Are Amish racists?

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I am from a Mennonite family in a small rural community who has married within their local Mennonite church for 150 years until my generation. (I told my husband when I first met him, that if he was in our local history/geneology book tracing my family line that I couldn't date him. It sounded like a joke, but I meant it.) Myself and most of my cousins have married spouses outside of our local gene pool. My brother's wife's family is in our local geneology book though.

My parents are double third cousins (3rd cousins through my paternal grandmother's lineage and also through my maternal grandfather's lineage) and while we are not all diagnosed, it is pretty safe to say there is most definitely autism in our gene pool. I have 1 kid diagnosed and 1 that I suspect but have chosen not to pursue diagnosis for, for various reasons; my cousin has 2 kids with autism; my dad's cousins have at least 2 kids diagnosed with autism (these children would be my 2nd cousins). If you did a study on my dad's family, a good case could be made for my great-grandparents (both my grandmother's parents had aspergers-like symptoms that severely disrupted their lives at times, my grandmother, and at least 5 of her 7 children having some degree of aspergers or high functioning autism. My dad and my youngest aunt seem to be the most severely affected of their generation.

There are doctors who specialize in the genetic diseases of the Amish. I have friends from Amish background whose cousins have been seen by a Lancaster area dr for a liver condition that is prevalent to the Amish genetic pool. I forget his name though.

The cases such as my family do not receive a lot of attention because, in the greater scheme of things, the medical community don't really care or don't see the possibilities. A lot of Mennonites don't go to the dr unless they absolutely need to.

It might be an interesting study, but is it going to help anyone a lot? Well, maybe. My family is not unique to the Mennonite community; I think there are other genetic studies that could be done amongst those of us with straighter family trees. Mennonite communities would be great for this because a lot are interested in history and geneology and there is a lot of data on such things.

I think you're a good, sensible, smart woman.

Your husband is lucky to have you as his wife.

Well, thanks! I am not sure if that is on topic, but thank you for the nice compliment. I think he agrees with you...at least most of the time. Lol.

Meistersinger, I thought the first cousin marriages, even among the Old Order Amish, were nixed by now. As in, legally can't happen. I could be wrong. However, since up till a very few generations ago, they were common, the damage is done for a lot of people.

What we see in a lot of our Mennonite families now are the "double cousins." I have several relatives who fall into this category. A young man sees a young lady who catches his eye, and as the families get to know each other, the young lady's brother sees that his sister's boyfriend has a sister who is young, pretty and unattached. He asks her for a date. Within the next few years, you have two new families with 4 or 5 kiddos each and these kids would be what I would term "double cousins" as they are related on both their mother's and father's sides of the family...not as damaging to genetics of children as first cousin marriages, but still keeps the gene pool small.

Surprisingly, first-cousin marriages are legal in at least some states in the United States--perhaps most states.

I see Meistersinger is from Pa so I am assuming he is referring to his home state. According to the following link that breaks it down by state, PA does not allow first cousin marriages under any circumstances. There are some that do, some that don't, and some that allow it only if there is almost no chance of children resulting from such marriages.

http://www.ncsl.org/research/human-serv ... cousi.aspx

I never looked it up, just was going on my assumption and what I heard others say. It is a topic that comes up from time to time in Mennonite circles (obviously). Now I know.

In New York State, it's totally legal!

I was shocked when I found that out!

When I was about ten, I had a little crush on a girl who was my third cousin. Even at age 10, I was concerned about the family relationship.

If we were to look back in our family trees, we'd all probably find plenty of first cousin marriages.
Edgar Allen Poe had married his first cousin, which was not at all out of the ordinary at the time, and the famous gunfighter Doc Holiday had had a romance with his first cousin.

I grew up in a close knit family and a lot of my cousins were--and are--almost as close as siblings. When we were children, we saw each other a lot, did stuff together, were back and forth at each other's houses. As adults, a lot of us are still close although we don't see each other as much.

Personally, i couldn't even think about my first cousins as marriage material--they were more like my brothers. It would have felt too weird to even think about marrying them. I love them dearly, but not in that way.