Hm. I'm not sure being equal-opportunity offenders makes the offence any less, now I come to think about it.
And the point of the analogy, I think, is that the Vimes/Vetinari cartoon would not have happened in Ankh-Morpork (or, if it did, would not have been followed by anything further in that line--tyrants can do that sort of thing) but that the freedom of the ordinary person to speak would not thereby have been in any sense curtailed, and that, Vetinari being Vetinari, the artists responsible would in all probability have still been alive. As these would have been if Charlie Hebdo had been shut down by government order, and not by a gang of (as eintx points out) unidentified thugs with guns.
Freedom of speech is a basic human right and must be defended. No-one should be allowed to murder anyone for offending them. But it has to be recognised that there are people who will push and push and push till something like this does happen, for no better reason than that they enoy shocking people. And that's no crime, but it's not heroic either.
Re: Your edit
And the point of the analogy, I think, is that the Vimes/Vetinari cartoon would not have happened in Ankh-Morpork (or, if it did, would not have been followed by anything further in that line--tyrants can do that sort of thing) but that the freedom of the ordinary person to speak would not thereby have been in any sense curtailed, and that, Vetinari being Vetinari, the artists responsible would in all probability have still been alive. As these would have been if Charlie Hebdo had been shut down by government order, and not by a gang of (as
Freedom of speech is a basic human right and must be defended. No-one should be allowed to murder anyone for offending them. But it has to be recognised that there are people who will push and push and push till something like this does happen, for no better reason than that they enoy shocking people. And that's no crime, but it's not heroic either.