Joseph Kony is a war criminal and should be stopped. That being
said, the group called Invisible Children is not doing it in an efficient or
honest way. The video that they put out caught the attention of millions of
young people across the globe. It was blowing up on Twitter and Facebook. Everyone
was catching the fever that if Kony 2012. Their mission statement is to bring
down a man that has been stealing children from families and using them for his
army. On the cover, this sounds like a great way to raise awareness and to help
fund the fight against this war criminal. However, as you dig deeper, there are
many things to Kony 2012 that do not add up.
The first problem with the operation is that only 31 percent
of the money that they raise goes to the people who really need it. This means
that there is 69 percent of the money that goes to the people in charge, which are
only four people. Other organizations could be raising money for the same cause;
they are just willing to give way more money to it than the Invisible Children.
The biggest problem that I have with this organization is
that they are not only late with this video, but they came in at a time where
Kony was becoming almost nonexistent. Kony has been around for twenty six
years. He has been declared by the United Nations a war criminal for six years.
This video should have come out years ago when Kony and the Lord’s Resistance
Army was at its height in 2003-2004. The United States sent in troops to Uganda
already, so they can’t be raising awareness to put more troops in Uganda. The
war in the Middle East is coming to an end, so I can’t imagine a lot of people
want to immediately send people back out. If we did send people back out, we
would be fighting a war that is basically over. Kony has been run out of Uganda. He has been fairly dormant in the last couple years also. Is it
possible that this group put this video out at this time simply to make money
for themselves? I believe this is exactly what they were doing.
Lastly, the backlash from the video put out by the Invisible
Children could be worse than the positives of informing the masses. Because the
video was put out online for anyone to see, Kony most likely has seen this
video too. Kony will most likely become scared upon seeing that the American people
are becoming more aware of him. This fear would cause him to kidnap more kids
in order to protect himself from the impending danger. Despite their good
intentions, they are actually causing Kony to kidnap more children for
protection.
Invisible Children may have had the idea to help educate the
common people about Joseph Kony. They may have had completely good intentions
about what they were doing. However, they did not go about it in a way that
would help anyone. Educating the public is not the same as helping save lives
in a country that no longer needs their lives saved.
Tyler I could not agree with you more. When the Kony video first hit the viral stage I was very skeptical too since this story came out of the blue. Media is such a powerful tool, and Invisible Children used the good will and intentions of youth to their advantage. They never once mention in the video that they first began filming in 2003. This is nine years ago and since then there has been legislation passed and interference by the UN. I agree that this video will hurt the children in Uganda and Kony will most likely build up his army. It is crazy to think that a video which seems to be only for good and positive intentions, is actually a scam and detrimental to a cause.
ReplyDeleteThis so called Kony campaign is nothing more than some public relations (PR) stunt to grow a business from young ignorant Americans so I do agree. This so called group is about 20 years late in the cause since the UN had this problem pretty much taken care of. This just goes to show that corruption is alive and well in the United States, but also how people twist paragon ideals or turn some simple problem into a complex mess. What’s really disappointing is how poorly informed American people of almost any age are on almost any topic whether it’s domestic or international. Finally when people find out about something they all acts like its life or death, but also think its so god damned important.
ReplyDelete-Will
It’s truly disheartening to dig deeper into an organization that seems to be promoting so much good and find that there is corruption. I had heard about the Invisible Children organization before this current Kony campaign. Even though I had heard about Invisible Children and knew the story behind the kids I never once heard about Kony himself. It does seem to pose a very good question of why not. My initial thought when hearing about the new video and seeing it was, “why now?” They have been an organization for about 9 years and they have never pushed to capture Kony until now. This is extremely odd, and is a shame that people weren’t able to adequately help these kids and families in an efficient and properly timed manner earlier.
ReplyDeleteBrennan Burling
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