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Make Joseph Kony Famous!
- Thread starter Infidelity
- Start date
A good debate thread should start with getting more background on the issue at hand.
That said, the whole purpose of Koni 2012, is to spread the story to everyone you know, because awareness solves all problems and it makes you feel good because you've done something about it. The messy details of actually fixing the problem is someone elses responsibility.
This isn't meant to be negative. It's how we respond, today, to social media and such siren calls. Koni is a dirt bag. 20 million Facebook posts and 30 million Linked inmessages will accomplish what, exactly?
In two days from now, this will be completely off the radar and a non news story. But, we would have all done our part. We posted it on FB, changed our profile pics and raised awareness for 48 hours. Do we really really want to do much more that this? Really?
Cause du jour.
next.
That said, the whole purpose of Koni 2012, is to spread the story to everyone you know, because awareness solves all problems and it makes you feel good because you've done something about it. The messy details of actually fixing the problem is someone elses responsibility.
This isn't meant to be negative. It's how we respond, today, to social media and such siren calls. Koni is a dirt bag. 20 million Facebook posts and 30 million Linked inmessages will accomplish what, exactly?
In two days from now, this will be completely off the radar and a non news story. But, we would have all done our part. We posted it on FB, changed our profile pics and raised awareness for 48 hours. Do we really really want to do much more that this? Really?
Cause du jour.
next.
I think he should start mass producing Small sized baseball Jersey's that say "Konys Kids" on them.
A good debate thread should start with getting more background on the issue at hand.
That said, the whole purpose of Koni 2012, is to spread the story to everyone you know, because awareness solves all problems and it makes you feel good because you've done something about it. The messy details of actually fixing the problem is someone elses responsibility.
This isn't meant to be negative. It's how we respond, today, to social media and such siren calls. Koni is a dirt bag. 20 million Facebook posts and 30 million Linked inmessages will accomplish what, exactly?
In two days from now, this will be completely off the radar and a non news story. But, we would have all done our part. We posted it on FB, changed our profile pics and raised awareness for 48 hours. Do we really really want to do much more that this? Really?
Cause du jour.
next.
Outstanding post.
I mean there's absolutely nothing wrong with publicizing this and such and we SHOULD be calling attention to this, but in the end, what's accomplished if that's all that's done? I don't know the answer, I wish I did but it is what it is.
read this first
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
We got trouble.
Please note that posting date has been edited to keep this at the top of the page. Post written March 7, 2012.
I do not doubt for a second that those involved in KONY 2012 have great intentions, nor do I doubt for a second that Joseph Kony is a very evil man. But despite this, Im strongly opposed to the KONY 2012 campaign.
KONY 2012 is the product of a group called Invisible Children, a controversial activist group and not-for-profit. Theyve released 11 films, most with an accompanying bracelet colour (KONY 2012 is fittingly red), all of which focus on Joseph Kony. When we buy merch from them, when we link to their video, when we put up posters linking to their website, we support the organization. I dont think thats a good thing, and Im not alone.
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 governments army and various other military forces. Heres a photo of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan Peoples 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 countries, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasnt been since 2006 by their own admission. These books each refer to the rape and sexual assault that are perennial issues with the UPDF, the military group Invisible Children is defending.
Still, the bulk of Invisible Childrens spending isnt on supporting African militias, but on awareness and filmmaking. Which can be great, except that Foreign Affairs has claimed that Invisible Children (among others) manipulates facts for strategic purposes, exaggerating the scale of LRA abductions and murders and emphasizing the LRAs use of innocent children as soldiers, and portraying Kony a brutal man, to be sure as uniquely awful, a Kurtz-like embodiment of evil. Hes certainly evil, but exaggeration and manipulation to capture the public eye is unproductive, unprofessional and dishonest.
As Chris Blattman, a political scientist at Yale, writes on the topic of ICs programming, Theres also something inherently misleading, naive, maybe even dangerous, about the idea of rescuing children or saving of Africa. [ ] It hints uncomfortably of the White Mans Burden. Worse, sometimes it does more than hint. The savior attitude is pervasive in advocacy, and it inevitably shapes programming. Usually misconceived programming.
Still, Konys a bad guy, and hes been around a while. Which is why the US has been involved in stopping him for years. U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) has sent multiple missions to capture or kill Kony over the years. And theyve failed time and time again, each provoking a ferocious response and increased retaliative slaughter. The issue with taking out a man who uses a child army is that his bodyguards are children. Any effort to capture or kill him will almost certainly result in many childrens deaths, an impact that needs to be minimized as much as possible. Each attempt brings more retaliation. And yet Invisible Children supports military intervention. Kony has been involved in peace talks in the past, which have fallen through. But Invisible Children is now focusing on military intervention.
Military intervention may or may not be the right idea, but people supporting KONY 2012 probably dont realize theyre supporting the Ugandan military who are themselves raping and looting away. If people know this and still support Invisible Children because they feel its the best solution based on their knowledge and research, I have no issue with that. But I dont think most people are in that position, and thats a problem.
Is awareness good? Yes. But these problems are highly complex, not one-dimensional and, frankly, arent of the nature that can be solved by postering, film-making and changing your Facebook profile picture, as hard as that is to swallow. Giving your money and public support to Invisible Children so they can spend it on supporting ill-advised violent intervention and movie #12 isnt helping. Do I have a better answer? No, I dont, but that doesnt mean that you should support KONY 2012 just because its something. Something isnt always better than nothing. Sometimes its worse.
If you want to write to your Member of Parliament or your Senator or the President or the Prime Minister, by all means, go ahead. If you want to post about Joseph Konys crimes on Facebook, go ahead. But lets keep it about Joseph Kony, not KONY 2012.
~ Grant Oyston
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]
We got trouble.
Please note that posting date has been edited to keep this at the top of the page. Post written March 7, 2012.
I do not doubt for a second that those involved in KONY 2012 have great intentions, nor do I doubt for a second that Joseph Kony is a very evil man. But despite this, Im strongly opposed to the KONY 2012 campaign.
KONY 2012 is the product of a group called Invisible Children, a controversial activist group and not-for-profit. Theyve released 11 films, most with an accompanying bracelet colour (KONY 2012 is fittingly red), all of which focus on Joseph Kony. When we buy merch from them, when we link to their video, when we put up posters linking to their website, we support the organization. I dont think thats a good thing, and Im not alone.
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 governments army and various other military forces. Heres a photo of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan Peoples Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan Peoples 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 countries, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasnt been since 2006 by their own admission. These books each refer to the rape and sexual assault that are perennial issues with the UPDF, the military group Invisible Children is defending.
Still, the bulk of Invisible Childrens spending isnt on supporting African militias, but on awareness and filmmaking. Which can be great, except that Foreign Affairs has claimed that Invisible Children (among others) manipulates facts for strategic purposes, exaggerating the scale of LRA abductions and murders and emphasizing the LRAs use of innocent children as soldiers, and portraying Kony a brutal man, to be sure as uniquely awful, a Kurtz-like embodiment of evil. Hes certainly evil, but exaggeration and manipulation to capture the public eye is unproductive, unprofessional and dishonest.
As Chris Blattman, a political scientist at Yale, writes on the topic of ICs programming, Theres also something inherently misleading, naive, maybe even dangerous, about the idea of rescuing children or saving of Africa. [ ] It hints uncomfortably of the White Mans Burden. Worse, sometimes it does more than hint. The savior attitude is pervasive in advocacy, and it inevitably shapes programming. Usually misconceived programming.
Still, Konys a bad guy, and hes been around a while. Which is why the US has been involved in stopping him for years. U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) has sent multiple missions to capture or kill Kony over the years. And theyve failed time and time again, each provoking a ferocious response and increased retaliative slaughter. The issue with taking out a man who uses a child army is that his bodyguards are children. Any effort to capture or kill him will almost certainly result in many childrens deaths, an impact that needs to be minimized as much as possible. Each attempt brings more retaliation. And yet Invisible Children supports military intervention. Kony has been involved in peace talks in the past, which have fallen through. But Invisible Children is now focusing on military intervention.
Military intervention may or may not be the right idea, but people supporting KONY 2012 probably dont realize theyre supporting the Ugandan military who are themselves raping and looting away. If people know this and still support Invisible Children because they feel its the best solution based on their knowledge and research, I have no issue with that. But I dont think most people are in that position, and thats a problem.
Is awareness good? Yes. But these problems are highly complex, not one-dimensional and, frankly, arent of the nature that can be solved by postering, film-making and changing your Facebook profile picture, as hard as that is to swallow. Giving your money and public support to Invisible Children so they can spend it on supporting ill-advised violent intervention and movie #12 isnt helping. Do I have a better answer? No, I dont, but that doesnt mean that you should support KONY 2012 just because its something. Something isnt always better than nothing. Sometimes its worse.
If you want to write to your Member of Parliament or your Senator or the President or the Prime Minister, by all means, go ahead. If you want to post about Joseph Konys crimes on Facebook, go ahead. But lets keep it about Joseph Kony, not KONY 2012.
~ Grant Oyston
Invalid Link Removed
You might want to check this out. I am not, and won't pretend to be, educated enough to either support or condemn the cause, but this is an interesting read.
You might want to check this out. I am not, and won't pretend to be, educated enough to either support or condemn the cause, but this is an interesting read.
A good debate thread should start with getting more background on the issue at hand.
That said, the whole purpose of Koni 2012, is to spread the story to everyone you know, because awareness solves all problems and it makes you feel good because you've done something about it. The messy details of actually fixing the problem is someone elses responsibility.
This isn't meant to be negative. It's how we respond, today, to social media and such siren calls. Koni is a dirt bag. 20 million Facebook posts and 30 million Linked inmessages will accomplish what, exactly?
In two days from now, this will be completely off the radar and a non news story. But, we would have all done our part. We posted it on FB, changed our profile pics and raised awareness for 48 hours. Do we really really want to do much more that this? Really?
Cause du jour.
next.
+1,000
The truth is, the people in any position to actually do anything about this already know whats going on. Had it served them any purpose to intervene, they would have already. Awareness is great for the spirit, in absolving one of ignorance, but its not going to change anything.
Agreed. Once in a great while though if enough attention is focused on a particular issue and enough pressure is brought to bare on folks who can possibly do something about, maybe something can get done, who knows. Regardless of how unlikely, some things may still be worth the effort I guess...
I will post in this thread as well. Joseph Kony hasn't been in Uganda for about 6 years now. You are witnessing a filmmaker pulling heartstrings in a viral marketing campaign, some are even calling it a scam.
If only us Americans put in this much effort and desire to break free from our police statish policies in this country.
Guys...come on. This is two-day old news. The world has moved on. We all did what we were asked to do, which was spread the story around to create "awareness". Mission accomplished.
We're now back to Iraq, I mean Iran, having weapons of mass destruction.
Keep shopping.
We're now back to Iraq, I mean Iran, having weapons of mass destruction.
Keep shopping.
Oh but don't forget about the oil they recently found in Uganda. Lets send more poor people to die for it
You drive? Heat your home with gas or oil? Then you'd be supporting it, like it or not. Just saying.
No, Im in support of either alternative power like nuclear(with our technology its not nearly as harmful as they lead us to believe) or to drill on our shores. We all live on this planet so why not drill a whole in our earth closer to us?
Kony is simply suffering from a case of mineral deficiency.
A 230 grain lead injection will fix him right up.
As well intended as this campaign is, he's unconcerned about his PR.
Since Uganda is old stomping grounds for the Brits, let 22 SAS get the job done.
A 230 grain lead injection will fix him right up.
As well intended as this campaign is, he's unconcerned about his PR.
Since Uganda is old stomping grounds for the Brits, let 22 SAS get the job done.
It's already pretty publicized that the so called "charity" only uses 31% of it's proceeds to help anyone. The rest goes to line the pockets of the founders.
