diff --git a/src/mu-runtime.c b/src/mu-runtime.c
index b19a44ff..23607383 100644
--- a/src/mu-runtime.c
+++ b/src/mu-runtime.c
@@ -87,8 +87,8 @@ mu_runtime_init (const char* muhome_arg, const char *name)
 	g_return_val_if_fail (!_initialized, FALSE);
 	g_return_val_if_fail (name, FALSE);
 
-	if (!mu_util_init_system())
-		return FALSE;
+	setlocale (LC_ALL, "");
+	g_type_init ();
 
 	if (muhome_arg)
 		muhome = g_strdup (muhome_arg);
@@ -124,8 +124,8 @@ mu_runtime_init_from_cmdline (int *pargc, char ***pargv, const char *name)
 	g_return_val_if_fail (!_initialized, FALSE);
 	g_return_val_if_fail (name, FALSE);
 
-	if (!mu_util_init_system())
-		return FALSE;
+	setlocale (LC_ALL, "");
+	g_type_init ();
 
 	_data	       = g_new0 (MuRuntimeData, 1);
 	_data->_config = mu_config_init (pargc, pargv);
diff --git a/src/mu-util.c b/src/mu-util.c
index dcdd26f3..ad8755d2 100644
--- a/src/mu-util.c
+++ b/src/mu-util.c
@@ -150,33 +150,6 @@ mu_util_cache_dir (void)
 }
 
 
-gboolean
-mu_util_init_system (void)
-{
-	/* without setlocale, non-ascii cmdline params (like search
-	 * terms) won't work */
-	setlocale (LC_ALL, "");
-
-        /* on FreeBSD, it seems g_slice_new and friends lead to
-         * segfaults. Same for MacOS. We cannot easily debug what is
-         * going on there (no access to such a system), so all we can
-         * do is add a lame fallback -> we let g_slice_* use normal
-         * malloc
-         */
-#ifndef __linux__
-        if (!g_setenv ("G_SLICE", "always-malloc", TRUE)) {
-                g_critical ("cannot set G_SLICE");
-                return FALSE;
-        }
-        /* g_debug ("setting G_SLICE to always-malloc"); */
-#endif /*!__linux__*/
-
-	g_type_init ();
-
-	return TRUE;
-}
-
-
 gboolean
 mu_util_check_dir (const gchar* path, gboolean readable, gboolean writeable)
 {
diff --git a/src/mu-util.h b/src/mu-util.h
index 0a049163..9721818b 100644
--- a/src/mu-util.h
+++ b/src/mu-util.h
@@ -29,15 +29,6 @@
 
 G_BEGIN_DECLS
 
-/**
- * do system-specific initialization. should be called before anything
- * else. Initializes the locale and Gtype. Note: this function is
- * called by mu_runtime_init.
- *
- * @return TRUE if is succeeds, FALSE otherwise
- */
-gboolean mu_util_init_system (void);
-
 /**
  * get the expanded path; ie. perform shell expansion on the path. the
  * path does not have to exist