Kony 2012: Is it a sham?

             A man by the name of Joseph Kony, the leader of a group known as the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), has conducted thousands of crimes against humanity. Still, for over 10 years, his brutal actions went largely unnoticed by the American media. That is, until a grassroots organization called Invisible Children brought the tyrant the infamy he deserved.  How? Through one, single YouTube video. That, my friends, represents a new age of social activism.

          
            Watch & share. That’s all that the young group of motivated, passionate teenagers asked for. And it worked. “You can lead or you can follow, but eventually everyone will have to MOVE,” says the team. Thousands of shares, e-mails, photos, and #stopkony tweets barraged the Internet. Within a month, the 30-minute informative video titled Kony 2012 became arguably the most viral video EVER. I encourage you to see the video for yourself, and comment below if you feel it impacts you.

            Yet, with great power comes great responsibility. After persuading thousands of willing people to donate or contribute to the cause of Invisible Children in Central Africa, Jason Russell, creative director of the Kony 2012 video, went on a psychotic meltdown. Disappearing from his home, he was later discovered running naked in public. He confessed to Oprah that the extreme media pressure had “broken” him. And just as quickly as Invisible Children’s reputation was built, it was degraded by thousands of enraged citizens posting negative remarks about Russell and the humanitarian organization being a sham. Now the team of young adults is forced to focus their efforts on explaining Russell’s actions and appeasing the public. But in all honesty, do you really think that one foolish act should discredit something as genuine and powerful as Invisible Children? The curse of social media is that it’s used as a vehicle to attract attention. And it’s easier to rally people around criticism, creating mass potential for harm.

            Still, the crew chose not to give up. Now Invisible Children claims to be days away from catching the warlord. With radio towers and surveillance infrastructure set up throughout Central Africa, they’ve guided countless villagers to safety and have identified the LRA’s current position. They have already received support from the EU, AU, and UN. In fact, Obama signed the LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act a few years ago. On November 17^th Invisible Children is inviting people across the world to assemble in Washington, D.C. to press the White House and federal officials to capture Kony. It might be a little too optimistic to claim that after years of struggle, THIS is the year that Kony and the LRA will be brought down. Nevertheless, their initial goal of raising awareness for the crisis has been far surpassed, and they owe a big thank you to our friends YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.