"Despite a higher risk of birth defects, marriages and eventual offspring from unions between nephews and nieces will not be banned in the Netherlands." Why not? "Marriages between cousins are particularly common in Turkish and Moroccan communities and [Health Minister Hans] Hoogervorst said a ban would be 'disproportionate' and impossible to enforce." This from Expatica News, with thanks to seafarious.
Hoogervorst "said he considered the risks of birth defects would be overshadowed by the violation of the personal freedom of choice if he banned marriages between first cousins. . . .
"Besides the slightly higher chance of birth defects, the chance of baby mortality is three to five times higher than non-cousin marriages. The [Christian Democrat] CDA is also concerned about hindered integration and forced marriages. . . . Meanwhile, Minister Hoogervorst said nephew and niece couples stand a 5 to 7 percent chance of having a handicapped child, 1.5 times more than 'normal' couples. He said the difference was not large enough to warrant a ban, representing a deep interference in personal lives. . . .
"CDA MP Sterk also said the party's concerns could not be easily brushed away and that it still saw sufficient reason for a ban. But Minister Hoogervorst said marriages between cousins were deeply entrenched in Turkish and Moroccan culture."
What do you think will happen when other deeply entrenched features of Muslim culture start to make their way into Western Europe? Will European officials balk at stoning for adulterers, or will they explain how deeply entrenched this practice is in certain Muslim countries?
Hysteria? Fear mongering? Consider this: Hani Ramadan, a prominent Muslim leader in Switzerland and brother of the famed European Muslim spokesman Tariq Ramadan, was dismissed from a teaching position in Geneva after publishing an article in the French journal Le Monde in September 2002, defending stoning as punishment for adultery.
You can not claim that close-relative marriages is strictly muslim custom. Hasidic community prictices it a lot -- and the results of that are fairly visible in Brooklyn, for example. Otherwise, ROP is a threat that should be monitored everywhere 24/7/364.
so what's the problem???...anyone who ignores biology and evolution will become the victim of it...those who do not adjust their culture and behavior to the changing times deserve to be left behind...or better...extinct!!!...let mother nature assert it's laws and allow those who breed amongst their family members learn it the tough way...
The problem is that the indigenous Dutch people will have to pick up the tab for the health troubles caused by these inbred relationships. Which means that community resources will be wasted addressing a situation solely caused by imported backwards and ignorant customs, and Holland will as a consequence become a poorer country. The same can be said for the UK where the incidence of babies born with rickets is skyrocketing due to the Muslim women not getting enough sunlight on their skin (because of burqas and restrictions to the home.)
Islam not only brings backwardness and suppression of individual rights; it also brings poverty.
Holland can probably count on slipping into the Second World (if not the Third) some time in the next 50 or so years.
you know that and i know that...and if the dutch don't then they will fall victim to laws of nature...it's just the way it works...
First cousin marriage is legal in many states in the US. It is legal in Florida, where I live.
Yeah, Kathy and guess what? Most of the states where cousin marriages are allowed have been historically the most backward, poverty-stricken states in the Union. The inbred, moronic Southern hillbilly stereotype must be based on something. Also, take a look at the history of the British royal family; they've been marrying their cousins for centuries. "The Madness of King George" was probably caused by inbreeding; we know that in the 19th Century the British royal family suffered a big problem with hemophilia. King Edward the 8th, AKA the Duke of Windsor, a product of a couple of centuries of cousin marriages, is reported to have deformed genitalia.
Thank god that most Americans now realize the dangers inherent in inbreeding, I guess even in hillbilly country.
The Muslim immigrants are a different matter; there's a hadith in which Mohammad says that cousin marriages are "strengthening" when of course the biological truth is the exact opposite.
But if it's a sahih hadith the Muslims will honor it, who cares what the real science behind the matter says.
As the old saw goes "It is the principal of the thing." The Dutch representative just can't muster enough energy, enthusiasm and passion to overcome what he knows will be the wildly passionate scatter shot cries of mistreatment that will arise from the Muslims if he defends a modern, rational rule. This rule collapses and the Muslims push on the to the next one. What about the age of consent (Mohammed "married" a 9 year old"); What about polygamy? What about legalizing wife beating? Where does it stop. Well the Dutch don't have the energy to draw a line in the sand and defend their own culture.
I am glad that I am not in my twenties, I don't want to live to see what is probably coming to Europe the former home of our Faiths and our Culture.
Actually, the problem is highly variable depending on how often it happens. If you get a cousin marrying another once every 4 or 5 generations it's much less risky than if your family tree looks like a ladder over those same 5 generations.
Of course, since the arab (christian as well as muslim) habit is to promote 1st cousin marriages and has been like that a long time their cousin marrying carries a greater health penalty than the oddball dutch couple who buck their family trend.
It's not, properly speaking, a religious problem, but an ethnic culture problem that spans religions.
All that having been said, what are these Dutch politicians thinking?
Florida is hardly a backwards, hillbilly state -- you speak out of massive ignorance. It amazes me that in order to defeat an external threat, the first thing some do is alienate their own countrymen. The wisdom of that is quite debatable.
The whole western Europe has been invaded by muslims,most of them radical islamic fanatics.
The popullation of these countries is terrorized and afraid to make a stand...In Paris,some christian,french born young females ,preffer to wear burqas if they have to go out at night,just to make sure they will not be harrassed by muslim males.
It is a sad situation,but true.