Offended PEN members refuse to participate in annual gala because Charlie Hebdo got an award

 

“If PEN as a free speech organization can’t defend and celebrate people who have been murdered for drawing pictures, then frankly the organization is not worth the name,” Mr. Rushdie said. “What I would say to both Peter and Michael and the others is, I hope nobody ever comes after them.”

PEN issued a statement extolling Charlie Hebdo but respecting the Shameful Six for their “convictions”, misguided as they were. 

And the PEN statement gets the aims of the magazine right:

But, based on their own statements, we believe that Charlie Hebdo‘s intent was not to ostracize or insult Muslims, but rather to reject forcefully the efforts of a small minority of radical extremists to place broad categories of speech off limits—no matter the purpose, intent, or import of the expression.

Offended PEN members refuse to participate in annual gala because Charlie Hebdo got an award « Why Evolution Is True