For the "heckling is speech" crowd, a hypothetical: Imagine that an important civil rights leader had emerged, and he was saying things that made many people uncomfortable. /1
Now imagine that those uncomfortable people gathered together their very loudest friends, and chanted so loudly wherever this person spoke that no one could hear him. /2
Now imagine that the government saw this practice, and realized that for a few bucks, it could recruit people to do this work for it, and literally "drown out" the message of the speaker.
Heckling isn't free speech because its purpose is solely to prevent speech. /3
Heckling isn't free speech because its purpose is solely to prevent speech. /3
Chanting and singing can all be powerful expressions of a message. But if the only reason your message is powerful is because it's louder than the speaker, then your advantage is only temporary. /4
Avoid setting a precedent that will destroy your own ability to speak when you are in the minority. Because ultimately, numbers will often be on the government's side, and the government often wants to do terrible things with that power. /5
Never forget that desegregation and suffrage were won by people who lacked the power to silence others. That's a tradition worth continuing. /6
