When Campuses Catch Fire: The Eternal Tug Between Power and Thought

In recent weeks, we’ve witnessed an unsettling face-off in the United States — not between political parties or ideologies, but between the US administration and some of the most respected universities in the country, both Big Ivy and Little Ivy.

Universities like Columbia, Harvard, and Yale — historically celebrated as bastions of critical thinking and liberal thought — now find themselves under siege. Accusations range from fostering antisemitism to allowing unchecked campus protests. Federal funding is being questioned. Administrators are resigning. Police are marching onto campuses. Students are being arrested. And the classroom — once a sanctuary of dialogue — is fast becoming a battleground.

This is not the first time in history that seats of learning have been targeted for their ideologies, for their daring to question, to think independently.

Nalanda and the Long History of Silencing Thought

Centuries ago, in the 12th century, Nalanda University — the ancient jewel of Indian learning — was set ablaze by Bakhtiyar Khilji. Its libraries, which held priceless texts in philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, and medicine, burned for months. Why was it destroyed? Because it represented an idea — the idea of free intellectual inquiry that threatened brute power.

Whether it was Plato’s Academy, which was closed under Roman rule, or the Jewish academies shut down during the Inquisition, or Tiananmen Square’s student movement in 1989, or the McCarthy-era crackdown on academic freedom in the US — history echoes a chilling pattern:

When power feels insecure, it comes first for the poets, the philosophers, the professors, and the students.

The Problem Is Not the Protest — It Is What We’re Ignoring

There’s a deeper irony playing out. While the U.S. administration gets locked in a moral tug-of-war with elite universities over ideological posturing, what about the real crises that need urgent attention?

• Gun violence is ravaging schools, colleges, and public spaces.
• Drug overdoses among the youth are at a historic high.
• Mental health issues on campuses are escalating silently.
• Mass shootings barely make headlines anymore unless the death toll is high enough.

Why is the discourse not centered around these? Why is the intellectual ferment of universities being viewed as a threat, instead of a space for reform, dialogue, and healing?

Why Are Campuses Becoming Political Hotbeds?

Because they always have been.

Universities are where youth meets idealism, where the mind is still raw enough to question the status quo. The same energy that leads to Nobel Prize-winning discoveries can also spark revolutions — or at least, resistance.

• In India, the freedom movement drew heavily from student-led protests.
• In the U.S., the civil rights movement, the anti-Vietnam War protests, and more recently, Black Lives Matter found their pulse in university campuses.
• In Iran, Hong Kong, Myanmar, Egypt — again and again — students become the first to rise and the first to bleed.

But the solution is not to suppress. The solution is to listen, to engage, and to channel youthful dissent into constructive change.

Between Censorship and Chaos: The Need for Balance

Should campuses be lawless? Absolutely not. Hate speech, incitement to violence, or disruption of learning must be addressed. But the answer is not state overreach or blanket surveillance.

A university must never become an echo chamber. But neither should it become a war zone.

As the world stands at the crossroads of climate catastrophe, AI disruptions, rising authoritarianism, and moral confusion, we need thinking minds — now more than ever.

Let us not forget: All change begins with a question. And questions are born in classrooms.

If we silence them there, where else do we expect the answers to come from.