The group that ran this are basically your typical, right wing, Shariah law is coming Muslims are all evil school of things, and as such, they are no friend of the first amendment or free speech. This ‘exhibit’ was basically designed to be as disrespectful and vile as it can be, that is the whole point, and I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised if they did this to try and get a violent reaction, so they can say “see, I told you so, Muslims are all terrorists”. I wouldn’t give this group any awards, at least Charlie Hedebo was an equal opportunity offender and was designed as outrageous satire, this thing is not.
And yes, with the first amendment comes responsibilities, there is the old idea that holds very true, that just because we can do something, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it. There is a lot better ways to have discussions about religion, even to satirize it, where there is a purpose, Voltaire did a magnificent job of that in his writings vis a vis the Catholic Church (for all I know he is still on their list of proscribed books), angered a lot of the ‘faithful’, especially the hierarchy of the church, but it was done in an intelligent way that skewered the foibles without simply being stupidly gross. If anyone asked me, I would tell them that the people who put forth this ‘exhibit’ don’t deserve anything but scorn, it is stupid to do something like they did knowing what the reaction would be, they are like someone who kicks a bee hive and then is shocked the bees swarm out.
However, I also am really upset when I hear people talking about ‘restraining’ exhibits like this, in effect calling for censoring them, often in the name of ‘public safety’, and those doing so totally don’t understand what the first amendment is for or why hate speech laws and the like are dangerous. Sure, something like this looks like a no brainer, it is obviously totally offensive, it is so far out there that it is easy to say “it should be banned”. The problem is where do you stop? The first amendment was put in so the government couldn’t act against speech they found merely to be offensive, the law if you suppress speech requires proving that the speech itself can cause direct harm, proven harm, like yelling ‘fire’ in a movie house, or for example divulging secrets (and even that has a very, very heavy burden on it, the Nixon administration tried to get the Pentagon papers suppressed, and failed, in large part because a lot of secrets turn out to be politically harmful, not secrets that would endanger lives). If you start allowing suppression of “hate” speech, it can be used in ways people wouldn’t expect. Religious conservatives could get a gay pride event shut down, arguing that the very celebration of gay pride was hateful towards their faith (the Vatican did just that in Italy, and had a pride march cancelled in Rome back in 2000, and it was justified that the march was basically hateful of the church). Leftist politicians could use this to suppress speech by extreme right wing types, and vice versa. You go down that slope, of suppressing speech because it offends someone, you end up with a society with hidden hate and a powder keg waiting to blow up, or worse, a dictatorship that controls what can be said about it.
However, that also means that those who think the people who did this are inane morons have every right to vent their fury on them, too, through words, if some businessmen underwrote this exhibit, make them pay by boycotting them, which is free speech, too. The two pieces of garbage who did this shooting in many ways are just as bad as those who would call for the exhibit to be banned, both totally disrespect the idea of free speech, both are saying they have the right to determine what others hear or see because they find it offensive, both are doing something they shouldn’t be doing. Calling on people to self restrain is one thing, asking them to think about what they are doing, telling them to, either out of fear or the law, is wrong.
The other reason such laws are dangerous is that the justification for shutting down something like this ‘exhibit’ would be the threat of violence, as in “This is deliberately inflaming Muslims, it can/will cause violence, should be suppressed”, and what that does is play right into the hands of the type of people who would commit violence because they are offended, it is using the threat of violence as a reason to stop it from happening, it is allowing someone else to set the agenda, and it is dangerous. Franklin has often been quoted about those willing to give up liberty for safety deserve neither, but it is true here (the irony being that a lot of people who quote Franklin on this often, in fact, are exactly what he was making this quote about, the kind of people who say suppressing rights is needed to guarantee safety and so forth).