints which might break their narcissistic control over their kids lives.
Most of the world actually has legal marriage between first cousins. In many places it's not even taboo. And on top of that, the chances of genetic issues with it are actually pretty small. It's multiple generations of first cousins having kids where it becomes a problem.
Apparently this taboo got started as thing by the Catholic Church during the medieval ages as some kind of property inheritance thing. I can't remember the details. I remember watching a whole video that argued this anti-cousin marriage thing is where the West got it hyper individualism from, compared to the rest of the world, but I can't find it now.
Take me to another place
Take me to another land
Let me fuck my cousin firstly
Let me understand her clam
Tennessee, Tennessee
Arrested Development does not approve. Such a underrated hiphop group. They lived together communally for a bit!
Everybody hold up, new kink jus dropped
Gotta have that Habsburg jawline 😍
In Germany it is still legal to fuck your cousin. Fucking your sister is technically illegal, but carries no punishment when both are under the age of 18.
Source: §173 StGB
As a Texan I’m not sure if I should thank Tennessee for making us seem a little less horrible or curse them for taking attention away from our bat-shittery.
Because, who the fuck cares?
Apparently a lot of people here actually care. It's so insane that people still want to regulate who others can fall in love with/marry.
I wish we'd just end all the benefits that come with marriage. I don't actually know why it's still encouraged by the government. It made sense for religions to push for people to get married but why should our government be designed in a way where it matters so much and there's so many incentives to marry?
Topical fact of the day: Both Einstein and Darwin married their first cousins.
Edgar Allen Poe as well.
When she was 13.
God damn east coast woke liberal infiltraitors trying to stop me from picking up women and getting some poon at the family reunion.
You fucken jest, but there are people in this thread actually arguing that point. They’re just doing it through bad faith means like pretending this issue is at all similar to gay marriage.
Cousin fuckers are not a marginalized group. Anyone telling you different is trying to sell you an ideology.
Alabama got the monopoly now
Tennessee has done a lot to outdo Florida as a shitshow lately.
I can’t tell what you mean by that.
Are you talking about them trying to outlaw it or about them trying to stop it being outlawed?
Everything I read about them is awful and backwards.
With issues like misplaced paternity, people should be dna tested before they marry, anyway. Your first cousin might not actually be your first cousin, and the stranger you meet on the street might actually be family. I’m just saying.
Cousin fuckers: Gino Bulso & Monty Fritts
All the fuckers in here pretending they actually believe “love is love” just so they can use it as a cudgel against the absolute monsters who think incest is wrong.
What the fuck is wrong with you? Go have your bad faith arguments somewhere else.
Step son/daughter or sibling? Is that in the laws yet?
It's legal in Finland. It's pretty damn rare. I wouldn't consider it a hugely shocking thing though, cousins usually aren't very close here. Would make for weird family relations though.
something something alabama, something something, it's now tennessee.
Does that mean i have to fight my cousin before i can marry them?