Speaking at Cornell University Wednesday, former Senator Rick Santorum delivered an insightful rebuttal to protesters who repeatedly interrupted him with chants of “Shame! Shame! Shame!”
“Now, I suspect that all of the people who just stood will walk around this campus and talk about tolerance.” The audience erupted into applause at the line, drowning out both Santorum and the protesters. When the fervor died down, he continued: “…and all of them will tell you you have to celebrate what? Diversity. Celebrate diversity, preach tolerance, but when it comes to anybody who disagrees with them, there is no tolerance.”
Such disruptions are becoming more and more frequent, especially on college campuses (see Daily Wire Editor in Chief Ben Shapiro’s speech at University of Wisconsin). Lacking facts or a reasoned argument with which to wage political warfare, progressives instead choose to silence their opposition.
Silencing one’s opposition in the manner seen at Cornell accomplishes several things, the most important of which is that it gives protesters the illusion of the moral high ground. Perception is reality, and the perception that the protesters are moral, and the speaker is, by contrast, immoral, is empowering.
To anyone watching who isn’t politically savvy, the incident between Rick Santorum and the protesters could come across as a simple good versus evil scenario in which Santorum is advocating something offensive, and the protesters are doing what they can to stick it to the man. In short, the powerless are fighting the powerful in the only way they can.
Many who watch the video will not be moved to look any further; they won’t search for the context of Santorum’s speech, and the protesters will win the perception war. However, in the full speech, which can be found on YouTube, Santorum says nothing offensive.
Prior to the interruption, Santorum was speaking of the angst felt by those in the blue collar sector who are falling behind. Here’s the text leading up to the protester outburst:
“You have the liberals and the conservatives–I’ll speak now back to America. With the liberals, you had, ok, we’re gonna give you this benefit and that benefit, and by the way, we’re gonna bring in loads of immigrants into this country to compete against who? [booing and chants of ‘shame’ begin].
Let’s look at the facts. The last twenty years, more people have come into this country than [in] any twenty year period in American history. We bring over a million legal immigrants into this country every single year. In addition, we bring in a lot of illegal immigrants into this country.
The point is, most of those legal and illegal immigrants–the vast, vast majority of them…are wage earners, and they are wage earners who command and compete–effectively, I might add–against many low-wage workers in this country. That’s one of the reasons wages have been held down over a long period of time…
We have seen a flood of manufacturing and resource jobs leave this country, and if you look at the wages that people earned who were blue collar workers, the highest paid wages were in those particular areas.
So, if you’re a person sitting there at home, and feeling that frustration. You see the Democrats, who say ‘we’re for you,’ but if you look at their policies, they’re hurting you. On the other hand you look at the Republicans…Republicans have been insensitive, and have not focused their attention. Thus, the Trump phenomena.
What Donald Trump did was identify these anxieties…and deliver a message that clearly got through to an inordinate number of people. And what happened was, you had a candidate on the other side who was tone deaf. Both candidates obviously had issues that hamstrung their campaigns, but Trump had a message and she didn’t.”
Santorum was merely analyzing the Trump movement, as well as what preceded it. Nothing he said came close to being offensive, yet the chants of “shame” began.
It’s important to note that at the beginning of the speech, Santorum mentioned that there would be an extensive Q&A when he was finished, and that he even welcomed debate and exchange. However, one cannot debate without coherent arguments. The Left has no coherent arguments, so rather than wait until the Q&A to respectfully engage in a debate, the protesters chose to shout Santorum down.
Knowing the context of Santorum’s speech, as well as the fact that he welcomed an exchange afterward, the protesters lose any claim to the moral high ground. Rather than come across as warriors fighting the machine, they come across as obnoxious prats with nothing to offer.