[...] It was not about that a number of journalists and newspapers in Europe were outraged about violation of the so-called tolerance but the fact that very many journalists were afraid to publish these cartoons, these pictures. Even I consider this legitimate. If you think that you are not prepared to take a certain risk by publishing an article then you can do that. No one is forced to do it. Interesting was the way this was justified and argued. And this actually was what made me feel sad. (...)  I do not tend towards cultural pessimism or to end of the world scenarios. But at the beginning of this year this unsettled me. Because when we take a clear look at this whole episode then we must after all come to the conclusion that many representatives of the European media were afraid – to call a spade a spade ‑ to perform their key task, namely to represent reality how it really is. You allowed yourself to be intimidated. And from my point of view not in a legitimate way: You criticised the Danish colleagues in order not to give in to your own ‑ to all intents and purposes legitimate – impulse. Perhaps you were ashamed, I don’t know what the motives were; in any case you didn’t represent it like it is.

And Charles Moore once presented this very beautifully in an editorial in the Daily Telegraph, that in certain areas of Europe, in fact, as far as this topic is concerned, perhaps a central line of conflict will occupy us for years to come. That here the media did not have the courage not to mince words. An indication that the culture if you like ‑ somewhat ambitiously formulated: the culture of freedom, the culture of democracy, the results and guarantor of which are to a certain degree the media – that the culture in certain territories of Europe can no longer simply be lived to its full extent. This was distinctly obvious to me in England where my English colleagues openly told me they would have liked to do it but they never dared to print these cartoons for fear of reprisals.
(...) I share Bernard-Henri Lévy’s optimism concerning ‑ so to say ‑ the necessity and also the continuance of media understanding or the perpetual table talk. I am worried when I observe such phenomena such as the cartoon furore. And I am somewhat angry when I see how highly respected colleagues of mine have presented the false arguments in this discussion in my opinion. (...)