Madri Kakoti

Madri Kakoti, aka Dr Medussa, on social media platforms, is an Assistant professor in University of Lucknow. She was a keynote speaker at Mediatrone, a Media Symposium conducted by the Centre for Media Studies, Jyoti Nivas College, Autonomous. In her speech, she talks about Oceania, a country without explicitly mentioning any country in the world. 

In her speech, she talks about the political structure of this country, riddled with corruption, government atrocities, surveillance, data security and how modern times as extensified these problems and that freedom is not really freedom but something that is constricted with laws and rules. These laws and rules act as a weapon for these institutions to control and restrict us on what we see, hear and what knowledge we gain. The modern era of media provides an extra layer of control to these agencies by controlling our data and controlling what we see through censorship that is not explicitly clear, like the 90s, but in the forms tech problems, terms and conditions of these media, it becomes tech-based and not agency or institution-based. These are not just restricted to general citizens, but also journalists who are considered the watchdog of a country and the fourth pillar of society. These institutions control what is published, what the journalist writes, and the publishing houses soon realise what brings revenue, and what brings trouble in the form of FIRs and legal problems. Soon, the journalists and media houses realise what to write, editors choose what brings revenue and learn to control what they write and publish without bringing in trouble. They also start choosing safe topics and avoid bringing in trouble. Even if the editors, despite all this, publish what needs to be said and known to the public, they are subjected to interrogations and even thrown in jail. The new era says you can publish, but you also need to pay for it, in terms of FIRs and court trials.   

Her speech also highlights the struggles of people who choose to go with the truth and find their space that comes with a lot of police and court involvement and interrogations that affect the person’s psyche and their daily life. It also talks about how these government uses religion and public opinion to their advantage. 

The surveillance, the power these institutions hold over the citizens, makes them aware that they are constantly surveilled and start to regulate themselves and act only in a certain order, referring to Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon. The Panopticon prison has a circular structure with prison cells arranged along the outer wall and a central watchtower at the centre.

Because the tower can see all cells, while prisoners cannot see inside the tower, inmates never know when they are being watched. This theory, in modern times, comes to life when these institutions survey what is being seen, learnt and what is being conveyed to the citizens. They decide what we see, so our knowledge of what we need to know comes close to non-existent. Means we will never know what we need to know, never be able tell what needs to be told, and finally everything we do, see and listen are controlled and curated by algorithms and media houses that are being controlled by power and money. To be seen is to exist; to be invisible is to be powerless. This is most evident in regions subjected to heightened surveillance, internet shutdowns, and media blackouts. These regions are not exceptions to democracy, but laboratories where techniques of control are tested and later normalised. Marginalised communities experience intensified scrutiny, with algorithms reproducing existing social hierarchies and automating inequality. Surveillance becomes statistical, opaque, and difficult to challenge.  

The speech helps us navigate through the idea of how the institutions control our actions, words, what we listen to, and everything important. The control is not explicit but subtle and very effective. The speech encourages to ask question and keep asking questions. The questions will eventually lead to answers. These answers will help us understand that everything is political and how to deal with and navigate through these politics.