What is making me mad about Kony 2012

[BexRani]

A video recently went viral, called "Kony 2012" if you haven't seen it just go on you tube and type in "Kony 2012"

The video is about wanting to stop a man named Joseph Kony.

After watching the video you probably want to do something to help... and like me you were shocked and horrified by it...but to me something was fishy about the video. And guess what??? I found an article about this "fishy" stuff

Quotes from the article:

"Invisible Children has been condemned time and time again. As a registered not-for-profit, its finances are public. Last year, the organization spent $8,676,614. Only 32% went to direct services (page 6), with much of the rest going to staff salaries, travel and transport, and film production. This is far from ideal for an issue which arguably needs action and aid, not awareness, and Charity Navigator rates their accountability 2/4 stars because they lack an external audit committee. But it goes way deeper than that."

"The group is in favour of direct military intervention, and their money supports the Ugandan government’s army and various other military forces. Here’s a photo of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan People’s Liberation Army are riddled with accusations of rape and looting, but Invisible Children defends them, arguing that the Ugandan army is “better equipped than that of any of the other affected countriesâ€, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasn’t been since 2006 by their own admission"

The full article is here at http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/post/18890947431/we-got-trouble

I believe Kony should be stopped, but I don't want to give my hard earned money to a charity that isn't using my money to stop him, and is supporting an army just as filfthy as Kony.

your thoughts?

[aubrietta]

Invisible Children is really transparent about their financials, they are all on their website. They have a pretty thorough response on their website:

invisiblechildren.com.s3-website-us-east-1.amazonaws.com/critiques.html

I feel pretty divided about this because the LRA really needs to be stopped and Kony needs to be arrested and tried for his crimes. Is Kony 2012 the way to do it? I have no idea. Is there a better way? Probably. Do I know what it is? No. Is it a good thing that someone is actually trying really hard to do something, even if it is in an imperfect way? I think so.

The whole situation sucks, but I do give props to people who see injustice and try to do something about it.

edited for riffles and to break link

[BexRani]

Thanks for your thoughts.

[BexRani]

http://thedailywh.at/2012/03/07/on-kony-2012-2/

Memebase is even outing the video

[BexRani]

Still doing research and found out that there are MUCH better charities to stop Kony From THE DAILY WHAT

Sending money to a nonprofit that wants to muck things up by dousing the flames with fuel is not helping. Want to help? Really want to help? Send your money to nonprofits that are putting more than 31% toward rebuilding the region’s medical and educational infrastructure, so that former child soldiers have something worth coming home to.

Here are just a few of those charities. They all have a sparkling four-star rating from Charity Navigator, and, more importantly, no interest in airdropping American troops armed to the teeth into the middle of a multi-nation tribal war to help one madman catch another.

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.c ... orgid=4943

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.c ... orgid=3220

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.c ... orgid=8392

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.c ... orgid=8875

[Bookworm]

I'll be checking out those links for better places - I have heard of the Invisible Children group for years and always feel so sad whenever I think of the situation with those poor kids... it's upsetting to hear this group is raising awareness for a good cause while being kinda shady themselves.

[BexRani]

Yes, it is very saddening that they remain so controversial. The video went from 11,000,000 to 15,000,000 in 45 min. from when i watched it. people are seriously being duped

[BlueChair]

Here's a short NPR story that gives it some context.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/201 ... c=fb&cc=fp

The LRA is a huge problem and they have done much damage in the region. But this is a really complex regional political issue. As the article states,

while awareness is good, "these problems are highly complex, not one-dimensional and, frankly, aren't of the nature that can be solved by postering, film-making and changing your Facebook profile picture, as hard as that is to swallow."

At any rate, the video was an instant turn off for me. Production value and ability to pull at heart-strings does not equal an effective mission. Plus the guy doing the narrating creeped me out. Sounds like a smooth operator.

[treemom]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-d ... lp00000009

I refused to watch the video because slactivism annoys me, if I changed my profile pic or do something like that it is always after an action and a call for an action.

Instead, I donated to beadforlife