Hi cuz! How do you like these 3/4 length sleeves. Hot, no?
This op-ed by pretty-boy John Stossel is close to ridiculous but i admire his use of the radical idea to get attention to a column. Not that I ever do such a thing. Now the bullshit kicker to this is the off-handed matter-of-fact remark that 20-percent of ALL marriages are cousins is horseshit. I’d like to see that backed up with facts. Who does this guy have his eye on anyway?
Conventional wisdom says only primitive people who live in isolated places marry cousins. It leads to stupid children. But that’s a myth.
It’s the sort of myth that leads to stupid laws. Half the states in America have banned cousin marriage, but there’s no good reason for it. You can marry your cousin and have perfectly intelligent kids.
Take Albert Einstein — was he intelligent enough for you? His parents were cousins, and he married his cousin. So did Charles Darwin and Queen Victoria. Worldwide, 20% of all married couples are cousins.
Many US states allow first cousins to marry. Several only allows it if the couple is beyond child bearing age. In most parts of the world the ban is unheard of. I don’t think any US jurisdiction bans second cousin marriages. A few allow first cousin marriages, but not double first cousins. An occasional close mixing doesn’t matter, but if the gene pool is stiffed frequently over generations is does. I only had a single female first cousin that was 15 years older and resembled Mr. Ed from the front and rear. There was no temptation there.
Not supporting or denying this – but think about how many people DON’T live in the US / Europe… perhaps… just perhaps the statement that “Worldwide, 20% of all married couples are cousins” could be correct.
It’s the “Worldwide” proviso that makes it believable to me. In the third world, there may be a lot of places where they don’t know anybody but their cousins. Or may not KNOW who their cousins are.
With his 20%, is he talking about first cousins or cousins in general? If it is the later I can believe it: Where I grew up in Wisconsin many of the people were related (third cousins, second cousins twice removed, etc..).
And here in Utah, where I live now, I’d guess the percentage is higher. A lot higher.
I’ve never looked up Stossel’s bio, but it seems to me he lost his crackers sometime in the mid-1990s.
My mom says I can’t continue to read this blog if John is going to use the “S” word a lot.
I’ll agree on the question of ‘what constitutes a cousin?’ When I was going out with my wife (back in the high school days), her parents were all obsessed with “You might be related because I know a Smith from blah who was married to Stacy and Stacy’s cousin divorced a guy from Germany who I swear was the dad of…,” my wifes cousin.
I told them to shut up.
Let me see,
considering all persons that are related in 1 form or fashion are called Cousins… Even if it was your Great grandfathers, sisters, great grand daughter…you are STILL cousins.
Saying that a family with 5 kids, had 5 kids each, and they EACH had 5 kids, 125+25+5+2(the parents) thats 157 people in 2 generations, with only 5 each.
How about a family of 10, or say 3 generations.
I can say I have a link in my past to Davey crocket and Daniel boone, but IF I cant marry a relitive(probably in the 100,000’s) thats abit limiting. Let alone trying to figure out WHOM is a relation.
The law has a basis, but its second cousins that CAN marry. Thats your grandfathers Sisters, grand daughters.. Thats also one reason why MANY states do blood tests.
John Stossel’s premise aside (and he has produced some excellent material – both written and video), the article’s poster/blogger/commentator is a blatant example of a long held truism.
And that truism is, when one has a paucity of ideas and is starved of the linquistic toots to get the job done, he/she resorts to profanity/obscenity. Whoever wrote this commentary/intro needs to wash their keyboard (not to mention their mouth) out with soap.
Please tell us it was NOT you, John Dvorak!
You are certainly a better wordsmith than this example. Why does the commentator think that his ideas will be more valid when his expressions are smeared with excremental words?
Unless you’re still in Jr. High School, don’t you think, maybe it’s time to mature and learn how to express yourself with a little more validity? I simply can’t take a writer as seriously capable of offering anything worth considering when it is expressed in such a potty-mouth way.
SIgned, Disappointed
Though I am loathe to agree with John Stossel(What the hell happen to 20/20 anyway? I remember when it did actual hard news!) 20% worldwide doesn’t seem that far fetched. Think about all the third world nations and their attitudes towards this. There are plenty of Europeans that as recently as 40-50 years ago that never saw it as an issue. Mind you, the idea of me marrying ANY cousin makes me nauseous!
All I know is that if I was John Stossel’s cousin, I’d be a bit worried.
Or excited.
linquistic toots
Hunter S. Thompson relied heavily on the linguistic toots. Ran for sheriff on the “I’ll toot in the Sheriff’s office if you elect me” platform, in fact. He was a GREAT writer.
potty-mouth
When has a word ever lept off of a page and given you a bloody nose?
This man needs to take a course in high school genetics. One of the first things that you learn is that because of the nature of genetics, if two cousins are to mate, then the chances that their baby will have a genetic disorder is much higher. This is because of the probability that their common close ancestor passed on an allele for a genetic disease to both of them. This also goes for other things, because humans who are the product of a couple who are too genetically identical are not as healthy because they have a smaller variety of genes.
One of the gifts of modern transportation, starting with trains id genetic diversity. Cheap travel gave people the opportunity to travel away from the crappy village where their ancesters lived for 1000 years and meet new people.
Mutts always survive longer than pure breds.
Oh that old canard about “profanity” being the refuge of a poor writer… whatever…
It isn’t true. It’s never been true. It never will be true. There is no reason why it should be true.
I agree that it isn’t typically effective to simply puncuate ideas with so-called explicatives. There are times and contexts where it might be funny or meaningful in some way, but a well constructed argument is well constructed regardless of a few curses.
— “Politicians are shitbags because they’re all stupid!”
— “Some politicians are shitbags because they line their pockets with corporate money and then claim to represent the common man.”
Simple statements, sure. Not my best work. But the first is the sort of idiotic crap I see in many other forums and from junior high school kids. The second supports its premise with an example and isn’t weaker because of the word “shit”.
Now I don’t care for that sort of language. Hearing “shit” makes me think of actual shit, and that is just distasteful. That’s why I like seeing the word “fuck” used liberally.
And anyone offended by words like that are just pussies who don’t deserve our consideration anyway.
@16
Reminds me of Red Foxx’s routine:
“When I’m asked why I use s___ and f___ in my jokes, my answer is: People do! “
Abraham Einstein + Helene Moos = Hermann Einstein
Julius Derzbacher + Jette Bernheimer = Pauline (nee Koch)
Julius Derzbacher accepted the family name Koch in 1842
Pauline (nee Koch) + Hermann Einstein = Albert Einstein
How exactly are they cousins? John Stossel is a poor journalist!
Before the discussion moves past this excellent insertion point, click here to hear a scholarly discussion on the flexibility and usefulness of the F-word (Flash video).
Especially high alert for workers in Cubeville 😉
14,
currently you have a 1 in 10 chance of being born with a handicap or genetic defect. Or did they miss that fact in school.
another fact for the REST of you.
That 99% of the people of the world, GENERALLY settle down and MOVE within a 20 mile range..THATS ALL.
PS, Move as in live, not party in Van. BC.
#20 – ECA – That 99% of the people of the world, GENERALLY settle down and MOVE within a 20 mile range..THATS ALL.
That’s about as depressing a stat as I can imagine.
Yeah that is except everyone in L.A.
This was from 2 years ago. Seems the 20% was not pulled out of thin air.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/science/2002-04-04-cousins.htm
He’s a libertarian. Of course he’s against such government intrusion into things that don’t affect it.
My chance of winning the lotto increases if I buy a ticket but there is still no guarantee that I will win the lotto. Cousins marrying each other increases the chance of deformations but does not guarantee deformations.
23,
Ya, I know about Cali, and how many left in the :LAST 2 earthquakes…I LIVE where they WENT.
25,
your chances of winning a lottery are exactly the SAME each time you play…No better and No worse then the time before…they are CRAP if not less. esp with the BALL drop system.
Considering all the groups that are GIVING money away, you would think that in 20 years they could give EVERYONE of us 1 million and then go away. How many HERE have won anything above $10,000, the Odds say…Less then 1 chance if 1 person has won and is on site.
…There are risks and challenges in any marriage, but it should not be for politicians to decide such intimate matters as whether you get to marry the person you love. Love, marriage and procreation are personal choices better not left to “experts” who are often repeating myths.
Is Stossel coming out in favor of Gay marriage?
Statement:
marriage and sex CAN/should be 2 seperate things.
Marriage is that 2 persons SHARE a life, and like being with each other and they are good together. Opposites or likes, these 2 persons WANT to be together and SHARE there lives.
Sex, is a Basic sharing of enjoyment. We started that way at birth, thru our teens, and WHY do we make it VERY serious about 16+ years old.
60-70% of marriages are going to cheat and the ABOVE that are going to get devorses(sp). But these numbers to RELATE much to each other. As in most marriages will continue even after.
I once had to drop my son off at a Boy Scout summer camp in ultra rural North Carolina. On the way there we traveled through a small 1 gas station & general store town. a majority the mailboxes on the street were variations on the same name and there was a decided resemblence between all the people and to several characters in Deliverance. Later I heard that the University sends students on a field trip there to note specific genetic defects associated with inbreading. Definately an indelible memory.
60-70% of marriages are going to cheat and the ABOVE that are going to get devorses(sp).
ECA, OK, which is it? 60% or 70%? When I see a statistic like that, to me it means someone just pulled a number out of the air and there is no rational basis for it. Geeze, that is even worse the the statistic that half the US Presidents were below average.
While marriage and sex are separate, they are assumed to be related. One may have either without the second, marriage generally requires consummation to be accepted.