When to Blaspheme

Over the years, I have thought about the space where the right to free speech intersects with not giving offense to a person's religion. It's not always clear when the person exercising the right of free speech is completely in the right. In the immediate aftermath of the killing of the Charlie Hebdo editors, Ross Douthat of the New York Times wrote a masterpiece of an op-ed that I think considers this difficult tension--he basically endorses blasphemy when the threat of physical violence is offered as the price to pay for free speech.