It doesn’t happen that often but I’m actually feeling sorry for a government minister this morning. Oldham MP Phil Woolas is being criticised in some quarters for stating what many people believe to be self-evident: that marriage between first cousins isn’t really a good idea.
The problem is that he happened to have talked about it in relation to Pakistanis – a British community in which the practice is very prevalent. As are childhood birth defects. Something scientists believe is no coincidence.
Clearly it’s a sensitive issue, particularly when many self-appointed “community leaders” will themselves have married cousins. I actually thought it was illegal in this country, but apparently not. But it’s certainly taboo within the wider community.
Politicians expect to take flak and are thicker skinned than most. The reason I feel sorry for Woolas is that said critics are being particularly disingenuous by pulling out not just the racism card – but also the Islamaphobic one.
This kind of thing makes me cross. Perhaps he could have raised the issue more sensitively – because it isn’t nice to single out any one community for criticism – but Woolas appears to have gone to great lengths to stress cousin-marriage is a cultural issue and not a religious one.
I have a number of Muslim friends – some Pakistani and others not – and have talked about this with them. All say the same thing – that it is mainly those who hail from particular regions of Pakistan who prefer to marry within the family. I know several British-born Pakistanis who have done so. Bangladeshis, for example, don’t really go in for it.
Minority groups have many genuine battles to fight. But by dishonestly – and deliberately – dragging other Muslims into this debate, those who speak for the Pakistani community are doing themselves and Islam a massive disservice and reinforcing the prejudices against them that some in our society sadly already hold.