UIGestureRecognizer has a property named enabled. This should be good enough to disable your swipes:
swipeGestureRecognizer.enabled = NO;
Edit: For Swift 5
swipeGestureRecognizer.isEnabled = false
UIGestureRecognizer has a property named enabled. This should be good enough to disable your swipes:
swipeGestureRecognizer.enabled = NO;
Edit: For Swift 5
swipeGestureRecognizer.isEnabled = false