re: Louisiana Leading - Florida bill to ban marrying first cousins fails to pass

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What’s the argument to NOT ban first cousin marriage?

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A bit of a backwards way of looking at it, as first cousin marriage is extremely common throughout history. The argument in favor of the ban is that it increases the risk of congenital birth defects. However, while the percentage jump is large (100%), the real jump is small (2% to 4%). So the “argument against” is that such a small real increase in risk isn’t sufficient to outweigh the infringement on liberty, especially when you consider that we allow people with known genetic defects to marry and have children.

On the flip side, sibling marriage is historically rare, has a significantly higher rate of birth defects, and is considered a societal harm due to family conflict/structure disruption. The latter being why step siblings generally aren’t allowed to marry in spite of the fact that they share no blood.