Progressives to Women: Fall in Line or Fall Silent
The controversial confirmation process for President Donald Trump’s second Supreme Court nominee, Judge Brett Kavanaugh of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, ended just as abruptly as it began.
Kavanaugh’s elevation to the highest court in the land came by way of a slim 50-48 margin on the Senate floor Saturday, and he was sworn in as an associate justice shortly thereafter.
As confirmation proceedings entered their final hours last week, the only vote truly left in question was that of Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican who, Friday afternoon, garnered the attention of millions as she spoke to the partisan nature of this confirmation process and the evidence that brought her to her final verdict. In conclusion, Collins expressed her intentions to support Kavanaugh’s confirmation.
The senator’s eloquent and momentous speech — which thoughtfully reviewed Kavanaugh’s judicial record, the allegations brought against him and the importance of the #MeToo movement — deflated the Democrats.
Uncertainty had, to that point, hung like a thick fog over the confirmation, with questions as to which way three Republicans — Collins, Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona and Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — and one Democrat — Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia — would swing, and even whether Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., would be present at all.
It was all but impossible for expert analysts to discern what the result might be.
Collins’ announcement of an affirmative vote put to rest any notion that the Democrats might still prevent Kavanaugh’s elevation. She had sealed the deal and, in doing so, not only earned the ire of a mob whose mission was to destroy Kavanaugh, but also earned herself a spot on the left’s list of persona non grata.
The senator had officially cemented herself as Public Enemy No. 1 to the Democrats.
Mere minutes passed between Collins’ closing statements and left-wing news agencies, radicals and protestors’ indiscriminate vilification of her.
It mattered little to devout Democrats that Collins’ defense of due process and case for Kavanaugh’s confirmation were laden with empathy for victims of sexual assault. Both her’ efforts to introduce level-headed bipartisanship to the dialogue and her emphatic validation of how important this repugnant process had been in raising awareness for, and informing the discourse surrounding, sexual victimization in the U.S. were for naught.
All that mattered, it would appear, was that Collins would vote to affirm Kavanaugh. She was supporting the presumption of innocence for a man the #MeToo movement and the court of public opinion had already deemed guilty.
Heads would roll for this, and what would follow was a putrid tarring and feathering of the highest magnitude.
As we’ve come to expect, left-wingers and so-called resistance fighters did not hesitate to sling mud and spread their anger through every form of media at their disposal.
Various sources reported every manner of ill-will wishing and threat fielded by Collins’ offices. The mud-slinging and threats varied greatly, from simple ad homonym attacks and name-calling to absurd wishes that waitresses would from this day forward spit in the senator’s food.
Many of the correspondences fielded, despite their aggressive nature, could easily be dismissed as heat-of-the-moment exclamations from those on the far end of the political spectrum, something that just comes with the territory of being an American lawmaker.
However, an exorbitant number of these correspondences and outcries crossed a fine line into territories that simply cannot be dismissed or ignored. Countless tweets and calls were of a particularly heinous nature — expressing hopes that Collins might be raped or impregnated against her will for her actions. Numerous positively abhorrent incitements of violence were made.
These sentiments were made all the more concerning by the fact that they were shared, and even encouraged, by various left-wing activists, journalists and celebrities who have recently entered into the political mainstream.
Linda Sarsour of the Women’s March calledCollins a “traitor” to the interests of women, a “rape apologist” and disturbingly “anti-woman” — despite the fact that she has numerous times opposed Republican legislation to restrict abortion rights. These individuals and groups indicated that Collins was in-league with the “oppressors” and in doing so made such disgusting attacks and mobilizations against the senator a tolerable political tactic.
The irony was unparalleled and clearly unrecognized by the left.
The same left-wing media officials and organizers who had spent weeks portraying themselves as the defenders of American women, railing against a “rape culture” they say tolerates and encourages violence and mistreatment of women, had committed entirely to an abrupt 180.
The abundant hypocrisy of this shift was not, however, what many have dismissed as an example of human fallibility in the heat-of-the-moment, but an audacious indicator of a hypocrisy that pervades modern progressive culture.
The attack on Collins is further proof that the American left’s elevation of advocacy for, and public defense of, women are political posturing — a facade that is quickly done away with when women like Collins have the gall to stand against the left’s interests and values.
The left seeks diversity, but only in its voting base. Diversity of thought is more often than not a vulgar concept to modern Democrats.
Do progressives care that American women are emboldened to partake in the political discourse? Certainly — but only if those women express beliefs and values deemed appropriate and acceptable by the mainstream progressive movement and its mouthpieces.
Dissent is unacceptable. The modern left has developed a culture wherein suppressing voices of opposition by any means necessary is the status quo. The culture war is far from over, and it’s far too important to progressives for the movement to allow for dissenting opinions among communities whose rights they claim to champion.
The American left has one desire in regard to the voice of women — that they fall in line and chant loudly or fall utterly silent once more. And it will go to abhorrent lengths to see this come to fruition.
Collins was not the first to face the more abusive facets of this hypocritical left-wing culture, and should the Republicans lose too much ground in the midterms, she will not be the last.
The views expressed in this opinion article are those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by the owners of this website. If you are interested in contributing an Op-Ed to The Western Journal, you can learn about our submission guidelines and process here.
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