While I'd agree that even the most respectful religious or political stories will offend some, regardless of how respectfully they try to present their arguments, certainly those who present their arguments in an insulting antagonistic bomb-throwing manner will offend far more.
A funny example you might enjoy hearing about, I was at a church meeting in 2003 and was discussing 9-11 with a Christian guy I'd just met who was a non-comics collector. I mentioned a story I read in the two-volume 9-11 artist tribute books. I mentioned one story (page 142 of the 200-page volume with an Alex Ross cover, a story by Peter Gross and Darick Robertson) that portrayed a mother and daughter visiting a museum built on the site of where the towers collapsed, around the year 3200. The woman says to her daughter that it was the turning point of history, where people of all nations transcended their governments and united the world in peace. The names of the 9-11 dead were etched in stone, and the 19 terrorists from 9-11 were forgotten, and even the reason they destroyed the towers was forgotten. All the world remembered was the good that resulted from people of the world uniting.
I started to explain this to the Christian guy, and I saw him flinch with resistance to the ideas of the story, and I finally stopped and said "You don't like the ideas, do you? You think the story is in contradiction of Bible prophecy..." And he said yes. I said to him that I agreed it contradicted Bible future events, but I still enjoyed it as a story. It's just a nice story! But his reaction was like I was trying to convert him to Satanism or Islam.
Geez!
So yeah... Some people offend pretty easily. And as purist as some here might think I am, there are people I run across who are far more ideologically rigid than I am.
I think the internet and the conservative/liberal chasm that has developed in the media have definitely increased that polarization, and widened the ideological chasm.
But hey, c'mon. Sometimes a story is just a story. In comics, as we've discussed in many previous topics, some of my favorite stories are written from a liberal perspective by folks like Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams, Roy Thomas, Gerry Conway, Mike Barr and the like. If it's portraying ideological liberals and their principled views, without demagoguing or insulting those who disagree, I still enjoy it. Sometimes I can even laugh to myself or with the writer, when reading some passionate demagoguery.
A few short stories I've re-read along these lines recently, both by Harlan Ellison, are "Santa Claus vs. S.P.I.D.E.R." and "Hitler Painted Roses".
You don't have to accept the ideas presented as gospel truth, just to enjoy a well-written story, or read and understand ideas written from another point of view.
