Order Jamie Glazov’s new book, ‘United in Hate: The Left’s Romance with Tyranny, Terror, and Hamas’: HERE.
First-cousin marriage (aka consanguineous marriage) across the Middle East and North Africa, has now made its way into Western world via migration. The practice is accepted in Islam. As usual, Keir Starmer, like other leftist leaders, makes unreasonable accommodations to Muslims, heedless of any adverse consequences to the interests of the people as a whole. “US slams Keir Starmer over refusal to ban cousin marriage as a ‘civilisational concern,’” by Conor Wilson, Express, January 12, 2026:
The White House has launched a scathing criticism of Sir Keir Starmer’s refusal to ban cousin marriage. Donald Trump’s free speech Tsar, Sarah Rogers, shared a clip of a debate in Parliament on the practice of first-cousin marriage, to illustrate concerns the US Government had previously expressed over civilisational erasure in Europe.
Responding to a video on X, Rogers said: “I’ve received some questions about what we mean, in our National Security Strategy, when we invoke ‘civilisational’ concerns. So I’m tweeting a relevant news item.” Last month, President Trump warned that Europe faces “civilisational erasure” as he questioned the reliability of the country’s longstanding allies.
The video shared by Rogers showed a Conservative MP speaking during PMQs as he warned of the health implications endured by the offspring of cousin marriages.
He said: “On Friday, this Government has a chance to let my bill go through to ban first-cousin marriage to committee stage. Will the Prime Minister think again before instructing his whips to block this legislation?”
The Prime Minister replied: “We’ve taken our position on that bill, thank you.”….
Sarah Rogers wrote:
I’ve received some questions about what we mean, in our National Security Strategy, when we invoke “civilizational” concerns. So I’m tweeting a relevant news item. https://t.co/7XKpGY3JGf
— Under Secretary of State Sarah B. Rogers (@UnderSecPD) January 11, 2026
Starmer’s opponents are taking him to the woodshed:
‘It is mental we still have it here!’
Journalist Cristo Foufas despairs as Labour are accused of backing cousin marriage as they stall a bill in which the ‘medieval’ practice would be banned. pic.twitter.com/z3mf2cVz7F
— GB News (@GBNEWS) January 10, 2026
Muhammad is the model for first-cousin marriage; he married his maternal cousin Zaynab bint Jahsh, and arranged the marriage of his daughter Fatima to his own cousin Ali ibn Abi Talib. The latter marriage was and is regarded among many Muslims as a “sacred bond,” as explained in the piece: The First Family: The Beautiful Marriage of Ali and Fatima, by the Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research.
First-cousin marriage adds to a host of other problems for the West that have also been imported via mass unvetted migration, including illegal migration. While it is generally refreshing to see Starmer criticized yet again, America has some sludge to clean in its own backyard. As the Telegraph stated: “In the United States, marriage to your first cousin is completely legal in over 15 states, with more allowing it in certain circumstances. Mr Trump has not moved to ban it.” Yet Trump hasn’t opposed a ban, as has Starmer.
According to Newsweek, “First-cousin marriage remains completely legal in these 17 states: Alabama, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, New Mexico, North Carolina, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont and Virginia.” Other states do “allow first cousins to get married in some specific circumstances.” The Tennessee legislature however, in April 2024 overwhelmingly (75-2) passed a bill in the House to ban the practice.
The Institute for Family Studies notes that America merely “tolerated first-cousin marriage in law during colonial and founding times,” but it “was never the norm” that it is in the Islamic world. But now, pressure is mounting in America and elsewhere “with increasing frequency” to legalize first cousin-marriage, due to Muslim migration. Now it’s time for change in America due to, as Sarah Rogers put it, “civilizational concern.”
Marriage between relatives such as first cousins doubles the risk of birth defects, ranging from “extra fingers or toes through to more life-threatening problems such as holes in the heart or brain development disorders.” And that’s just for starters.
Richard Holden, the Conservative MP campaigning to outlaw the practice of first-cousin marriage, warned of its “significant”impacts “on health and women’s rights.” He also “accused Labour of ‘turning a blind eye’ to cousin marriage by refusing to support his private member’s bill on the issue.”
In the UK, the Pakistani population is over 1.6 million, constituting the second-largest ethnic minority, concentrated in London, Birmingham, Bradford and Manchester. It’s no secret that members of Muslim rape gangs were disproportionately from a Pakistani background, and now that this demographic is burgeoning in numbers, so is the risk of birth defects, concomitant with the Pakistani community’s acceptance of first-cousin marriage.
An article from the Genetic Literacy Project entitled Cousin marriages: ‘If you ever want to see some fascinating genetic disorders, you should all travel to Pakistan’ notes that over 60% of the Pakistani population carries out consanguineous marriages (inbreeding, often first or second cousins). The report addresses risk of genetic abnormalities among such offspring.
The left-leaning BBC ran a report last year featuring a Birmingham Pakistani couple defending first-cousin marriage amid calls for a ban. Yet the BBC also ran another article on the very same day revealing “worrying new data” about the health of consanguineous offspring, following the largest study of its kind from the Pakistani community in Bradford. The researchers recruited 13,000 babies, where one in six children in the study had parents who are first cousins. The longitudinal study followed the children from infancy to adolescence. The data findings “caught the attention of lawmakers across Europe,” which led to Norway outlawing first-cousin marriages, with Sweden following.
Yet three months ago in Britain, the NHS pulled a “controversial” blog on first cousin marriage, despite it being “factually based,” thus displaying (again) the pervasive nervousness over offending Muslim groups — which has come to define Britain and all leftist-ruled countries.
An article from the Oxford Journal of Law and Religion, The Case for Banning Cousin Marriage, sums up nicely the cumulative case for banning first-cousin marriage, and concludes:
Thus, having given full consideration to the medical, social, and geopolitical context of cousin marriage, we can finally answer the documentary-makers’ questions posed at the beginning of this article:
- Should one marry one’s cousin? No.
- Should others be allowed to marry their cousin? No.
- Should we abolish stigmas and laws against cousin marriage? No.
- Is cousin marriage really that bad? Yes.
- Can we ban cousin marriage? Yes.
- Should we ban cousin marriage? Yes.
Keir Starmer has proven himself unwilling to stop the steady flow of mostly Muslim illegals invading Britain via the English Channel; how can anyone expect any backbone from Starmer in standing up to an accepted Islamic practice, and one which Muhammad himself modeled? Starmer has already sold out Britain to dhimmitude.
Of his own accord, Starmer will likely do nothing, but public pressure sometimes budges the hardest cases. In the meantime, let’s hope, too, that America gets more serious in confronting this “civilizational concern” of inbreeding among the states where consanguineous marriages are still legal.
