Shouting down a speaker violates the speaker's first amendment rights.

[alp227]

After the Muslim students at UC Irvine were convicted of conspiring to disrupt a speech by an Israeli ambassador, I've come to the conclusion that disrupting others' speech violates their 1st amendment rights and therefore cannot reasonably be protected free speech. Now while I normally support the American Civil Liberties Union I am disappointed that its Southern California chapter executive director : "If allowed to stand, this will undoubtedly intimidate students in Orange County and across the state and discourage them from engaging in any controversial speech or protest for fear of criminal charges." C'mon, that is just plain ridiculous. As I've said in the original DU thread linked, the sensible alternative to shouting down Michael Oren would have been to engage in controversial speech in another venue, as ACLUSC exec dir Hector Villagra said.

Is it not a crime to deprive another person of civil rights? That's the criminal conviction that two of the police officers who beat Rodney King got in federal court. Think about this: if a right-wing astroturf group paid a group of people to attend a Barack Obama speech and shout Obama down with right-wing talking points, would you defend the people's actions, and would that be criminal?