Ted Cruz gave university snowflakes a lesson on the 1st Amendment during a Senate hearing on Tuesday about free speech on college campuses. 

Cruz defended free speech as an important avenue for opposing sides to debate each other, and noted that diversity of thought is important for a healthy democracy. 

"If universities become homogenizing institutions that are focused on inculcating and indoctrinating rather than challenging, we will lose what makes universities great," Cruz said. "Far too many colleges and universities quietly roll over and say ...we will effectively reward the violent criminals and muzzle the First Amendment."

Pointing to a Knight Foundation study, Cruz spoke about the fear students feel when expressing themselves on campus. He called this an "indictment of our university system."

"If ideas are strong, if ideas are right, you don't need to muzzle the opposition," said Cruz. "You should welcome the opposition." 

Why do faculty and administrators silence free speech? Cruz attributed it to their fear that "their ideas cannot stand the dialectic, cannot stand opposition, cannot stand facts or reasoning, or anything on the other side."

"It is only through force and power that their ideas can be accepted," said Cruz.

When hateful speech, which is free speech, arises, Cruz said the best remedy is to debate it openly in public to show its moral bankruptcy.  

"We don't need to use brute force to silence them because is truth is far more powerful than force," Cruz concluded.