What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.

Rushdie’s point is that “freedom of expression” is not meaningfully tested by protecting agreeable or conventional speech; it is tested precisely where speech shocks, insults, or violates taboos. If a society allows expression only so long as it never offends, then the boundary of permissible speech will be set by the most easily offended or the most powerful groups, producing de facto censorship. The quote does not claim that offense is a virtue in itself; rather, it argues that the legal and cultural principle of free expression must include the right to risk giving offense, because art, satire, criticism, and dissent often do. In this view, protecting sensibilities cannot be the standard for restricting speech without hollowing the freedom out.