4644

Exactly. Honesty and truth when it’s convenient - that should be the new scout motto.

4645

A followup to that original story.

“She’s a nice person,” Sarah said. “She had the idea that all Muslims are bad. We just talked about peace.”

“I think things went too far,” Laleyla said. After the meeting, both Fargo women wanted to go immediately to Horab & Wentz, CPA, Hensley’s former place of work, to ask the owners to give Hensley’s job back. Hensley was fired Wednesday, one day after the hate crime was committed.

Horab & Wentz owner and CPA, Scott Wentz, said his accounting firm received hundreds of emails and calls from around the world, including some calls wanting to hire Hensley.

Charges could have been filed against Hensley, Kempf said. With the city dealing with five hate crimes halfway through 2017, mediation and forgiveness was the better route.

“Unfortunately, incidents like what happened this week and the social media commentary following it can cause further division and set us back from progress we are trying to make as a community,” Fargo Police Chief David Todd said.“I want to put before you an example of what can be accomplished even though mistakes were made and unfortunate words were said. Amber Hensley, Sarah Hassan and Leyla [Laleyla] Hassan have all expressed regret regarding their interaction and language with each other.”

4646

I am glad they reconciled, but maybe the solution isn’t to have a heart to heart so much as don’ t run around in parking lots telling people that Christians and the government are going to kill people you don’t understand.

4647

If she actually ‘had the idea that all Muslims are bad’ at her age, and with her presumed level of education (CPA, right? so at least bachelor’s degree?), then that is a serious indictment of our educational system and/or the basic values parents should be teaching their kids.

Not that there won’t always be some idiots who make headlines with their idiocy.

4648

She’s not a CPA, I believe she was a secretary, but you don’t have to have an education to know that telling someone they are going to be killed or die in that way is not okay. Would she have been so eager to reconcile if she hadn’t lost her job even?

I mean she wanted to talk to them after she was fired.

4649

Even private citizens get to go on apology tours now!

4650

Listening to the actual video, it looks to me like they are both just yelling whatever comes to mind that think will hurt the other person. It sure sounds to me like the Muslim women is repeatedly calling the other women “fat”. So they are both verbally yelling out nasty stuff at the other person, it just so happens that one of them is yelling something about a characteristic of the other person that is legally protected against, whereas calling someone fat isn’t illegal and isn’t going to make the news.

4651

Yelling fat bitch is not the same as yelling all Muslims, Jews and blacks will be taken out back and shot to death. They’re not even on the same level.

4652

They are both just yelling crap at each other. They both should be deeply ashamed of their behavior. The cries of “your fat” come before the cries of we’re going to kill you all. I’m not particularly surprised if someone repeatedly calls someone a fat bitch that that person strikes back with whatever comes to mind. That’s just standard human behavior.

Both peoples’ behavior is reprehensible

4653

We’ll have to agree to disagree on this. I don’t see this as equal at all.

4654

Yeah, while both parties behaved poorly, they’re in no way equivalent.

Insulting someone is far different than threatening to kill them.

4655

But the ‘whatever comes to mind’ is interesting. I’ve gotten in screaming matches with strangers, which I deeply regret. I think ‘stupid’ and ‘fucking’ appear a lot in my sputtering. It wouldn’t occur to me to start talking about killing millions, etc. Not that I’m any sort of saint. I’m glad none of my tirades have ever gotten caught on video, especially in today’s environment.

4656

I agree it’s interesting and says something very unfortunate about what’s lying under the surface probably in a lot of Americans. Also it says something very unfortunate about what our current red lines are and what is considered reasonable to say even in this sort of a yelling match. And I think sadly Trump’s election has moved those lines.

However, this ultimately looks like a bunch of school yard kids both yelling insults at one another, and for one to lose their job, and the other to be face no consequences just seems like bullshit to me. We can’t fully assess blame without seeing the start of the fight and who kicked things off, but if this happened in a K-12 schoolyard, I would have long talks with both of the students and explain to the one why saying we’re going to kill Muslims is horrible, but I would equally explain to the other that calling someone a fat bitch is also very wrong and that she shouldn’t have particularly been surprised when she got hit back, and that she shares blame for what happened.

4657

Calling someone a smurf on the playground is not the same as a kid yelling at some other kid to die or go back to Africa or telling them that one night the police will come and knock down their door to kill everyone in their house. And the following conversation with those two children should not even be close to the same nor is the concern even close to the same.

It is completely different.

4658

I’m glad they were all able to hug it out.

We need more of this. Not the yelling crazy hateful shit at each other, but the second part, the meeting, talking and realizing everyone’s not so different after all. We need this between Muslim Americans and people like the woman in this incident. We need it between members of our African American communities and members of the police forces in the districts that serve them. We need it between Hispanic immigrants, both legal and undocumented, and the people in their communities and beyond.

So often understanding and empathy come from simple exposure and discussion.

4659

Yes! Jesus. Thank you. I was starting to feel like the only not-completely-cynical person around here.

4660

I think this is a great idea but… do you really think that lady would go to one of those meetings? She probably didn’t even recognize she was having a very strong and murderous reaction to a specific group of people until she was recorded and fired like that.

4661

Maxine Waters on fire today.

4662

I was gleeful when I found out I live in her district. Glee. Ful.

4663

Priebus has been fired via tweet…