The Faber College mantra is “ Knowledge Is Good.” Animal House’s institution of higher learning had it right. Knowledge is good. It is also power. And that is what many of these conservatives who are seeking to strangle and muzzle our educational institutions fear. This determination to be the gatekeepers of which knowledge should be available to young people is happening both at the secondary level - witness the conservative extremism of the Central Bucks and Pennridge school boards - as well as on the college level with DeSantis’ dismantling of the New College “woke” curriculum. Knowledge is power, a threat to those who would maintain our status quo of comfy white cis-gender privilege. No pesky facts about racism, about gender, about hard-to-stomach historical events in this country. Because the more you know, the more you know, and that “more” can lead to greater understanding, to acknowledging, accepting and respecting different ideas and perspectives. We certainly can’t have that! What is so troubling and brazen about this movement to whitewash our history and our society is that it is a movement that knowingly and unapologetically seeks to impose its own form of indoctrination, of circumscription of ideas. It is supported by those who embrace this un-thinking, and are happy to jump on this conservative “anti-woke” bandwagon. Ban books! Ban troubling academic courses! Ban Pride flags! Offer access only to what WE deem appropriate! Limit students’ exposure and access to information on all sides of an issue - that would then allow them to draw their own conclusions. That’s not in the course plan! Knowledge is good, knowledge is power, and must be curtailed. Much better to promote a curriculum that would close minds and bar doors. These gatekeepers want to replace one (alleged) indoctrination with another - theirs. They are not educators. They are despots determined and desperate to obtain power and to impose their beliefs on all of us at the cost of our individual freedom and right to learn, to think and to believe for ourselves.