The problem with this kind of requests if you comply with it, then you've set a precedence. Then who knows who else is going to get offended and then start demanding something else to be taken down.

And the worst case scenario in this attention hungry culture how many others will start making demands like this just for more publicity? I can't read minds. I didn't know this artist before this debacle. It certainly brought him a lot of free publicity. How many people are going to start doing the same now given the amount of free publicity?