The bill would remove first cousins from the list of family members with whom it’s illegal to have sexual relations in the state.
Edit: there is an update to this story and Rep. Nick Wilson has withdrawn the bill saying it was filed in error. See the new thread.
Normally, I agree with you. What consenting adults do in their bedrooms is not my concern.
But with incest, there’s an underlying question of why communities would be interested in encouraging cousins to pair off. It belies an insularity that is coercive and dangerous to society as a whole. It’s the same argument against polyamory. Consent becomes a weird concept when you’re raised in a cult.
It is pretty silly that we don’t give two shits about affairs and cheating anymore legally but still oppose polyamory or polygamy where everyone is aware. Stupid cultists ruining it for everyone else.
“Where everyone is aware” is part of the problem. Most poly groups don’t want people to know, because of the stigma associated with it. That’s a double edged sword, again because how do you say a woman consented to be a sister wife when she’s been conditioned from birth to be a servant inside an insular community?
There are also a number of contractual and legal issues related to being married that are built around a 1 to 1 relationship. If six people want to live in a house together and all sleep together and raise kids together, consenting adults have that option. Who gets custody in a breakup? Who gets the house when someone dies? That’s got to be spelled out because it’s not a standard marriage.
It isn’t like being remarried multiple times with step parents who may or may not have adopted their step kids is a smooth process. Or even just a basic divorce can be really complex in a way that having more people wouldn’t really be that much of a difference.
But we even treat non-marriage relationships with multiple people worse than someone cheating on their spouse. It is just silly.
I’m not interested, one person is complicated enough for me.