In an unprecedented act of incivility and rudeness, the Standing Up for Racial Justice chapter at Cornell University shouted down Senator Rick Santorum as he gave a talk regarding conservative values and the 2016 election.

Before the Senator even came out on stage it was clear that he was going to be in for a rough owoight, as Cornell College Republicans president Olivia Corn was shouted down and mocked even during the introduction for Senator Santorum. Even as she pleaded for the protestors to be respectful (and was mocked for doing so) the cry bullies refused to relent. They continually yelled things such as “extremism is not conservative” and “what about the unions?” in response to her introduction highlighting the Senator’s accomplishments. Even as she admonished them to please be respectful, maintaining a poise and integrity that her counterparts clearly lacked, Olivia was subjected to the sort of environment that has kept conservatives silenced on campuses for so long. They continued to interrupt and bully her throughout her introduction, and it got no better when the Senator came out to speak.

When the Senator came out he was immediately met by early twenty something social justice warriors attempting to shout him down. It became so ridiculous that he even mockingly asked “Does everyone here know what a question is?” and pleaded “Just to be clear, I’m going to give a speech, does everybody know what a speech is? I am going to give a speech, after which we will have questions” at two points early in his talk, while repeatedly emphasizing that he would have a long Q&A and hoped for a lively discussion. Predictably, social justice warriors in the crowd began screaming back at him, and it only got worse as the talk went on.

When the Senator proceeded to lament that millions of immigrants are being brought in to compete against domestic laborers it caused a major triggering, causing the special snowflakes to scream out cries of “Shame!” in response, ignoring the Senator’s argument that we have brought in more people in the last 20 years than any 20 year period in American history, and that these wage earning immigrants are effectively competing against many low wage workers, holding wages down. This point, of course, went totally over the heads of the Cornell students in question, who began screaming back at him about unions.

After the third or fourth interruption and the second chanting of “shame” at one of his points, the Senator had finally had enough. “Now I suspect that all of the people that just stood will walk around this campus and talk about tolerance” replied Santorum to a standing ovation from the rest of the crowd “and all of them will tell you that you have to celebrate what? Diversity. Celebrate diversity! Preach tolerance! But when it comes to anybody who disagrees with them there is no tolerance. There is no tolerance.”

As Santorum was saying this a young woman in the crowd was hysterically screaming at him about Trump in an attempt to shout him down. The Senator responded in brilliant fashion.

“You can continue to make your point all night long in that matter if you want to, and just understand (and I think everyone in this audience and those watching on the internet will understand) what the lefts idea of tolerance is, and that is ‘if you agree with me you can speak, if you don’t agree with me then we are going to do what you are doing right here”.

Even the officials at Cornell University were apparently so embarrassed at the lack of civility and decorum displayed by temper tantrums of so many of their students that a university employee actually got up and reminded the protestors (who she admonished for not listening to the same statement at the beginning of the event) that there is an order to protesting, that the speaker has a right to speak without intimidation, and that freedom to assemble and lawfully protest must not interfere with the right of the speaker to be heard. She concluded that the Q&A was their time to speak, now was their time to listen, and that the people may need to be escorted out if they continued to interrupt.

Of course, as anyone who has seen how these children tend to behave would predict, people continued to interrupt and the Cornell University administration did nothing about it. The loud student who had been interrupting him continued to do so and there were more “Shame” chants that came during his talk.

During one such interruption at the Q&A portion of the event, Senator Santorum once again decided he’d had enough and proceeded to address the protestors head on.

“Now, they just said something really interesting, this is the real problem. Because their feeling is, once they come into the public square (which they did), because liberals and conservatives alike allowed people to come into the public square and advocate for their positions, they believe that now that they have won….shut down the square, we won, everybody else shut up. Now, think about that, I heard her say that and I hear them say it all the time, ‘We won, shut up! We won, sit down! We won, I’m gonna scream over you! We won, I’m gonna call you names! I’m gonna try to bully you! I’m gonna try to make you feel that you are on the wrong side of history!’. The bottom line is, ladies and gentlemen, this is what you need to be afraid of. Because for 200 some years their position was not the position that the United States of America held, now that they have made some gains and they’ve changed it their feeling is ‘You’re not allowed in anymore! You’re not allowed to speak up or we’re gonna call you really nasty, inciting names!’.

That is something that people at Cornell, other than the half dozen people here who are screaming and hollering all the time, need to be concerned about. Because this is your country, and you need to be concerned that people that you don’t agree with have the opportunity to come into the square and make their claims. As odious as they may sound to you, as offensive as they may be to you, just like I did when I fought for people who vehemently disagree with me for the rights to come in and speak their piece, that is an important element of how we all get along. Because if we have a country that says only those who agree with me can speak and everybody else has to shut up, that’s when you have civil unrest. That’s when you have violence in the streets. As long as people feel they have the opportunity to be heard, respectfully, then America is going to be okay.”

The Cornell College Republicans, who were saddled with massive security fees in order to protect Senator Santorum and the members of their club from this mob of angry, intolerant people, were predictably appalled and angered by the complete lack of respect shown towards them by others in their campus community.

“I want to say I was appalled by the reaction to Rick Santorum today.” Cornell College Republicans Chapter President Olivia Corn posted to Facebook following the event “I understand, he has said some things that a lot of people disagree with, INCLUDING ME, but he was not afforded the chance to speak. These protests that occurred cost the Cornell Republicans thousands of dollars, and that is absolutely ridiculous! When I was speaking tonight, people were yelling and not giving me the respect I deserve. I have never been more ashamed to be a Cornell student than I was tonight”.

This incident hits home very personally for this author, as I have grown up in Ithaca and found that the Cornell Republicans fall and spring speakers are typically the only places I can go to hear anybody who agrees with me in this liberal enclave. Over the time I have been in the area the Cornell Republicans have previously invited speakers such as Shimon Perez, Allen West, Ron Paul, Ben Carson, Jeb Bush, Kimberly Guilfoyle and even (ironically enough) Senator Santorum and had each speak without any incidence of heckling or interruption.

Though it has always been somewhat intimidating to speak out as a conservative in this college town, the reaction to the 2016 election seems to be attempting to silence conservatives in this community. Whether it was the Cornell Republicans arguably being intimidated into not endorsing Donald Trump for President, the same thing happening at neighboring Ithaca College or a mayor of the city who seems to delight in taking shots at Trump and his supporters in the aftermath of the election, the stigma surrounding conservatives in the area around the Cornell campus seems to have reached an unprecedented level. People on both sides of the aisle should be appalled at this attack on free expression and call for more tolerance and acceptance, terms that these protestors would ironically claim to represent. In an elite university which is expected to produce the leaders of tomorrow tolerance for debate and discussion must not be cast aside.

The talk can be seen in full, thanks to Young America’s Foundation, at the link below.