John McDade comments in his article (The Tablet, 24 January) about “the culture of violence” in a suburban Parisian ghetto likely to explode into violent conflict. Of course Charlie Hebdo was a little magazine hardly known in the wider world, causing offence to religion in general, not just Muslims; there were also very offensive cartoons of Jesus, Our Lady and Pope Francis. Je ne suis pas Charlie.
While not condoning violence and murder, it could be argued that in that situation Charlie staff should have said “enough” after the first attack, but they persisted. If the Sun newspaper decided to replace its page 3 girl with a series of cartoons portraying the Queen and senior members of the royal family naked and engaging in grotesque sexual activity, for example, I do not think we would find David Cameron and the general public marching down Whitehall in support of freedom of the press. He would be ensuring that the forces of law and order kept freedom of expression within reasonable bounds.
Brian Kearney, Cheltenham, Glos
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