The bottom line here is that you are willing to accept suppression of speech by private actors. It may have to meet your test for "hateful" speech or whatever, but now you're only arguing degrees rather than principle. My point is only that the First Amendment does not shield anyone from the consequences of his speech, except to the extent that the government cannot punish him for it. If you are delivering an offensive message, you may expect people to react as offended people would -- even if that reaction is shouting you down -- and you get no privilege or immunity from such reaction because of the First Amendment.Big RR wrote:Sue--you are clearly correct, people can do what they want and the actions are generally protected. However, I do have a problem with anyone trying to prevent a point of view (generally any point of view) from being heard. Mocking is fine IMHO, as is heckling (and laughing, etc.), but shouting down a person is not except in very exceptional circumstances (like drowning out hateful speech from the hearing of attendees at a funeral or putting a IPOD on someone crossing the gauntlet into an abortion clinic). Now this is only my opinion and not the law, but it does bother me when this is done.
As far as I could tell from what little I have seen of the Trump rally incidents, it doesn't seem that the protestors initiated the physical confrontations; that was the Trump supporters. But physical violence crosses whatever "free speech" line you draw (whether in governmental or private action), and in this case it is the Trump supporters that should be condemned for their resort violence, not the protestors. (Like they could have shouted down the guy with the microphone and the arena sound system in any event.)
Like I said, how such tactics may play out in any given political campaign is highly debatable. But I don't think they are inherently "un-American."
ETA:
Everything I just typed is summarized neatly by Econoline's cartoon and post.
