Joseph Kony

At the time of this writing, the video on Kony has been viewed 56 million times.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc

Invisible Children has been far more successful than they could have anticipated but the videos success has created controversy.



I am not an expert on child soldiers, or on international human rights, but I understand both some of the critics and some of those angered by them so here are my takes on some of the criticisms:



#1. Invisible Children are not in the Better Business Bureau and have a bad rating from Charity Navigator, also they only spend 1/3 of their money on helping people.



This is an invalid criticism that is laughably wrong. Invisible Children has extremely transparent financial records. They are posted online. They do not have the highest Charity Navigator score because they do not have enough independent BOD members, something they said they are working on. There are lots of crooks who do fundraising, but none of them post all their financials online. By the way, if you see others who work in this area, most would do well to get to where Invisible Children is in terms of transparency and accountability.

They do not spent all their money doing relief or development because they are primarily an advocacy organization. That is what they are focused on, and they are doing a great job with that.



#2. The video takes something very complex and makes it too simple.



Part of this I agree with and part I disagree with. When you say "No one knows who Joseph Kony is" it is is mildly irritating to people like me who wrote about him and the LRA back when they were active, but it is incredibly frustrating to people who wrote about him, sought to bring him to justice, rehabbed children he abducted etc. Now when they show the ICC indictment list in the video, most people do not realize that before Invisible Children existed, the indictment had come down which caused Sudan to cut off the official support that Kony relied upon.



Kony has been working his evil since I was 6 (I am 31) but he has also been cut off and posing very little threat for more than 5 years. In 2003 when Invisible Children founders first went to Uganda they encountered a very real threat around Gulu. By 2006 when they founded their 501c3, he was not nearly as much of a threat. Explaining that he has been a criminal on the run living in jungles and no longer attacking anyone in Uganda is not the impression you get by watching the movie.


Joseph Kony is not the worst. Omar Al Bashir, also indicted for war crimes by the ICC (http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2010-07-13/rest-of-world/28310190_1_genocide-icc-action-bashir) has been responsible for magnitudes greater crimes than Kony and was one of the backers providing the weapons that enabled him. He also is the reason you may have heard of a region called Darfur. After the Southern Sudanese were sufficiently armed to reduce the effectiveness of his genocidal campaigns of slavery, rape and torture there, he moved on to Darfur.

When you have a chance to cast a spotlight on one thing, if your issue is child soldiers, those who work in Africa on that issue will be frustrated if you fundraise to fight someone who is almost completely impotent. They are particularly frustrated while many more children than Kony ever attacked are currently enslaved in Somalia (30k compared to 200k).


Here is the problem for the critics. I wish people would read multiple books and understand the Acholi people and some of their grievances with the government of Uganda and how that continues to cause conflict and lead to the poverty and instability that enabled Kony to work. They will not. Invisible children made things simple because people want things to be simple.


Elliot Ross wrote a condemnation of the audience as an aid worker in Africa that was spot on:

To ask people to climb down from the soaring heights of “Kony 2012” (remember how we fall down into Uganda from the heavenly realms of Jason Russell’s Facebook page?) a place where they get to feel both sanctified and superior, and truly descend into the mire of history and confusion is simply too big an ask. It would be boring and difficult and it would not be about Facebook or Angelina Jolie or coloured wristbands or me. When the euphoria evaporates and the Twittersphere has dried its tears (probably by the end of this week), all that remains will be yet another powerful myth of African degradation.


Read more: http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2012/03/08/why-you-should-feel-awkward-about-the-kony2012-video/#ixzz1oeo9m0TO


Joseph Kony is evil. Getting people involved in helping children overseas is a great thing. Getting people passionate about justice is a great thing. Leaving people confused when they learn that what they thought was clear was not the whole picture is a danger when we make something too simple.

#3
They support military intervention! They should be all about peace!


This is one of the critiques that absolutely flummoxes me. I support exporting the concept of the 2nd Amendment.

The particular evil of Kony could not exist in the United States because of the 2nd Amendment. The evil of Bashir could not exist either. If Muslims on horses come to the villages where they used to take slaves in protected parts of Southern Sudan, they will be shot to death before they can pull the trigger on the AK 47. If a murderous genocidal madman tried to take over our government, we would have another revolution.


#4
This is all very colonial. They are racist paternalists to think their help is needed in Africa.


This criticism is garbage. What this should show us is that they are people who believe that we have an obligation to help the helpless wherever they are found.

Leaving Africa to the Africans is not an enlightened approach, it is instead helping apathetic and xenophobic people avoid caring for their neighbor who through globalization we now see in need despite the distance.


Conclusion:


Kony 2012 is an incredibly well done piece of advocacy. It will continue to provoke jealousy. It will also provoke some warranted criticism (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/uganda/9131469/Joseph-Kony-2012-growing-outrage-in-Uganda-over-film.html#.T1jZY8PT8n4.facebook).

Jason Russell is not a guy who got an LLM from Georgetown and worked with International Justice Mission and the International Criminal Court to bring the weight of the law against a brutal warlord. He is a documentary filmmaker and advocate. When he advocates in a way that is successful and that gets people to care, we should all be excited. When people ask more questions and learn more and feel that there are some issues not addressed in the film, we should be understanding.

It is my hope that God uses the video Kony 2012 to stir compassion in the hearts of his people so that more get involved. I hope they care enough to learn more. I hope they care enough to help. I hope that their enthusiasm draws them into relationships that make a difference and not towards the purchase of a trinket that they wear while its cool and then discard like the WWJD and Livestrong bracelets.