Yesterday several students entered school excited to share their discovery of the video “Kony 2012.” This 30 minute video has gone viral on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, with over 50 million views in less than a week. After our Project Citizen Unit and our current start to the Genocide Unit I am proud to see students engaged in news, with the a desire to understand what was happening.
--- This situation highlights the need to teach all citizens how to think independently. The movie is gripping and well done - yet remember one must cross check information and search to understand the situation beyond one movies tale. After cross checking the facts and the stories YOU, critically and independently should come to an understanding of what is happening. That maybe asking more questions, seeking more answers, or acting to help. But remember I hope to have all students leave the 7th grade social studies class with the skills to thrive as a citizen: being able to critically think, write, and act for oneself.
Today we are going to investigate the story of “Kony 2012” and you will draw your own conclusions and decisions on how to act. Be prepared to summarize the situation in your own words by being able to answer the basic questions.
The Site for Invisible Children: (the video is available here but must be watched outside of class)
Who is Joseph Kony?
- Joseph Kony is the world’s worst war criminal. In 1987 he took over leadership of an existing rebel group and renamed it the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). The LRA has earned a reputation for its cruel and brutal tactics. When Joseph Kony found himself running out of fighters, he started abducting children to be soldiers in his army or ‘wives’ for his officers. The LRA is encouraged to rape, mutilate, and kill civilians -often with blunt weapons. The LRA is no longer active in Northern Uganda (where it originated) but it continues its campaign of violence in Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, and South Sudan. In its 26-year history the LRA has abducted more than 30,000 children and displaced at least 2.1 million people
- Invisible Children has been working for nine years to end Africa’s longest running armed conflict. US Military advisers are currently deployed in Central Africa on a “time-limited” mission to stop Kony and disarm the LRA. If Kony isn’t captured this year the window will be gone. We are taking action to ensure these two things 1) That Joseph Kony is known as the world’s worst war criminal. 2) That the U.S. military advisers support the Ugandan Army until Kony has been captured and the LRA has been completely disarmed.
Why are we making Joseph Kony famous?
- Invisible Children’s Kony 2012 campaign aims to make Joseph Kony famous, not to celebrate him but to raise support for his arrest and set a precedent for international justice. In this case, notoriety translates to public support. If people know about the crimes that Kony has been committing for 26 years, they will unite to stop him. Secondly, we want Kony to be famous so that when he is stopped, he will be a visible, concrete example of international justice. the other war criminals will know that their mass atrocities will not go unnoticed or unpunished.
- Invisible Children’s email: info@invisiblechildren.com
Random additional information - can you tie this information into one of ideas you learned about on block day?
- In 2005 Kony was indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, but has evaded capture
Article 1: Invisible Children's "Kony 2012" viral video stirs emotion and controversy”
(CBS News) If you're on Facebook, chances are a link titled "Kony 2012" has appeared on your news feed this week.
The video, which was uploaded to YouTube on
March 5, tells the story of filmmaker Jason Russell's personal mission
to take down Joseph Kony, the Ugandan leader of the guerrilla group
Lord's Resistance Army (LRA).
Produced
by the non-profit group Invisible Children, it has all of the elements
of a powerful viral video: heroes and villains, heart, purpose and a
call to action (the filmmakers also make good use of Facebook Timeline
as storytelling tool). In less than a week, the video has garnered over
26.6 million views, but it's also sparked controversy.
Invisible
Children has been criticized for spending more of their resources on
advocacy and filmmaking rather than on-the-ground humanitarian work.
According to Charity Navigator, Invisible Children's accountability and transparency score is at 45 out of 100. In comparison, similar organizations Africare and AMREF USA have scores of 70 and 67, respectively. Invisible Children's explanation of the score is
that they only have four independent voting members on their board of
directors. Charities with fewer than five independent voting members get
15 points deducted from their accountability and transparency score."Invisible Children's financial statements are online for everyone to see. Financial statements from the last 5 years, including our 990, are available at invisiblechildren.com/financials. The organization spent 80.46% on our programs that further our three fold mission, 16.24% on administration and management costs and 3.22% on direct fundraising in FY2011. Invisible Children is independently audited every year and in full compliance with our 501 c 3 status."
Critics also say that Invisible Children's video simplifies an issue that is more complex than just eliminating Kony from Uganda.
Along with organizations like the Resolve campaign and GuluWalk, Invisible Children has been accused of manipulating facts. Foreign Affairs magazine wrote in Nov. 2011:
"In
their campaigns, such organizations have manipulated facts for
strategic purposes, exaggerating the scale of LRA abductions and murders
and emphasizing the LRA's use of innocent children as soldiers, and
portraying Kony -- a brutal man, to be sure -- as uniquely awful, a
Kurtz-like embodiment of evil. They rarely refer to the Ugandan
atrocities or those of Sudan's People's Liberation Army, such as attacks
against civilians or looting of civilian homes and businesses, or the
complicated regional politics fueling the conflict."
Critics
don't appear to doubt the altruism of Invisible Children's mission,
they are more concerned with what happens after people watch the video.
"One
consequence, whether it's [Invisible Children] or Save Darfur, is a lot
of dangerously ill-prepared young people embarking on missions to save
the children of this or that war zone," said Chris Blattman,
professor of political science and economics at Yale University. "At
best it's hubris and egocentric. More often, though, it leads to bad
programs, misallocated resources, or ill-conceived military adventures."
Invisible
Children recognized the critique that they oversimplified the issue and
admitted that the film was meant to serve as an entry point to the
topic.
"In
our quest to garner wide public support of nuanced policy, Invisible
Children has sought to explain the conflict in an easily understandable
format, focusing on the core attributes of LRA leadership that infringe
upon the most basic of human rights. In a 30-minute film, however, many
nuances of the 26-year conflict are admittedly lost or overlooked," the group said in a statement.
Ultimately,
Invisible Children want to shift the conversation so that critics and
allies, alike, continue to raise awareness about Kony and the LRA.
"Let's
focus on what matters, and what we DO agree on: Joseph Kony needs to be
stopped. And when that happens, peace is the limit," the organizers stated.
Article 2: Source: The Telegraph: “Joseph Kony 2012: Obama administration congratulates success of campaign”
The 30-minute video,
Kony2012, was produced by three US videographers campaigning for
greater efforts to capture Kony, the leader of the LRA. The video has
been viewed on YouTube alone almost 50 million times in the last five
days. Jay Carney, the White House Press Secretary, congratulated the
"hundreds of thousands of Americans who have mobilised to this unique
crisis of conscience." Mr Carney said: "I think this viral video that
you mentioned is part of that response, raising awareness about the
horrific activities of the LRA, and consistent with the bipartisan
legislation passed by our congress in 2010 the United States continues
to pursue a comprehensive multi-faceted strategy to help the governments
and people of Central Africa in their efforts to end the threat posed
by the LRA and reduce the human consequences of the LRA's atrocities."
The US last year sent 100 combat troops to central Africa to advise forces aiming to hunt down the LRA. Despite the success of the campaign, there is growing outrage in Uganda over the viral film.
Critics argue Kony and his diminishing troops, many of them kidnapped child soldiers, fled northern Uganda six years ago and are now spread across the jungles of neighbouring countries.
“What
that video says is totally wrong, and it can cause us more problems
than help us,” said Dr Beatrice Mpora, director of Kairos, a community
health organisation in Gulu, a town that was once the centre of the
rebels’ activities.
“There
has not been a single soul from the LRA here since 2006. Now we have
peace, people are back in their homes, they are planting their fields,
they are starting their businesses. That is what people should help us
with.”
The
video aims to make Kony “famous” by encouraging supporters to plaster
US cities with posters, in order to make the fight against the Lord’s
Resistance Army an issue of “national interest” to Washington.
That,
the video’s makers claim, will ensure funding for 100 US military
advisors sent to train African armies to find Kony will continue.
“Suggesting that the answer is more military action is just wrong,” said Javie Ssozi, an influential Ugandan blogger.
“Have
they thought of the consequences? Making Kony ‘famous’ could make him
stronger. Arguing for more US troops could make him scared, and make him
abduct more children, or go on the offensive.”
Rosebell
Kagumire, a Ugandan journalist specialising in peace and conflict
reporting, said: “This paints a picture of Uganda six or seven years
ago, that is totally not how it is today. It’s highly irresponsible”.
There
were criticisms that the film quoted only three Ugandans, two of them
politicians, and that it spent more time showing the filmmaker's
five-year-old son being told about Joseph Kony than explaining the root
causes of the conflict.
Invisible
Voices has faced criticism over its finances. Of more than £6 million
it spent in 2001, less than £2.3 million was for activities helping
people on the ground. The rest went on “awareness programmes and
products”, management, media and others.
“It is totally misleading to suggest that the war is still in Uganda,” said Fred Opolot, spokesman for the Ugandan government.
“I
suspect that if that’s the impression they are making, they are doing
it only to garner increasing financial resources for their own agenda.”
Invisible
Children said the video focused on Uganda because its "people and
government...have a vested interest in seeing him stopped".
"The
LRA was active in Uganda for nearly 20 years, displacing 1.7 million
people and abducting at least 30,000 children," it said in statement.
Optional Reading:
- NPR’s “Fact Checking The Kony 2012 Video”
- Guardian offers their point of view here "Kony 2012: what's the real story?"
- Reuters explains their side here "Kony 2012 video goes viral, big names line up in support"
- “Kony 2012 campaign: Oprah and bracelets won't solve problem”
Excerpt from this article:
“Implying
that finally now, by getting the word out about Kony via celebrities,
bracelets and social media, can the LRA be ended plays into this
narrative of white rescuers coming to help poor Africans and totally
ignores the efforts, good and bad, by Ugandans to fight the LRA for 25
years. I belong to a discussion group of hundreds of Ugandan
journalists, and so far only one has been willing to stand up and say
this campaign is a good thing (and mainly because it might help more
people find Uganda on a map). Nearly everyone else finds Kony 2012
self-aggrandising, patronising and oversimplified.
As
someone who, like the Invisible Children founders, loves and cares
deeply about Uganda, perhaps most worrying to me is defining the image
of Uganda in the minds of these millions of video viewers as a place of
perpetual conflict and strife. Thursday, some of my Ugandan friends
pointed out, was International Women's Day and attention to the many
positive things to celebrate about the progress of Ugandan women were
overwhelmed by attention to Kony 2012.
On
a darker note, Uganda also has many serious problems: a president in
power for 26 years, millions in stolen funds and missing medicine, oil
wells soon to begin flowing (with the potential for further corruption)
and one of the world's youngest populations facing high rates of
inflation and rising unemployment. Like many who know more than just one
household name connected to Uganda, I worry that these important and
more complicated issues will be overwhelmed by the half-informed outcry
over the LRA and Uganda will, for millions, still be connected to one of
the most terrible times in its history. And, of course, to the nice
Americans who came to help.
We
should stop Kony, and Invisible Children as an organisation and Kony
2012 as a campaign are intended to further this goal. But not all
well-meaning efforts are flawless and, rather than being depicted as
cynical nay-saying, criticism should be embraced and addressed rather
than rejected.
If
there were a referendum on whether or not Joseph Kony should be hunted
with all available resources until he is arrested or killed, it would
certainly pass. But translating millions of video views to change on the
ground in eastern and central Africa is much harder than the social media outpouring of concern (and congratulation about that concern) would lead you to believe.
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