"When oppression works its way into society, it does so by limiting our imagination first, stopping us from finding our way out of the tyranny of control by forcing us to curb what is possible, what we may need and not yet know.
The recent story coming out of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) that Savneet Talwar, the director of its graduate art therapy program, was placed on leave after she asked students to “create a mock therapeutic treatment plan for a queer Arab woman who sympathized with pro-Palestinian protests and feared retaliation under the Trump administration” is a prime example of this decay that authoritarianism can insert into a democratic society, one that we have to fight at every turn. "
For decades, Palestine, or the “P-word” as many refer to it nowadays, has become a third rail of creative and academic spaces that should know better than to control the minds of youth, who will solve the problems we face today and tomorrow. For almost three years now, this verbal and intellectual kryptonite in the US, Germany, and elsewhere has created a climate of fear that many are finding hard to navigate. The crackdown on pro-Palestine campus encampments in 2024 instilled that chill, while persecution of its leaders and activists, like Mahmoud Khalil, has outlined the potential penalties those who step out of line will suffer.