The right to give offence

I've never read a word of Phillip Pullman's fiction, maybe I will when my daughter is older, but I admire his response to a christian antagonist at the Oxford Literary Festival last weekend. Nobody has the right not to be offended whether they be athiest, agnostic, christian, jew, muslim, hindu, sikh or whatever. If you think otherwise, then you don't understand what freedom of expression (under the law) means in a liberal society. Not gratuitously giving offence in everyday life is, of course, a matter of decency, good manners and prudence: but it is not a moral imperative.