Never before in history has there been such domination of people's minds by the mass media. Never before in history has there been such a concentration and centralization of media, capital and military power in the hands of so few people. The countries that form the "group of seven" (in the North) control almost all the technological, economic, media, information and military power in the world.

Five hundred multinational corporations (MNCs) account for 80 percent of world trade and 75 percent of global investment. Less than five hundred billionaires own more than half of the wealth of all the inhabitants of the globe. With such concentration of the economic and technological means of power, the mass media and electronic telecommunications have served to colonize the minds of men and women and to plunder the economic and intellectual wealth of the majority of the world's population, especially in our so-called Third World, or South. The word "colonize" is no longer used by the post-modern media. More innocent words are used: Post-Colonial, Free Trade, Aid, Cooperation, Sustainable Development, Structural Adjustment and other post-modern terms with a double meaning.

To expand the global market, the media plays its role in developing certain values, patterns of behavior and perceptions of beauty, femininity, masculinity, success, love and sex. The media creates a global consumer with an increasing desire to buy what the transnational capitalists (TNCs) produce, thereby maximizing their profits. Neocolonialism, like colonialism, cannot maximize its profits without exploiting others, and you cannot exploit women and men without deceiving them. Post-modern deception by the media and the broader information system is subtle. It works on the conscious and the unconscious levels. It gives you the impression that you are free to choose while it robs you of all the means of free choice.

But how can we be free to choose if the media injects us day and night with false information? The media has developed an ideology of individualism based on destroying the resistance of the individual. It glorifies the individual hero, the star. It destroys the idea of collective resistance. It propagates post-modern ideas such as the end of history, the end of ideology and the end of representation. It divides people by religion, ethnicity and race, under the idea of difference, diversity and authentic identity, but it globalizes capital and profit under the idea of One World and One Humanity.

Post-modern capitalist writers and journalists provide the media with ideas which deceive the majority of men and women. Most of the writers and thinkers from our countries in the South adopt the ideas of capitalist thinkers in the North. Independent and original thought is not encouraged by our governments. You go to jail if you create new ideas for more justice and freedom. Most of the governments and dictators in Africa, Asia and Latin America are agents of the global economic powers and are protected by the U.S. army or police. Women and men are prevented from resisting locally or internationally. How can we organize ourselves under such oppressive systems? How can we unite the efforts of women and men if collective resistance is punished?

Our NGO in Egypt was closed down by the government in 1991 because we opposed the Gulf War, because we had different views from the government and emphasized the need to oppose the policies of the multinationals and neocolonial powers and because we resisted discrimination between people by class, gender and religion.

Religious political groups (so-called fundamentalists), whether Christian, Moslem, Jewish, Buddhist or other, are the other face of neocolonialism, the legacy of the late capitalist, patriarchal system. They separate the economy from culture, but in reality both their money and culture are limited. For example, the Gulf countries and Islamic fundamentalist groups have their money and political and information headquarters in Western financial centers — New York, London, Geneva, Frankfurt and Luxembourg. They are an integral part of the global economic and information systems.

Most of the powerful media and TV satellites in our region are owned by the rich Gulf governments or billionaires in oil-rich states or even the head of the state himself. These media follow the American media. After the Gulf War in 1991, the Gulf countries were exploited economically even more ferociously and used as military bases by the United States. Ironically, these nations actually pay the United States to exploit them in return for so-called protection.

The media in Egypt are Americanized just like the media in Europe and other parts of the world. The mass media serve as agents of neocolonialism in the South. Information is considered to be the missing link in the so-called development chain. We, the underdeveloped in the Third World, have to be taught how to consume and how to be modern, or postmodern. The cultural imperialism thesis explores the harmful influence of the U.S. media on countries in the South as well as in the North. Media and cultural imperialism are the logical accompaniments to economic imperialism. Through control of the mass media you create the conditions for conformity to the global market and limit the possibility of effective resistance to it.

The dominant global economic forces are the MNCs, especially those in communication, advertising and marketing. They dominate local economic and political activities, including the election campaigns. The international and national groups which organize and control the MNCs constitute an elite class called the "Transnationalist Capitalist Class" (TCC). The dominant individuals in the TCC are the executives, the politicians and the media marketers. The theory of globalization suggests that the key to understanding how media and communications function in the global capitalist system lies in examining the ways in which the communication of information is being transformed into a global ideology of consumerism.

In Egypt, as in other parts of the world, many poor women and men obey the messages of the media and advertisements, even when these messages are against their health or general interests. In many circumstances this is the only economically rational option open to them. It is often a trap, but one that is entered not out of choice (as some may think) but out of a lack of viable alternatives. It is a trap similar to the one that poor working women enter when they wear high heels which hinder their movement on unpaved streets. They have no alternative if women's shoes in shops have high heels, if advertisements in the media connect high heels with femininity and beauty, if movie stars, TV stars, the wives of rulers and upper- and middle-class women wear high heels, and if media messages are subliminal, affecting the subconscious and exploiting the deep instincts and depravations from which most women and men suffer. The media need only show the so-called "First Lady" wearing earrings (as big as footballs) and many women will hurry to wear them.

The struggle over control of the electronic media is reflected in the growing number of TV satellites, cable TVs and video cassettes in our countries. The opportunities for domination are obvious and have been seized by hegemonistic groups, whether official organizations or rich individuals in the government or private sector. Today in Egypt the mass media are owned by the government, but with the process of privatization and the hegemony of global capitalism, the mass media, including TV and cinema, will be handed over to rich individuals or groups. As the result of the Nile Satellite launch, we will have several TV satellites owned by a few billionaires in Egypt. The rent of one TV satellite is about three million dollars, beyond the means of anyone other than the government or the billionaires.

While the media was under government control, most dissenting ideas were censored, but under the new billionaires, the media will be controlled by the rich business class who are agents of the global, neocolonial powers. Mass media control can be exercised directly through the capitalist production process and indirectly through marketing and distribution. Commercial rather than intellectual goals are dominant and will continue to be so. The contention that private satellite television in Egypt will create progress has been disputed. Sometimes governmental control of telecommunications is, relatively speaking, preferable to private-sector or individual control, under which only those rich enough to own the technology may speak to those who are rich enough to use it.

Alternative media which are less capital intensive may challenge the hegemony of the TNCs in the mass media, but they are still marginal in the North and unknown in the South. The Transnational Advertising Agencies (TNAAs) are increasingly active in the South, where they direct local agencies. Most advertisements in Egypt serve the distribution of American and TNC goods. The TNAAs build up admiration of American "heroes" who fight in the Gulf or in Somalia (or other parts of the world) for humanitarian goals, or who fight in Iraq or Libya or Somalia or other countries.

The mass media have become the superstructure of dictatorships, globally and locally. The football or baseball competitions, like the sex and crime films, are designed as alternative channels of youth protest in repressive societies. So-called "identity politics," which tend to glorify indigenous values, such as the veiling of women, is part of the post-modern media deception. Neo-colonial powers are selective in their "identity" policies. They preserve local values that serve their interests and destroy the others that do not work in their favor. The veiling of women's faces or hair does not prevent the distribution of Western goods. Many upper class women in Egypt and the Gulf countries wear veils imported from the United States or bought from the local market. The veil became a fashion, a commodity like earrings and face lifts. Indeed, veiled women often wear lipstick, complete make-up, fashionable earrings, high, pointed heels, mascara, artificial eyelashes and perfumes.

Feminists are seen by the global media as women fighting against sexual harassment or rape. But in our countries we are fighting against both sexual and economic rape. This is not shown by the media. Indeed, when the media allow us to speak, the economic part of our statement is censored out. This has happened to me several times, especially in American and British media. In Egypt, my name is included in what they call "the gray list." I am virtually banned from TV, radio, major newspapers and the cinema.

In spite of all these obstacles, we have to continue the struggle locally and globally. Globalization from above by the TNCs and their media should be challenged by globalization from below by women and men who are the majority of the world. We have to create our own media and communicate with each other through the Internet, e-mail and other electronic devices. With the continuous advance in communication technology we will be able to reach each other with less money and less time. The decentralization of the media and communication technology is inevitable, and it can be turned to our favor. The unveiling of the mind is our goal, to be accomplished by exercising political power through local and global organizations.

— Nawal El Saadawi is a novelist, psychiatrist and journalist. She founded and edited the magazines Health and Noon, which was published by the Arab Women's Solidarity Association. She has been awarded several national and international literary prizes. Because of her outspoken writings in Egypt, Dr. El Saadawi has been imprisoned, censored and several times forced into exile.

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