You know it is THE perfect solution to said problem.

We used to be rude to every immigrant that came to Canada, with the result that most of them got their acts together and assimilated.

Only recently have we begun telling immigrants to maintain their own traditions, and the result is a dead Muslim girl.

If Muslims feel "torn between their new home and their old one", they should go back to the old one. Am I stopping them?

If they are wearing "traditional garb" but "don't necessarily want to do so" -- their "masters" will soon come around when we start shunning them everywhere they go. Or they'll go back where they came from (see above). It's a win-win. Especially if it means I can get an English speaking cabbie who actually knows his way around Toronto.

What really drives Muslims to radicalism are the weekly Saudi-sponsored sermons they get at their Canadian and US mosques, not me refusing to take a cab driven by a Muslim once a year or giving someone a dirty look.

I really don't care about anybody's hurt feelings, let alone those of a bunch of unassimilated troublemakers.

My feelings have been hurt since around 10:30 AM, September 11, 2001 and they haven't knocked themselves out to make me feel any damn better.

Shunning is a nice old fashioned conservative idea. The trouble with Canadian conservatives is how many of them are really progressives.

(In fact, here's a challenge to Canadian "conservatives": do you agree or disagree with this statement:

"...the right to say nasty things about people
seems part of the whole point of being free."

(I know how many of you -- too many of you -- would answer, and it ain't heartening.)

As for the real progressives around the blogosphere, and their 12 readers: could you at least have the decency to be more furious about the murder of a local 16-year-old girl for wearing the wrong clothes, than about my reaction to same? Your priorities are as warped as ever, dudes. And your shopworn moral exhibitionism just as unsightly.

PS: an addition to my "public gestures" post yesterday...

I went to a demo supporting the Danish "Mohammed" cartoonists at Bay and Bloor, which just happens to be down the street from the Bang & Olufson store. During the demo, a young man who worked in the store came out and handed us all little Danish flag lapel pins, to thank us for our "buy-cott" of all things Danish.

See: that is the sort of simple, decent, thoughtful public gesture one expects from civilized people, who want to show what side they're on, and support those who support them. Wasn't that nice?

Helloooo! We cannot read your minds, people! Get with it.