I am openly against the whole “Kony 2012” movement that has clogged up my Facebook news feed like some sort of obese person’s arteries after eating at McDonald’s. This is not because I am a supporter of any of Kony’s values. I just hate sensationalist journalism that only gives part of the story.
The short video, which is 30 minutes long, tells the story of the leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army, operating in Uganda, the Congo and Sudan. The whole child soldier and kidnapping thing is bad and forcing children to do atrocious wartime acts is something that should be a major concern to all humans because it is a universal issue and one that should be taken lightly.
That being said, who the hell is this organization Invisible Children? Anyone with any sort of back ground in figuring out how money works can look at the organizations financial statements and see that the guys in charge take over $2 million dollars off the top for “traveling and filmmaking expenses” and admit to only 31 percent going to actually aiding the movement. Okay, that is a little fishy, but then the group furthers their cause of peace by demanding military involvement with bringing Kony to justice. After a quick two second search on Wikipedia, I discovered that two years ago, Obama sent 100 combat-equipped troops to help remove Kony. I am terrible at math but in almost every case 100 is greater than one. As if that was not enough, the founders of the movement want the Ugandan Army (Kony is not even in Uganda anymore) to step in and hunt down this monster.
I have never been a fan of sensationalist journalism, or gross exaggeration of news events. So when I found out that Jason Russell, the guy who directed and created the video, was arrested for public intoxication, indecent exposure, and public masturbation, I just had to laugh. After the incident, his wife revealed that he was dehydrated and stressed. Okay, really? I am a college student who needs to fit in a social life as well as attempt to get good grades in my stupid core classes. Between Fridays and Sunday night, I am usually running off of a thimble of water and about 8 hours total of sleep. Never in my life of partying here at Fairfield have I ever experienced anyone, nor myself, being even a tiny bit close to his level, so I am unsure if I should be impressed.
So the question is: should this display of complete drunken debauchery be held against the entire “Kony 2012” movement? The answer is unmistakably yes. Anyone who is clearly in the state of mind to start tugging on their heat-seeking-love-missile in the middle of San Diego should not be the voice of moral authority on any sort of issue. Being the representative of a major organization trying to get something done, he should have at least attempted to hold himself to some higher standard. Maybe just get arrested for public intoxication and disregard the whole naked, masturbation thing -just a thought. I think he may have just placed himself just behind Rick Santorum in my eyes as crazy people who should be disregarded at all costs. But this is a crazy world we live in, so maybe in order to open our eyes to the real issues, we need to get a little weird and get a little freaky. Who knows what will happen?
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