Charlie Hebdo and the need to reconsider liberal satire

Murder is not the equivalent of satire, and so when Jihadists kill satirical writers and cartoonists in the heart of liberal Paris, our first instinct is disbelief that anyone should kill over the production of a quick sketch of an historical figure, Mohammed. Such incomprehension has been expressed across global media; in Kenya, by columnists such as The Standard's excellent Peter Kimani, who correctly can't accept 'murder as a response to satire'.

In the aftermath of the horrific Hebdo killings, commentators have argued this is a case of the right to free speech and to offend versus intolerance and the desire on part of gate-keeping fundamentalists (of any belief system) to ban everything that's contrary to their skewed interpretations of faith.