What would be your opinion of this scenario?

Not really, but in order for what you describe to happen, you'd have to surgically extract your own head first, in order to make room.

So when do you perform the next surgical procedure so you can acknowledge that people who actually live in France and the UK have pointed out that you're wrong?

Seriously, Flyboy, you've become a remora for every hysterical conspiracy theory on the Internet. You used to be smarter.

I think you bombed children and enjoyed it.

Classic you!

Presumably if Mateo only cared about religion here, he wouldn't have mentioned the Somali angle at all. And since Somalis aren't the only Muslims around, not limiting his calculation to Somalis would have let him cite an even larger number of Muslims.

Mateo knew exactly what he was doing. Have fun trying to cover for him, though.

And you think the former is better than the latter?

You'd rather have an actual racist, as opposed to a shirt stirrer? Wordforge was founded on shit stirrers, it wasn't founded on racists.

Edit: with the exception of Muad Dib.

You called a black poster a monkey in a thread about race. You fully knew what you were doing, racist.

Yes, because while they're both equally shit views, the latter also was intended to push rules and make moderation harder.

That's the thing about the left in general...they can't stand opposition & dissention. Any disruption in their delusional status quo makes them uneasy & fearful. They tend to lash out in kneejerk fashion and in that mental state they often revert to their conditioned responses like "racist!" "bigot!" "fascist!" and so on. They often use these terms interchangeably and at random times.
What can you do but try to be patient with them? It's not their fault, it's that damn disease of liberalism that has a vicious grip on them.

Speaking of Serbs - we had a Serb garage band put on a show in our gym (a former slaughterhouse) when I was at Camp Colt Bosnia. They were not bad! Some of their equipment was beat up and old because they were poor as hell of course. Their guitar player could tear up some Carlos Santana songs! They sang a couple of songs in Serbian which must have had some controversial lyrics because some of the locals were none-too-happy, but they got over it when they got back to the standard rock songs in English.

It's funny. I've been lurking at this board for years and despite your reputation, I don't think you're actually a complete idiot. But then you say things like this without the slightest bit of irony (considering the known love of orthodoxy and conformity on the right) and I think...am I wrong? Is this person actually an idiot after all? I'm not stupid enough to think you care about my opinion, obviously, but maybe a miracle will occur and you'll take this to heart: you're smarter and better than this dumb shit you're posting. You know damn well the hardcore right doesn't tolerate opposition and dissension any more than the hardcore left...and that most normal people on all sides of the political spectrum are capable of open-mindedness and nuance. So fuck off with this hyperpartisan bullshit.

OF has huge clue resistance in some areas. He is really not self aware at all. He is often fooled by simple right wing bullshit. He is one of the more frustrating people on the board for me because he is so close on some things and then he goes so racist dumbass . It is like he idolizes the old man from grand torino. He does not seem to understand the guy is part of the problem.

Yes and calling a prominent black member a monkey in a thread about race isn't pushing the rules because...

...he's an alcoholic elderly person?

This is how too many Americans view the politics of foreign countries. And, all too often, view American politics as well...

Since nobody else has mentioned it, a religious group having their own legal system isn’t all that unusual. Hasidic Jews in NYC, for example, have a system that’s as large as what people predict Muslims in America will have. The Catholic Church, rather famously, has had their own freaking army and certainly have their own legal system today. Scientologists have their own court system to handle disputes between members.

Lots of other churches have their own unofficial legal system that members are suggested to use, rather than involving the secular legal system. Nobody seems to be bothered by those, even though, just in the US, they’ve been the mechanism by which the abuse of millions of people has been covered up. Makes you think.

Most people aren't. They think that "Sharia law" means brutal, Middle Age punishments, and nothing more.

In fact, the fundamental principle of Sharia law is for settling disputes between people without it getting violent. If two people both claim ownership of the same car, for example, a Sharia court can examine the situation, listen to both sides, and see whose car it is. No stoning, no hands cut off, nothing like that. The term just means "the path by which you lead the camel to water". IOW, a way of reaching peace and settling disputes.

What can make Sharia law evil is the traditions in a given country as to what punishments should be imposed for various offenses. But they are not fundamentally a part of Sharia law itself.

Christianity actually has a similar system. The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 6:1, "If one of you has a dispute with another, why take the case before the ungodly and let them judge it? Why not settle it between Christians?" This is actually practiced quite a bit in some Christian circles. In many churches, it is considered very "bad form" for a Christian to sue another Christian. Instead, they ask the pastor, or the elders, to settle the dispute. The system works quite well.

But the way the "Christian" church dispensed "justice" in the Middle Ages, though it claimed its legitimacy to do so on the basis of this passage, had nothing to do with the teaching of Jesus. It was just an excuse to be brutal and violent. Nevertheless, that was the result of a given context rather than a fundamental aspect of the principle Paul proposed.

It is the same with Sharia law. It is as good or as bad as the people who invoke it.

When countries like France allow people to voluntarily settle disputes among themselves on the basis of Sharia law, without it having any legal standing (that is, the ruling is not binding, so if the person who lost doesn't like it, he can still take the issue to court), it's pretty much like telling any group of people, "Settle things among yourselves if you want to, provided the way you do it is not in contradiction with the laws of the country." The kind of barbaric punishments handed out in some Islamic countries (like stoning an "adulteress" to death because she was raped -- or even stoning anyone for anything) could never be applied in France, even if the people involved wanted that kind of punishments. Which they don't. (Except perhaps for a ridiculously small percentage of extremists, a much smaller percentage of the Muslims in France than the percentage of White Supremacists among the white population of the USA.)

The bottom line in allowing Sharia law to be practiced is that it makes it legal for people to "settle out of court" on the basis of arbitration that is done within the structure of their religion. But like many other out-of-court settlements, if you don't like it, you can always insist on going to court.

So let's play your game @Marso.

No, I wouldn't want to live in an enclave dominated by Somali Muslims implementing their vision of Sharia Law. I think that particular social experiment would most likely produce extermely illiberal results to put it mildly.
I also wouldn't support having no police force in the first place (despite being supportive of the idea of defunding current police forces) and I believe that the situation would be best dealt with by law enforcement intervening.

Is that what you were looking for? Now, what's your point?

It is almost like if you are familiar with the laws and cultures of other people you don't need to fear them as much. You stated that all really well and I just want to ad the comment that the freedom to practice religion and not to restrict it as a voluntary part of american culture is supposed to be the core of our government view on religion. People like @Marso seem to feel we need to stomp out religious ideas nand practices because they are scary, but that is not freedom.

really it is just the same problem over and over in history where this group of worshipers starts imposing their views and laws on others. The right to practice religion freely and without force is what has allowed western civilization to step away from the violent fighting of the past. The problems pop up when we start to lose that freedom. That needs to be applied to Islam also.

This is true. I've said before, we all have more in common that we have that separates us. Unfortunately, there are some on both sides that want the two sides to remain apart.

Except without the TV audience.

This.

@oldfella1962 isn't stupid by any stretch, he just seems to be very selective about what he's willing to absorb and thus ends up having exactly the same conversations again and again and again....

My guess is that somewhere, he received the indoctrination that "liberal" is a bad word and hasn't shaken it despite all evidence to the contrary. Wouldn't surprise me if it was in the service. The armed forces seem exceptionally talented at breeding hardcore conservatives.

I wonder what that suggests about the military. Nothing good, I imagine.

I was in the military and I am a liberal. Always have been. Your last line is borderline offensive. oldfella's belief is not inherent in the military. It's a cultural thing here in the US. Mostly in the south and much of the rural midwest. But, only because their social circles tend to revolve around the church or their family and friends attend church and the church is very conservative. So liberal is bad.

I'm not looking for anything and there's no 'point' the way you're thinking- the OP wasn't some trap I was baiting to pounce on Leftforge or anything like that. It was for thought and discussion.

The simple truth is that nature abhors a vacuum. Now IF (and it's a gigantic, unlikely IF) Minneapolis goes whole-hog and actually disbands it's PD, something is going to fill that space. My scenario is presented as one possibility that could potentially occur in the muslim community, but not realistically anywhere else. Other scenarios are possible too.

Just interested to hear people's thoughts on it, that's all. Once upon a time, we used to have actual discussions around here without the immediate oil-water separation into left-right polarization and name-calling. I should have known the usual suspects would jump right in and start branding me a racist for stating the truthful fact that the vast majority of muslims in Minneapolis are, in fact, Somali immigrants. (Who, being from the African nation of Somalia, happen to be black.)

Maybe you think it's a dumb topic- that's okay. Post the and move on.

From now on maybe I'll just stick to memes and calling you guys idiots and monkeys.

indeed! Much like spot261 and gun control!

"A person's treatment of you is a function of their inner relationship with themselves."

What you are ascribing to your countrymen is EXACTLY the view you have of your countrymen.

damn, he just used the rubber/glue argument. He's good. watchit.

The difference being that I can actually back up my arguments with evidence

Did I ever tell you I used to be pro gun?

Problem was there's an entire globe full of case studies and sample populations to compare and when you weight them up there just isn't any compelling case for an armed populace. There really isn't.

I promise you without the 2A you wouldn't have found yourself in this position.

And you seem to feel that people must be very tightly controlled indeed, to the point where you genuinely do come across as being authoritarian.

I'm not putting that out there as an insult, it really is how you present yourself.