I haven't written about l'affaire Springer' because, frankly, I find the whole thing utterly bizarre.

I cannot think of a single rational reason why the BBC should not have broadcast the opera. I am, as regular readers will know, the first to criticise the Beeb. This, it seems to me, is one of the rare recent instances of the BBC doing exactly what a public broadcaster should be doing. It is precisely because the BBC is a public service broadcaster that it should show West End hits, and challenging programmes, rather than bland ratings chasing schedules which we used to seeing on its channels. When the two come together - Jerry Springer is both popular and challenging, a rare and welcome combination - then it should be meat and drink to a public service broadcaster.

For once, the BBC has been doing its job – providing access to plays and events which most people couldn’t otherwise see. And whatever one thinks of Jerry Springer, the Opera, is is undeniably a major theatrical event.

As it happens, I think those Christians who claim to be offended (I write 'claim' because, anecdotally, most of the protestors appear not even to have seen the opera) are not merely wrong but stupid, too, since they seem to be unable to grasp the basic point that it is a satire on the media, not Christianity, as anybody with even basic intelligence can see.

As Melanie Phillips points out:

...it is astonishing to me how many people -- Mary Kenny in the Guardian, William Rees-Mogg in the Times -- have not understood that the thing is a satire. It is not blasphemy. It is not attacking religion. It's attacking television.

Rees-Mogg takes particular offence at the show's ending,

'"Nothing is wrong, and nothing is right. And anything that lives is holy. And in conclusion, F. you. F. you all"'

Which he takes at face value as an endorsement of nihilism. But this is not endorsing the nihilistic television culture. It is satirising it.

But even though the protests miss the real target; even if we take their objections at face value: so what? Those of us who criticise the media's refusal to take militant Islam to task because it risks offending some Muslims, or who defend Salman Rushdie's right to satirise Islam, must be equally robust in defending those who might offend Christians (or Sikhs, or Jews, or paraplegics, or AIDS sufferes, or businessmen, or trades unionists, or anyone, for that matter).

My worry is not that the BBC broadcast Jerry Springer, the Opera; it is that it would not broadcast a play satirising Jesus - or Mohammed.