The Kony 2012 Buzz

In less than 6 days the Stop Kony 2012 campaign has hit the global internet like a mad tornado kicking up dust all over the place and creating a storm of emotions.  It’s all over Facebook, Vimeo, Twitter, EVERYONE’s blogging about it, celebrities are talking about it, politicians are talking about it, it’s all over the news, on the telly, on the web, some support and advocate for what the Invisible Children (IC) organisation are doing, some will jump on any emotional hype train that comes along, some are criticizing the aims and motivations of IC. There’s been so many blogs and articles and news stories written about the Kony campaign both for and against.  You can read some of them here, here, here, here and here.  I think the main conclusion is ‘it’s complicated…’   If you haven’t seen the documentary then please watch it!

Most of the contention seems to be around 1. money and how IC are spending their donations and 2. Kony is not actually in Uganda any more and that wasn’t made clear enough in the film.

Well anyway here’s my two cents worth of an opinion to be added to the many other opinions out there on the world-wide-web:

Kony has left a wake of destruction, physical, emotional and psychological in Northern Uganda.  And just because he hasn’t been in Uganda for the last 6 years and his army is smaller now doesn’t mean this is still not an important issue.  Yes lets help rebuild the broken people in Northern Uganda, but what about the people Kony is now terrorising in the Congo and Southern Sudan?  He still needs to be caught and bought to justice!  Even though Uganda is relatively safe now, there have been over 2200 abductions in the last 2 years in her neighbouring countries.  There’s been over 80 LRA incidents in the last week in these African countries and you can see them on the LRA crisis tracker that IC have set up.  An amazing radio system that gives these remote villages communications to warn each other of LRA activity in their areas, and this website allows the rest of the world to see when these things are reported in real time.

I think what IC are doing is incredible, despite the criticism that they’re just making media and not actually helping the people affected, (which isn’t true – 1 of their 3 mandates is to provide on the ground relief, rehab and development assistance).  IC have provided a statement concerning all the criticism they’ve received.  Make your opinion based on having all the facts and read their side of the story here.

Unlike other NGO’s IC have stated their mandates as being more than just aid relief and development.  They clearly and transparently state the 3 ways they aim to fulfill the mandate of their organisation.

Invisible Children’s mission is to stop LRA violence and support the war-affected communities in East and Central Africa. These are the three ways we achieve this mission; each is essential:

1. 1) Make the world aware of the LRA. This includes making documentary films and touring them around the world so that they are seen for free by millions of people.
2. 2) Channel energy from viewers of IC films into large-scale advocacy campaigns to stop the LRA and protect civilians.
3. 3) Operate programs on the ground in LRA-affected areas that provide protection, rehabilitation and development assistance.

As you will see, we spend roughly one third of our money on each of these three goals. This three-prong approach is what makes Invisible Children unique. Some organizations focus exclusively on documenting human rights abuses, some focus exclusively on international advocacy or awareness, and some focus exclusively on on-the-ground development. We do all three. At the same time. This comprehensive model is intentional and has proven to be very effective.

I disagree with the criticism that says the Invisible Children organization as a charity are not spending the donations they receive in the way that a charity should.  That most charitable aid organizations and NGO’s spend over 90% on programming and aid relief, but of the $8mil Invisible Children received this year they only spent 31% on programming because the films they make should count as fundraising not programming.  What Invisible Children have set out to do is provide awareness to the world on a very important issue.  In order to break through the complacency and apathy of the people of the world, they needed to create momentum, a certain hype and make it easy for people to get involved.  They’ve developed a website and some great media, its easy to show your support by way of pledging and sending messages to governments and policy makers, they’re providing posters and stickers and orchestrating a worldwide plastering of posters simultaneously, which will inevitably create publicity creating further awareness!  And its only cost them $8 million this year.  Only $8mil a year to get the US government to finally take action!  Thats less than half of what a party would spend on a presidential campaign.  And the people made it happen!

People give to those causes, they rally together and give to charities and aid organizations to help those affected by famine and natural disasters and African children vulnerable to 3rd world diseases and lacking clean drinking water because it pulls at their heart-strings and they’re not sure how else they can help.  When people believe in a cause, especially when it affects their core being in an issue of humanity; if we see human suffering, especially the innocent and helpless, the little children of the world there’s no way that doesn’t break our heart and the thing inside of us that thinks what if that happened here, what if we were living in a country where no-one advocated for us.

Kony 2012 provides all that and more, as a campaign it provides normal people like you and I something specific and tangible we can do and a fixed time period to do it in.  Bring awareness to the world, share it on your social networks, simply click a few buttons to send messages to the culture and policy makers, take part in the worldwide ‘posterbombing’ taking place on April 20, donate money to help the Ugandan military prepare, train, find and arrest Joseph Kony.

I don’t think that giving financially should be written off as simply ‘white people trying to assuage their guilt’.  It’s not as simple as that.  Sometimes giving our money is actually the one thing we can do.  When you’re on the other side of the world and you don’t have any political or social power, what can you really do to help ‘save the world’?  I can only do what I can, help spread the word, cover the night, talk to those who don’t yet know about the situation, pray that the right people with the right power will become aware of this situation and that their conscious would be moved to do something about it, and give my money to those who are in a position to actually do something.

In my last few blog posts I’ve been looking into the crowdfunding model as a method of funding for filmmakers and whether it’s sustainable in the long term.  My early conclusions are if you can find your audience and if enough people believe in you and in the issue then it has the potential to be a huge success.

Even though IC is not being advertised as an organization that is crowdfunded, it pretty much is that, as is any charitable organisation.  IC clearly state that they’re a media based organisation and that filmmaking and other media is a huge part of their aim in creating awareness, so if people give them their money then really what do they expect its going towards.  I say ‘go for it’ make more films.  They certainly have achieved what they set out to do and that’s create awareness.  The whole world is talking about it in less than a week!  It’s all over the internet, everyone’s talking about, whether for or against at least there’s more awareness than there was last week.  Invisible Children are already running a number of on the ground programs for redevelopment and hopefully all the awareness the Kony 2012 campaign has created will get more people thinking about the practical ways they can help.