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Against the tide

Are a few Muslim taxi drivers taking the US on the road to a Muslim state?

Posted by: Rhonda Robinson

Saturday, October 21, 2006 12:00 AM

Muslim taxi drivers at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport have asked the Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC) for permission to refuse anyone suspected of carrying liquor. MAC proposed a plan that, if adopted, would mean a government authority would endorse a signal to identify who follows Islamic law and who does not. What's next?

The issue has been festering for just under a decade according to an article by Daniel Pipes published inJewish World Review,Muslim taxi drivers serving the airport are turning their nose up at travelers who carry alcohol in transparent shopping bags, leaving them dumbfounded on a curb.

While this was a growing concern for the airport, the cab drivers are now complaining that when they pass up a costumer they have to go back to the end of a very long line in which they may have to sit for hours. The Muslim drivers want to be able to pass someone carrying alcohol without going to the end of the line.

This has become a real problem. You do the math. Muslims make up three-quarters of the 900 cabdrivers, multiply by 3 (the number of customers watching empty cabs drive by) per day, week, year. MAC, thinks it has the answer.

They have purposed a plan by which a two light system will be mounted atop the cab. The light will tell potential costumers who follows Islamic law and who does not. At first glance this may seem reasonable to some. But Pipe goes on to point out some real potential problems if this compromise is made.

"But on a societal level, the proposed solution has massive and worrisome implications. Namely, the two-light plan intrudes the Shari'a, or Islamic law, with state sanction, into a mundane commercial transaction in Minnesota. A government authority thus sanctions a signal as to who does or does not follow Islamic law."

"Why stop with alcohol? Muslim taxi drivers in several countries already balk at allowing seeing-eye dogs in their cars. Future demands could include not transporting women with exposed arms or hair, homosexuals, and unmarried couples. For that matter, they could ban men wearing kippas, as well as Hindus, atheists, bartenders, croupiers, astrologers, bankers, and quarterbacks."

I remember learning in school that America was a "melting pot". People from all over the world came here to make a better life for their families.

With the new multicultural philosophy, are we allowing people to come, and not expect that they embrace American ideas of freedom?

Before you answer that question, read this Chicago Tribune article about the Muslim American Society, then you tell me.