Joseph Kony 2012 Campain. Your thoughts?

[Sir Comradical]

I came home today and I started seeing it all over facebook, even my apolitical brother mentioned it to me and was going on about this 'Invisible Children' documentary.

As bad as Kony is, doesn't it seem convenient that an out of nowhere facebook campaign against Kony just so happens to align itself perfectly with US imperialism's agenda in Uganda and Central & East Africa? There's no doubt that Kony is a reactionary thug however the Ugandan state his militia is fighting against is a staunch ally of US imperialism. But yeah, Kony's the bogey man, right? My gut tells me it's an imperialist funded campaign to garner support for America's role as the policeman of the world who bring bad guys to justice.

[Robocommie]

Bin Laden's dead, I guess we need a new one.

[Tim Cornelis]

Invisible Children, Inc. is a nonpartisan, non-profit organization seeking to draw attention to the atrocities committed by Joseph Kony and the rebel force known as the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Central Africa. Invisible Children uses film to raise awareness of the abductions and the forcing of children to become soldiers. Primarily youth-driven, Invisible Children creates effective and adaptive programs on the ground in Central Africa that focus on rehabilitation, education, and micro-economic development

just sayin'

[Sasha]

Me knowing a ex lra child soldier makes Koney and his leadership one of the few people I would gladly see getting a drone missile up his arse. There is such a thing as the lesser evil even when it comes to imperialism.

[ed miliband]

the whole thing seems incredibly cult-like tho - i've been invited to like 20 different KONY 2012 nights (which involves purchasing a pack of posters and flying them around town) and my feed is full of people posting the video - before i went to bed last night i hadn't heard of kony

also the documentary is totally in 'white man's burden' territory

[bricolage]

the whole thing seems incredibly cult-like tho - i've been invited to like 20 different KONY 2012 nights (which involves purchasing a pack of posters and flying them around town) and my feed is full of people posting the video - before i went to bed last night i hadn't heard of kony

also the documentary is totally in 'white man's burden' territory

what video is this?

[Hiero]

Me knowing a ex lra child soldier makes Koney and his leadership one of the few people I would gladly see getting a drone missile up his arse. There is such a thing as the lesser evil even when it comes to imperialism.

It is about the hypocrisy of imperialism. A US state funded group is probably pushing this, like the CIA. No one mention lesser evil to imperialism. It is about the ability for the US to influence public opinion through subvert tactics to align that public opinion with foriegn policy.

So here we are again where people public opinion focuses on individual figures and not the actual poverty and warfare that Africa faces on a daily basis.

[Hiero]

what video is this?

http://vimeo.com/37119711

[ed miliband]

http://chrisblattman.com/2009/03/04/visible-children/

[Sasha]

It is about the hypocrisy of imperialism. A US state funded group is probably pushing this, like the CIA. No one mention lesser evil to imperialism. It is about the ability for the US to influence public opinion through subvert tactics to align that public opinion with foriegn policy.

So here we are again where people public opinion focuses on individual figures and not the actual poverty and warfare that Africa faces on a daily basis.

The LRA was funded for decades by fundamentalist US evangelists and US state, if they finally decided to put down their own maddog I'm not going to shed a tear..

[l'Enfermé]

You know the LRA is very much into cannibalism and abducting children to train them as child soldiers? Any involvement by Western Imperialism here is actually going to improve the situation, believe it or not, because it can't even become worse.

[milkmiku]

"Look, this is how I see it.
It's an effort to drum up support for US/NATO "humanitarian intervention" into African countries such as Uganda.
The US has vested strategic interests in this region (countering Chinese expansion and securing oil and resources).

I dislike the video because of it's blatant attempt at manipulating emotions, especially through the use of children.

I hope that there will be an effort to properly document and present the opposing side to this whole thing, so that we can actually look at this issue as informed people, not through this fad activism angle that we're about to see explode."

[black magick hustla]

Me knowing a ex lra child soldier makes Koney and his leadership one of the few people I would gladly see getting a drone missile up his arse. There is such a thing as the lesser evil even when it comes to imperialism.

yea cuz' thats how it always happens. :rolleyes:


doesn't really matter who you support or not cuz' this is the internet and giving support to one side over the other has as much significance as support for aliens to invade the world and make it communist. however, i think its dumb and ignorant and strikes of white man's burden to root for uncle sam to shit all over the place.

[milkmiku]

It could go both ways, depending on who take up the reins of power in the region when he goes down. History as shown us that when ever a dictator falls in a region such as this, another simply takes his place.

[black magick hustla]

You know the LRA is very much into cannibalism and abducting children to train them as child soldiers? Any involvement by Western Imperialism here is actually going to improve the situation, believe it or not, because it can't even become worse.

child soldiers, cannibalism, arbitrary massacres, mass rapes etc. are the bread and butter of much of subsaharan africa. you can't destroy capitalist barbarism by capitalist armies brah, especially not by wiping out a specific faction

[ed miliband]

The LRA was funded for decades by fundamentalist US evangelists and US state, if they finally decided to put down their own maddog I'm not going to shed a tear..

so you reckon it would be in and out - get kony and it's over? that's what the campaign seems to suggest/support

a) it wouldn't be
b) i'm sure there are many more kony's
c) y'know if someone uses child soldiers, it's probably very likely that they will be protected by child soldiers as well

etc etc etc

[ed miliband]

http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/

[Hiero]

The LRA was funded for decades by fundamentalist US evangelists and US state, if they finally decided to put down their own maddog I'm not going to shed a tear..

Think of it this way. I don't really shed a tear when crime underworld figures kill each other. But I do shed a tear when the poor civilian is hit by the stray bullet, or the wrong house is target. I can oppose the whole system of the underworld style of crime rather then cheering on when criminals kill each other.

[SHORAS]

He's a warlord but prefers to be known as The Lord of War apparently.

[Hiero]

He's a warlord but prefers to be known as The Lord of War apparently.

Nicholas Cage tell you that?

[ed miliband]

all the dumb people on my facebook are posting the shit out of this but so is one of my liberal "socialist" friends

lord

[SHORAS]

Hollywood doesn't lie my friend.

[bricolage]

this is taken from libcom, have to say the whole thing does look proper suspect.

The problems with the 'Kony 2012' campaign: Ok so let's get this out of the way first, the basic idea of the campaign is great, to raise awareness of a war criminal that uses children as soldiers and sex slaves. Unfortunately the whole campaign seems to be missing the bigger political picture, I think this is nicely demonstrated in the statement of its second goal:
'That the U.S. military advisers support the Ugandan Army until Kony has been captured and the LRA has been completely disarmed. They need to follow through all the way and finish what they have started.'

This statement not only suggests that the campaign is in favour of U.S. intervention but is completely uncritical of the Ugandan Government and its army, both of whom are by no means 'the good guys' in this. I can't be bothered going into too much detail but here are a few key points:

1) The Ugandan Government is a dictatorship with Yoweri Museveni as the president since 1986. Among many of its human rights violations the regime tortures prisons, oppresses other political parties and the press and also wishes to introduce a bill that would have 'convicted homosexuals' put to death.

2) In the civil war in which Yoweri Museveni gained power child soldiers were used by his army (National Resistance Army) which is now the army of Uganda but under a different name. (http://www.teachkidspeace.org/doc315.php)

3) The Ugandan army, or rather its high ranking officers have being using 'ghost soldiers' (soldiers who are no longer on the pay-roll) to siphon off funds, making the war even more profitable for them than usual, giving them a vested interest in its continuation. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/3514473.stm)

4) (kinda the same point again) War is profitable, especially for large arms economies such as the U.S. and the UK. 'U.S. Military adviser support' may as well say 'we want to US and its arms manufactures /dealers to sell the Ugandan Government shit tons more weapons'.

I'm sure there's many more points that could be made, and this is still a really basic explanation that barely goes into any detail, but even a single one of these points is enough to be critical of the campaign and its support of the Ugandan army. If the campaign really wants to be truly supportive of human rights it needs to recognise that Kony is not the only war criminal, all warmongering is a crime against humanity.

[gorillafuck]

You know the LRA is very much into cannibalism and abducting children to train them as child soldiers? Any involvement by Western Imperialism here is actually going to improve the situation, believe it or not, because it can't even become worse.even if we are going to argue from a lesser evil perspective, that is really untrue.

what you are suggesting is that the United States invade 4 countries at once to fight a war against a guerilla army in the middle of Africa which has a significant amount of children as soldiers. while simultaneously funding armies which are notorious for extreme, mindless violence to engage in a counter-insurgency.

I honestly can't think of anything that would be a more effective way to turn the whole African continent into a civil war than what you are suggesting.

[bricolage]

you know what, I think everyone I know is just slow on the uptake, cos my facebook's going nuts about it now. I need some tech-savvy friends.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

They lost me when they said they "support the Ugandan Army." The shit army that is part of the country which is currently trying to kill of all queers? Yeah... well, support can't really be given to anyone (other than the working class) in this situation.

[Bronco]

Yeah I pointed out the support of the Ugandan army to a couple of my Facebook friends who posted it, they're no strangers to carrying out atrocities themselves, to quote this (http://www.afrol.com/articles/11238) article:


To anyone who is unfamiliar with the war in the northern Uganda which started way back in 1986 when Museveni had just come to power, Museveni's quest to prosecute Kony might sound like the most brilliant idea for a very responsible person. However, to those who have lived through the years and experienced atrocities perpetrated by both the rebels and the Ugandan army, the Uganda People's Defense Forces (UPDF), Museveni is just as criminal as the Kony he trying to prosecute.

Since 1986, Museveni's army has been known to have committed some of the worst atrocities on the ethnic Acholi people who occupy the regions of Gulu, Kitgum and Pader. The UPDF, also formerly known as the National Resistance Army (NRA) became infamous for burning civilians alive in huts, killings, and the rapes of both women and men in what the Acholi called tek gungu. Tek Gungu referred to rape of men and women by Museveni's soldiers who would force a man or woman to kneel down (gungu) before the rape is committed against the male or female victim. These rape incidents have been documented by Human Rights Watch and yet remains ignored by most so-called mainstream media. Museveni, despite his army's atrocities remains a Western "darling."

The period 1987-1988 was the worse in the history of the Acholi and it was also at that time that Museveni's army intensified atrocities on the civilians. This was a period that Museveni declared a state of emergency. He entrusted his commanders like his brother Salim Saleh and Major General David Tinyefunza to help him do the job. Their atrocities included the terrible forcing of Acholi civilians in a pit dug into the earth in a place called Bur Coro. The top of the pit was then covered with soil and grass which was then set ablaze. The civilians slowly suffocated from the smoke. Such sadistic killers have never been punished.

Later, the army exported such atrocities into Teso in Eastern Uganda. In an incident which was also documented by international human rights agencies, people were forced into a train wagon in a place called Amakura and were suffocated. This incident is known in Uganda as the Amakura massacre. To make it more effective and unknown to the international community, Museveni banned media reporting on war and no journalists were allowed to enter the war zone.

By 1990, Museveni had accomplished most of what he wanted, leaving tens of thousands of Acholi dead and thousands languishing in Luzira prison for alleged treason. All these are well documented and still remain fresh in the minds of the Acholi who had trusted Museveni and thought he would treat them as citizens of Uganda rather than his adversaries.

As if his terror was not enough, in 1996 Museveni declared a presidential order that stipulated that all local Acholi living in their homes in the villages be forcefully moved into concentration camps to be surrounded by government troops ostensibly to guard them against LRA rebels' atrocities. Where else in the world but in Africa would the international community today stand for such gross violation of human rights.

Museveni's troops immediately started beating up locals to run to the camps. They burnt down crops and houses of the locals so that they would not go back to their homes. The result was the creation of communal homelessness for over 500,000 people who up to now, have no permanent home, and live in some of the worse human conditions the world. Although Museveni prefers to call the camps "Protected Camps," the locals who live there know it as a concentration camp in which terror reigns and individual freedoms don't exist.

Government soldiers claiming to be guarding these camps are well known for their atrocities on the hapless civilians. They rape the women and have contributed to the increase in the rate of HIV/AIDs - now the highest in that region.

These are just few recorded incidents and yet the majority remained unreported. Similarly, the government is indiscriminately using its Helicopter gunship and night-guided vision technology to try to spot and kill the LRA rebels. However, the majority of the unfortunate victims are innocent civilians.

And also (http://ugandansabroad.org/2010/10/02/u-n-goes-public-on-updf-atrocities-with-damning-report/)


This weekend has been a diplomatic nightmare so far for Uganda after the U.N. released a report on Friday accusing Uganda and Rwanda of mass rape, crimes against humanity, and the targeted killing of civilians during the second Congolese war.

The report suggests that some of the attacks by Ugandan and Rwanda armed forces could be potentially characterized as genocide in international law. It draws upon two years of investigations of the UPDF, RPF, and local Congolese militias that allied with the two militaries.

The uncritical support for this campaign irritates me, and it's hard to to be sceptical of it without being painted as some apologist for Kony and his crimes. It's also not as if the likes of Kony are a rarity either, there are lots of warlords out there in Africa, and still thousands of children being used as soldiers in countries like Somalia, Sudan, Chad etc. people would be better off examining the problems in these countries that allow such things to thrive than placing full trust in an organisation such as the Ugandan military

[Sam_b]

All I'm going to say on this is fuck Invisible Children and fuck their support for a Ugandan army that uses rape as a weapon.

[Bronco]

Seen a bit of a mini backlash to this with a few people posting this link on Facebook

http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/


I do not doubt for a second that those involved in KONY 2012 have great intentions, nor do I doubt for a second that Joseph Kony is a very evil man. But despite this, I’m strongly opposed to the KONY 2012 campaign.

KONY 2012 is the product of a group called Invisible Children, a controversial activist group and not-for-profit. They’ve released 11 films, most with an accompanying bracelet colour (KONY 2012 is fittingly red), all of which focus on Joseph Kony. When we buy merch from them, when we link to their video, when we put up posters linking to their website, we support the organization. I don’t think that’s a good thing, and I’m not alone.

Invisible Children has been condemned time and time again. As a registered not-for-profit, its finances are public. Last year, the organization spent $8,676,614. Only 32% went to direct services (page 6), with much of the rest going to staff salaries, travel and transport, and film production. This is far from ideal, and Charity Navigator rates their accountability 2/4 stars because they haven’t had their finances externally audited. But it goes way deeper than that.

The group is in favour of direct military intervention, and their money supports the Ugandan government’s army and various other military forces. Here’s a photo of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan People’s Liberation Army are riddled with accusations of rape and looting, but Invisible Children defends them, arguing that the Ugandan army is “better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries”, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasn’t been since 2006 by their own admission. These books each refer to the rape and sexual assault that are perennial issues with the UPDF, the military group Invisible Children is defending.

Still, the bulk of Invisible Children’s spending isn’t on supporting African militias, but on awareness and filmmaking. Which can be great, except that Foreign Affairs has claimed that Invisible Children (among others) “manipulates 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.” He’s certainly evil, but exaggeration and manipulation to capture the public eye is unproductive, unprofessional and dishonest.

As Chris Blattman, a political scientist at Yale, writes on the topic of IC’s programming, “There’s also something inherently misleading, naive, maybe even dangerous, about the idea of rescuing children or saving of Africa. […] It hints uncomfortably of the White Man’s Burden. Worse, sometimes it does more than hint. The savior attitude is pervasive in advocacy, and it inevitably shapes programming. Usually misconceived programming.”

Still, Kony’s a bad guy, and he’s been around a while. Which is why the US has been involved in stopping him for years. U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) has sent multiple missions to capture or kill Kony over the years. And they’ve failed time and time again, each provoking a ferocious response and increased retaliative slaughter. The issue with taking out a man who uses a child army is that his bodyguards are children. Any effort to capture or kill him will almost certainly result in many children’s deaths, an impact that needs to be minimized as much as possible. Each attempt brings more retaliation. And yet Invisible Children supports military intervention. Kony has been involved in peace talks in the past, which have fallen through. But Invisible Children is now focusing on military intervention.

Military intervention may or may not be the right idea, but people supporting KONY 2012 probably don’t realize they’re supporting the Ugandan military who are themselves raping and looting away. If people know this and still support Invisible Children because they feel it’s the best solution based on their knowledge and research, I have no issue with that. But I don’t think most people are in that position, and that’s a problem.

Is awareness good? Yes. But these problems are highly complex, not one-dimensional and, frankly, aren’t of the nature that can be solved by postering, film-making and changing your Facebook profile picture, as hard as that is to swallow. Giving your money and public support to Invisible Children so they can spend it on supporting ill-advised violent intervention and movie #12 isn’t helping. Do I have a better answer? No, I don’t, but that doesn’t mean that you should support KONY 2012 just because it’s something. Something isn’t always better than nothing. Sometimes it’s worse.

If you want to write to your Member of Parliament or your Senator or the President or the Prime Minister, by all means, go ahead. If you want to post about Joseph Kony’s crimes on Facebook, go ahead. But let’s keep it about Joseph Kony, not KONY 2012.

[brigadista]

http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/03/07/stop-kony-yes-but-dont-stop-asking-questions/

[Comrade Samuel]

Is there really a good reason to put Castro on the same poster with kony and hitler? I guess thats Irelivent. Maybe it's just a bunch of people asking to further U.S imperialism but I'm happy any time someone brings down the hammer on a genocidal madman. "will of the people" or not more power to them.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

@Bronco: What sort of backlash? What did your friends say?

[Bronco]

@Bronco: What sort of backlash? What did your friends say?

Oh not much really, just seen a few people posting that Visible Children link underneath some of the Koby 2012 shares and pointing out some valid criticisms, still overwhelmed by the people posting the video and just going on about what a great cause it is and everything though :rolleyes:

[Lobotomy]

I was suspicious the moment I saw 5 posts about "Kony 2012" on my news feed from people who have never seemed to give a shit about African issues ever.

[Welshy]

Is there really a good reason to put Castro on the same poster with kony and hitler? I guess thats Irelivent. Maybe it's just a bunch of people asking to further U.S imperialism but I'm happy any time someone brings down the hammer on a genocidal madman. "will of the people" or not more power to them.

I don't think that is Castro on the poster. I think it's suppose to be Osama Bin Laden.

[Ocean Seal]

The LRA was funded for decades by fundamentalist US evangelists and US state, if they finally decided to put down their own maddog I'm not going to shed a tear..
I'll shed a tear for all the innocent people that they kill in the process of putting down their own mad dog.

[Misanthrope]

The Invisible Children organization financially supports the Ugandan army and Sudan People’s Liberation Army who are known for raping and looting. The United States has sent multiple missions to stop Kony but have failed miserably every time and invoked an even more violent response. Even more, Kony hasn't been active in Uganda since fucking 2006. Invisible Children is a pro-imperialist organization with a political and profit based interest. All of the posting of their rhetoric are doing nothing but supporting mindless militarism and a war in Uganda which would bring much more destruction (aka more children's lives lost).

[Sasha]

though this post on the daily what of all place was quite true:


On Kony 2012 (http://thedailywh.at/2012/03/07/on-kony-2012-2/)


Mar. 7, 2012
http://chzdailywhat.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/8e0672ba-1f10-46d2-903c-2ac61735938e.jpg
On Kony 2012: I honestly wanted to stay as far away as possible from KONY 2012 (http://s3.amazonaws.com/kony2012/kony-4.html), the latest fauxtivist fad sweeping the web (remember “change your Facebook profile pic to stop child abuse”?), but you clearly won’t stop sending me that damn video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc) until I say something about it, so here goes:
Stop sending me that video.
The organization behind Kony 2012 — Invisible Children Inc. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invisible_Children_Inc) — is an extremely shady nonprofit that has been called ”misleading,” “naive,” and “dangerous” by a Yale political science professor (http://chrisblattman.com/2009/03/04/visible-children/), and has been accused by Foreign Affairs of “manipulat[ing] facts for strategic purposes (http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136673/mareike-schomerus-tim-allen-and-koen-vlassenroot/obama-takes-on-the-lra?page=show).” They have also been criticized by the Better Business Bureau (http://www.bbb.org/charity-reviews/national/children-and-youth/invisible-children-in-san-diego-ca-4469) for refusing to provide information necessary to determine if IC meets the Bureau’s standards.
Additionally, IC has a low two-star rating in accountability (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=12429) from Charity Navigator because they won’t let their financials be independently audited. That’s not a good thing. In fact, it’s a very bad thing, and should make you immediately pause and reflect on where the money you’re sending them is going.
By IC’s own admission, only 31% of all the funds they receive go toward actually helping anyone (http://c2052482.r82.cf0.rackcdn.com/images/737/original/FY11-Audited%20Financial%20Statements.pdf?1320205055) [pdf]. The rest go to line the pockets of the three people in charge of the organization, to pay for their travel expenses (over $1 million in the last year alone) and to fund their filmmaking business (also over a million) — which is quite an effective way to make more money, as clearly illustrated by the fact that so many can’t seem to stop forwarding their well-engineered emotional blackmail to everyone they’ve ever known.
And as far as what they do with that money (http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/):
The group is in favour of direct military intervention, and their money supports the Ugandan government’s army and various other military forces. Here’s a photo (http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_-PnDZmngAhM/Sa_KBGNySiI/AAAAAAAAAJY/uBOfiAysghs/s1600-h/IMG_2941.JPG) of the founders of Invisible Children posing with weapons and personnel of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Both the Ugandan army and Sudan People’s Liberation Army are riddled with accusations of rape and looting (http://www.observer.ug/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=17456%3Aupdf-in-kony-hunt-accused-of-rape-looting&catid=78%3Atopstories&Itemid=116), but Invisible Children defends them, arguing (http://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/qk0pd/kony_2012_help_raise_awareness_and_stop_joseph/c3ycvhb) that the Ugandan army is “better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries”, although Kony is no longer active in Uganda and hasn’t been since 2006 (http://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/qk0pd/kony_2012_help_raise_awareness_and_stop_joseph/c3ycvhb) by their own admission. These (http://books.google.ca/books?id=czMrNdvNuWgC&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=UPDF+rape&source=bl&ots=ci63KTOEn7&sig=YrY7g_wWwmmIEb0MmCkk398RhBo&hl=en&sa=X&ei=yW1XT-m-MITW0QGywKG6Dw&ved=0CC8Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=UPDF%20rape&f=false) books (http://books.google.ca/books?id=tVOCIHLqn6wC&pg=PA45&lpg=PA45&dq=UPDF+rape&source=bl&ots=QX7Q996i0Z&sig=BuQdCci0vmhaXicxSWqfa88rYJk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=yW1XT-m-MITW0QGywKG6Dw&ved=0CDIQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=UPDF%20rape&f=false) each refer to the rape and sexual assault that are perennial issues with the UPDF, the military group Invisible Children is defending.
Let’s not get our lines crossed: The Lord’s Resistance Army (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%27s_Resistance_Army) is bad news. And Joseph Kony is a very bad man, and needs to be stopped. But propping up Uganda’s decades-old dictatorship and its military arm, which has been accused by the UN of committing unspeakable atrocities (http://www.voanews.com/english/news/africa/UN-Congo-Report-Released-Amid-Protest-from-Uganda-Rwanda-104165814.html) and itself facilitated the recruitment of child soldiers (http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/country,,CSCOAL,,COD,,498806012d,0.html), is not the way to go about it.
The United States is already plenty involved in helping rout Kony and his band of psycho sycophants (http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136673/mareike-schomerus-tim-allen-and-koen-vlassenroot/obama-takes-on-the-lra?page=show). Kony is on the run, having been pushed out of Uganda, and it’s likely he will soon be caught, if he isn’t already dead (http://ilto.wordpress.com/2006/11/02/the-visible-problem-with-invisible-children/). But killing Kony won’t fix anything, just as killing Osama bin Laden didn’t end terrorism. The LRA might collapse, but, as Foreign Affairs points out, it is “a relatively small player in all of this — as much a symptom as a cause of the endemic violence.”
Myopically placing the blame for all of central Africa’s woes on Kony — even as a starting point (http://www.wrongingrights.com/2009/03/worst-idea-ever.html/) — will only imperil many more people (http://chrisblattman.com/2011/11/21/what-you-should-be-reading-if-you-want-to-understand-the-us-and-the-lords-resistance-army/) than are already in danger.
Sending money to a nonprofit that wants to muck things up by dousing the flames with fuel is not helping. Want to help? Really want to help? Send your money to nonprofits that are putting more than 31% toward rebuilding the region’s medical and educational infrastructure, so that former child soldiers have something worth coming home to.
Here (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=4943) are (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=3220) just (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=8392) a few (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=8875) of those charities. They all have a sparkling four-star rating from Charity Navigator, and, more importantly, no interest in airdropping American troops armed to the teeth into the middle of a multi-nation tribal war to help one madman catch another.
The bottom line is, research your causes thoroughly. Don’t just forward a random video to a stranger because a mass murderer makes a five-year-old “sad.” Learn a little bit about the complexities of the region’s ongoing strife before advocating for direct military intervention.
There is no black and white in the world. And going about solving important problems like there is just serves to make all those equally troubling shades of gray invisible.
[kony2012 (http://s3.amazonaws.com/kony2012/kony-4.html).]
<li class="comment">172 Comments and 0 Reactions (http://thedailywh.at/2012/03/07/on-kony-2012-2/#disqus_thread)

[R_P_A_S]

This campaign is INSANE!! Insane as of the attention it has received and the tactics/methods. WOW! When you get apathetic people to "do their part" you are on to something. How the fuck can we make a similar campaign against capitalism now? :rolleyes:

[Misanthrope]

You know the LRA is very much into cannibalism and abducting children to train them as child soldiers? Any involvement by Western Imperialism here is actually going to improve the situation, believe it or not, because it can't even become worse.

So any already poverty stricken war zone is going to helped by bringing in imperialist armies?

"White man's burden" anyone...

[Robocommie]

Invisible Children is a pretty good demonstration of why a lot of "non-profit" NGOs are completely full of shit and not a viable means of addressing real life problems. If the organization isn't 100% volunteer, then that means somebody is making a living off of it, and that means it's just another industry, with the amount of money they actually spend to help people just making up the overhead.

[NewLeft]

Actually, using this tactic against capitalism might not be such a bad idea. :lol:

[Os Cangaceiros]

Every time I see this thread, I think it's a campaign to elect Joseph Kony president in 2012...

[NewLeft]

Every time I see this thread, I think it's a campaign to elect Joseph Kony president in 2012...
I don't understand why it's Kony 2012? :confused:

[Questionable]

Found a humorous comic on reddit that pretty much sums up my views. Beware, though; it's lengthy.

http://i.imgur.com/K3mgn.jpg

[Misanthrope]

I don't understand why it's Kony 2012? :confused:

It's catchy and marketable. It also creates the first impression that this is a relatively new occurrence.

[milkmiku]

Found a humorous comic on reddit that pretty much sums up my views. Beware, though; it's lengthy.



Everyone should definitely read the comic, It sums up the entire situation completely. The worst thing of all is the fact that it is working. Truly these are the end times. Africa here we come again!

[R_P_A_S]

They lost me when they said they "support the Ugandan Army." The shit army that is part of the country which is currently trying to kill of all queers? Yeah... well, support can't really be given to anyone (other than the working class) in this situation.

During what portion of the video was that said???

[bricolage]

During what portion of the video was that said???
The stated aim of the video is...

'That the U.S. military advisers support the Ugandan Army until Kony has been captured and the LRA has been completely disarmed. They need to follow through all the way and finish what they have started.'

[R_P_A_S]

The LRA was funded for decades by fundamentalist US evangelists and US state, if they finally decided to put down their own maddog I'm not going to shed a tear..

Could you please provide some sources?

[the last donut of the night]

i don't even care if IC is a corrupt piece of shit NGO, i'm tired of brown and black people being treated like stupid, naive savages by the first world media

[R_P_A_S]

"Look, this is how I see it.
It's an effort to drum up support for US/NATO "humanitarian intervention" into African countries such as Uganda.
The US has vested strategic interests in this region (countering Chinese expansion and securing oil and resources).

I dislike the video because of it's blatant attempt at manipulating emotions, especially through the use of children.

I hope that there will be an effort to properly document and present the opposing side to this whole thing, so that we can actually look at this issue as informed people, not through this fad activism angle that we're about to see explode."

When you said you hope there's an effort to present "an opposing side" to this do you mean one that highlights facts about Uganda, Imperialism and other political reason that might be behind this possible "humanitarian intervention?"

[hatzel]

It's catchy and marketable. It also creates the first impression that this is a relatively new occurrence.

It could also create a sense of urgency, as in, we have to get in there now, during 2012. It can't wait until 2013, you know, if it's Kony 2012...

[Os Cangaceiros]

The LRA is a pretty interesting group, in that it doesn't really seem to rely on or want the support of the local population in the areas it's in. The support of the local populace is key in any successful insurgency. Rolling through town and killing people/abducting kids doesn't seem like a very sure way to win that support, though. That's really a testament to Kony's evasiveness, that he's able to outwit 'murika and it's African allies, all the while having the locals hate his guts.

[Luc]

I vaguely remeber my friend (who is rather smart not a leftist) showing me somthing about a guy not being in africa I think it is Kony and it was saying he isn't in Uganda anymore or he's dead I will check tomorrow (when I see him again) and update my post as soon as possible.

it could of been something completely unrealted though Kony sounds familiar and definitely there was mention of Invisble Children

:unsure:

[Sasha]

Could you please provide some sources?

i remember there was a advisor to a prominent political hopefull who had strong ties to the LRA, cant find the story now and some other ties with the evangelist movement, but i stand corrected, it seems primary funing always came from karthoum/sudan.

thought this was cute though:
http://www.zimbio.com/2008+Presidential+Candidates/articles/WGCHbfyC2OL/Rush+Limbaugh+Endorses+Lord+Resistance+Army

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

When our group was still in existence we had some people in Uganda and southern Sudan. The LRA and the Ugandan army's periodic campaigns against it were issues they frequently addressed. Their immediate goal and argument was an end to the bloodbath. They exposed farcical "negotiations" and the cynicism of both sides which lead to nothing but more bloodshed and horror of people with no stake in the outcome. Put simply, they wanted to stop the war, torture, killing, etc., as quickly as possible, and fought for exactly that -- which beyond being an immediate need, was also an absolutely necessary precursor to any kind of forward advance. One thing they never, ever, called for, was "assistance" from the blood-soaked hands of U.S. and European imperialism. Having experience European colonialism first hand, they knew exactly what that kind of "assistance" would entail.

You would think that liberal "humanitarian intervention" cover for imperialist invasions and interventions would have been discarded by now, since it's been exposed so many times... But apparently not.

What I wrote in one of the many threads on Libya applies here:


Unfortunately, you don't get to decide how and why imperialism pursues its interests. Capital serves capital. If and when the U.S. or European powers decide to intervene in Libya [or Uganda], it will be because they think it will serve their interests. It will not because they want to help "the people," and it will be not be done in accordance with the wishes of people in Libya [or Uganda] requesting assistance.

What's missing in both sides of this long distance fan fest (what does it mean to "support" or oppose this or that side of a war in Africa from behind your computer screen in North America anyway, and how does it differ from choosing a team in the World Cup?) is the question of class, as is usual for the left.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

BTW, the title of this thread is beyond awkward. Is Kony running for U.S. president in 2012 or what? Perhaps a mod can rename it something like "Your thoughts on current campaign against Joseph Kony & LRA"

[R_P_A_S]

Scroll down to UGANDA.. even their own Military uses Child Soldiers.. WOW!
Kony 2012 is fucking hypocrisy at its finest

http://www.cfr.org/human-rights/child-soldiers-around-world/p9331

[R_P_A_S]

For some reason when I post this... It just makes it small..


Found a humorous comic on reddit that pretty much sums up my views. Beware, though; it's lengthy.

http://i.imgur.com/K3mgn.jpg

[revhiphop]

Honestly, I think he should be killed. But really, Western presence WILL destroy Uganda. It's hard to say "go to war" with him, because all his soldiers are children. In a way, this man is extremely clever, but then again so was Hitler.

[ed miliband]

thing is it wasn't the hipsters on my facebook reposting it - they were the most cynical

it was the most square boring people who were the most enthused - the type i've never seen express an interest in politics at all

[Bilan]

thing is it wasn't the hipsters on my facebook reposting it - they were the most cynical



Please. Never, ever use that fucking irritating word "hipster" again. The elitist arrogance that underpins it doesn't give any credibility to your goddamn argument and I'm sick to death of seeing that fucking shit all the time.
It's not a bizarre subculture that caused this response. Don't be such an ass.

And that goes for the rest of you as well. If you can't do anything but capitalise on who is currently targeted as being a twat in the west, then maybe you ought to reassess yourself. For fucks sake. Hipster has only substituted emo. Use. Your. God. Damn. Fucking. Brain.
Fuck.

Anyway, there are obvious problems with this campaign - primarily it's assumption that taking out a warlord will mean that the circumstances that made it possibly for him, Kony, to emerge will disappear. This assumption is false and dangerous. The poverty and the suffering in Africa is what caused this. It happens all across Africa. Kony is just one amongst many.

Secondly, using the US military, or for that matter any military, whether international or internal (Uganda's) is foolish. The US military, as well as Ugandas, and all others are notorious for their brutality - they're fucking militaries. They might not use children in the army but that won't stop them from shooting or bombing children indiscriminately as they have done in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

To it's credit though, to have made the amount of people aware over night that they have - I believe it's at 7 million views - is unbelievable. Take note. As a propaganda campaign, that's nothing short of incredible.
But instead of sneering and calling people hipsters, liberals, and whatever other bit of dirt people choose to sling, we - that is, anti-imperialist, communists, etc - ought to be correcting their positions and the misguided ideas emerging as part of this.
This is one notoriously bad war lord among hundreds, whose emergence has a direct relationship with the carving up of Africa by Europe and a direct relationship to the raping of Africa, and to the meddling of the Western super powers in Africa; celebrities swinging their dicks won't stop poverty or war lords - only emancipation from the system that keeps them as slaves to tyrants and the rich will.



it was the most square boring people who were the most enthused - the type i've never seen express an interest in politics at all

That is a fucking awesome. People who were not interested in politics became interested because there was an appeal to them they could identify with because the right media was used in the right way?
It's a lesson. It also demonstrates that not everyone is an apathetic prat, even those who parade about as being so are capable of some kind of political consciousness.
Let's not pretend that it's all good, but thats a positive step. It means that changing people opinions and enlightening them to the vast inequalities inherent in global capitalism, and the disastrous consequences of this system, is absolutely possible.

[Questionable]

That is a fucking awesome. People who were not interested in politics became interested because there was an appeal to them they could identify with because the right media was used in the right way?
It's a lesson. It also demonstrates that not everyone is an apathetic prat, even those who parade about as being so are capable of some kind of political consciousness.
Let's not pretend that it's all good, but thats a positive step. It means that changing people opinions and enlightening them to the vast inequalities inherent in global capitalism, and the disastrous consequences of this system, is absolutely possible.

Have to agree with this viewpoint. I always found the attitude of "Pfft, all the *insert hated group here* are talking about it. They're so stupid," to be counter-productive from a political standpoint. Even if they're supporting Invisible Children, at least we have a chance to comment on their status and reveal to them the flaws within the Ugandan military.

[gorillafuck]

Please. Never, ever use that fucking irritating word "hipster" again. The elitist arrogance that underpins it doesn't give any credibility to your goddamn argument and I'm sick to death of seeing that fucking shit all the time.
It's not a bizarre subculture that caused this response. Don't be such an ass.

And that goes for the rest of you as well. If you can't do anything but capitalise on who is currently targeted as being a twat in the west, then maybe you ought to reassess yourself. For fucks sake. Hipster has only substituted emo. Use. Your. God. Damn. Fucking. Brain.
Fuck.he was referring to the reddit image. goddamn, man.

a significant amount of people have posted the dailywhat article opposing this movement. at least on my main page.

(good god how I hate that facebook is actually relevant to this topic)

[#FF0000]

That is a fucking awesome. People who were not interested in politics became interested because there was an appeal to them they could identify with because the right media was used in the right way?
It's a lesson. It also demonstrates that not everyone is an apathetic prat, even those who parade about as being so are capable of some kind of political consciousness.
Let's not pretend that it's all good, but thats a positive step. It means that changing people opinions and enlightening them to the vast inequalities inherent in global capitalism, and the disastrous consequences of this system, is absolutely possible.

Eh, I dunno. I've seen tons of people with Livestrong bracelets, pink ribbon shirts, and all these things, but to be honest I don't think it means they really give a shit. I get the feeling that it's more about feeling good about having "done something" regardless of whether or not they even understand anything about what they're doing.

And I'm not saying "they don't really care" because they're new to it and don't know anything about Uganda or the LRA, but have you seen the absolute indignation people post in the comments sections of the blogs that are critical of Invisible Children? I'm not talking about childish attacks with no substance, mind you, but pieces that articulate some pretty big problems with the entire Kony campaign that would make any thinking person give pause (the fact that Kony hasn't been in Uganda for 7 years, the tiny size of the LRA at this point, and the horrendous track record of the Ugandan military -- the folks IC wants to give money to -- when it comes to the use of rape as a weapon).

Instead the bulk of the comments are hysterical and, most of the ones I've seen betray the fact that a lot of these people didn't even read the articles. How dare they criticize people who are trying to "do something", they say.

The behavior reminded me immediately of someone who takes it personally when you say you don't like a band they like, or something. I mean, if this was something people dedicated time to for years and years -- then yeah, I could understand the hysterical reaction. But these people haven't. It's a campaign they heard about yesterday, and all they do for it is tweet.

So, I don't know. To me, it looks like this is another RED, another Livestrong, another pink ribbon, another cause for people who want the 'activist look'. But maybe you're right. If anything this shows you can get a whole lot of people to make a big deal for a cause but I just wish we knew how to make people think critically instead.

[Althusser]

There is no doubt Kony should be stopped, but for Invisible Children Inc. to say they "support the Ugandan army" is complete bullshit. In the civil war in which Yoweri Museveni, leader of Uganda (supported by U.S. and invisible children) gained power, child soldiers were used by his army (National Resistance Army) which is now the army of Uganda. The Ugandan army have committed atrocities too, but the west turned a blind eye because Museveni is a coward who cooperates with US imperialism.

As for the hipster with the Ray Bands... he's a tool for US imperialism or a con-artist. Go buy a bracelet, go buy a t-shirt, go buy his 200+ dollar KONY pack. Buy the emergency kit. Buy a bunch of 5 dollar Kony posters to hang somewhere. Where is the money going? You tell me. Unless that money is going to funding a guerrilla revolutionary faction to overthrow the Ugandan regime, Kill KONY, rehabilitate the damaged children, and start a socialist democracy, free from the poverty that entails American Imperialism, then that money might as well be going to buying that hipster douche a new pair of converse and a Modest Mouse CD. My 2 ¢.

[Robocommie]

Sometimes false consciousness can be more destructive than apathy, just like how sometimes, doing nothing is actually better than doing the wrong thing.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Me knowing a ex lra child soldier makes Koney and his leadership one of the few people I would gladly see getting a drone missile up his arse. There is such a thing as the lesser evil even when it comes to imperialism.

You should not be an administrator on this site.

[gorillafuck]

Sometimes false consciousness can be more destructive than apathy, just like how sometimes, doing nothing is actually better than doing the wrong thing.yeah. I mean, people get pumped for this, sure. people also get a surge of enthusiasm when America goes to war. just because someone supports something when previously being apolitical does't make it good.

[Q]

@The pic posted by Questionable: It wouldn't really surprise me if it actually went like that.

[gorillafuck]

yeah, for sure. get rid of the actual humor in it and the "hipster" references and it's a pretty solid scenario.

[Misanthrope]

Me knowing a ex lra child soldier makes Koney and his leadership one of the few people I would gladly see getting a drone missile up his arse. There is such a thing as the lesser evil even when it comes to imperialism.

Doesn't bombing the LRA defeat the purpose of liberating the children..

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Eh, I dunno. I've seen tons of people with Livestrong bracelets, pink ribbon shirts, and all these things, but to be honest I don't think it means they really give a shit. I get the feeling that it's more about feeling good about having "done something" regardless of whether or not they even understand anything about what they're doing.

And I'm not saying "they don't really care" because they're new to it and don't know anything about Uganda or the LRA, but have you seen the absolute indignation people post in the comments sections of the blogs that are critical of Invisible Children? I'm not talking about childish attacks with no substance, mind you, but pieces that articulate some pretty big problems with the entire Kony campaign that would make any thinking person give pause (the fact that Kony hasn't been in Uganda for 7 years, the tiny size of the LRA at this point, and the horrendous track record of the Ugandan military -- the folks IC wants to give money to -- when it comes to the use of rape as a weapon).

Instead the bulk of the comments are hysterical and, most of the ones I've seen betray the fact that a lot of these people didn't even read the articles. How dare they criticize people who are trying to "do something", they say.

The behavior reminded me immediately of someone who takes it personally when you say you don't like a band they like, or something. I mean, if this was something people dedicated time to for years and years -- then yeah, I could understand the hysterical reaction. But these people haven't. It's a campaign they heard about yesterday, and all they do for it is tweet.

So, I don't know. To me, it looks like this is another RED, another Livestrong, another pink ribbon, another cause for people who want the 'activist look'. But maybe you're right. If anything this shows you can get a whole lot of people to make a big deal for a cause but I just wish we knew how to make people think critically instead.

Yeah. Pity is not politics.

This sort of thing also underlies the fact that communism is the end-result of the self-liberation of the proletariat, achieved when it pursues its own interests, as a class. It's not a moral project aimed at "bettering society," or anything like that.

Liberal campaigns are exactly the opposite. They allow participants to feel good about themselves and get a nice night's sleep, because you see they are on the "right side" and "doing something" about those poor people "over there" where things are really bad (like the "Free Tibet" hippies impervious to "their own" governments' heinous acts around the world). Meanwhile exploitation continues unabated in the "free world," and the engines of imperialist warfare gear up for another "humanitarian intervention," with the full backing of the liberal campaign, which of course is on its side, because although "we have our problems," in the end "our troops" are ultimately "the good guys." These people are "doing something" while all we do is "complain and criticize."

And that's precisely where the danger lies.

[gorillafuck]

yeah it apparently hasn't dawned on some people that fighting an army which uses child soldiers involves fighting the children that people want to save.

[A Revolutionary Tool]

When our group was still in existence we had some people in Uganda and southern Sudan.

What group are you talking of here?

[R_P_A_S]

this is a decent piece.. please read..


http://pomee.tumblr.com/post/18899601760/kony-2012-causing-more-harm-than-good

[NewLeft]

NTP8ZIXnoMM

Sorry for the Chomsky, but this is worth noting.

[GPDP]

Jesus christ, my SISTER (who heretofore has never seemed to give a shit about politics) is going crazy with this shit, sending the video to everyone and posting statuses about it. Having read what the campaign and the organization behind it are about, I cannot get behind them in the slightest. Thus, I feel compelled to confront her and ask her to reconsider her support for the campaign. Yet knowing her, she's gonna take it personally and get all emotional and refuse to listen to what I have to say.

Yet I'm going to attempt to do so anyway. I refuse to let this shit go unchallenged.

[#FF0000]

just do what i did and call everyone who buys this shit a fucking idiot.

[Deicide]

ff nailed this thread.

Now only if the 'radical' left could start such a snowball effect. We'd have revolution by next week, and we'd probably make it home in time for dinner!

[GPDP]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/www.invisiblechildren.com/critiques.html

Invisible Children's rebuttal to the accusations levied against it.

Thoughts?

[#FF0000]

For more than two decades, Kony has refused opportunities to negotiate an end to the violence peacefully, and governments of countries where Kony has operated

UH excuse me? Uganda and the LRA are at an uneasy peace right fucking now.

And they don't even answer why the fuck they're operating in Uganda in the first place. "They're the most prepared!"

So fucking what? Are they about to march into the goddamn Congo to get him?

[Agent Ducky]

Guys, any advice on what I can do?
My school has a really strong Invisible Children club and they have "KONY 2012" posters absolutely EVERYWHERE.
Counter-posters about the implications of intervention and the Ugandan government?

[Robocommie]

UH excuse me? Uganda and the LRA are at an uneasy peace right fucking now.

And they don't even answer why the fuck they're operating in Uganda in the first place. "They're the most prepared!"

So fucking what? Are they about to march into the goddamn Congo to get him?

Whatever it takes to get that oillll I mean warlord!

[Ostrinski]

Guys, any advice on what I can do?
My school has a really strong Invisible Children club and they have "KONY 2012" posters absolutely EVERYWHERE.
Counter-posters about the implications of intervention and the Ugandan government?Burn your school down.

[black magick hustla]

i been fighting the good fight by trolling kony liberals and "socialists" in fb

[ed miliband]

Please. Never, ever use that fucking irritating word "hipster" again. The elitist arrogance that underpins it doesn't give any credibility to your goddamn argument and I'm sick to death of seeing that fucking shit all the time.
It's not a bizarre subculture that caused this response. Don't be such an ass.

And that goes for the rest of you as well. If you can't do anything but capitalise on who is currently targeted as being a twat in the west, then maybe you ought to reassess yourself. For fucks sake. Hipster has only substituted emo. Use. Your. God. Damn. Fucking. Brain.
Fuck.

Anyway, there are obvious problems with this campaign - primarily it's assumption that taking out a warlord will mean that the circumstances that made it possibly for him, Kony, to emerge will disappear. This assumption is false and dangerous. The poverty and the suffering in Africa is what caused this. It happens all across Africa. Kony is just one amongst many.

Secondly, using the US military, or for that matter any military, whether international or internal (Uganda's) is foolish. The US military, as well as Ugandas, and all others are notorious for their brutality - they're fucking militaries. They might not use children in the army but that won't stop them from shooting or bombing children indiscriminately as they have done in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

To it's credit though, to have made the amount of people aware over night that they have - I believe it's at 7 million views - is unbelievable. Take note. As a propaganda campaign, that's nothing short of incredible.
But instead of sneering and calling people hipsters, liberals, and whatever other bit of dirt people choose to sling, we - that is, anti-imperialist, communists, etc - ought to be correcting their positions and the misguided ideas emerging as part of this.
This is one notoriously bad war lord among hundreds, whose emergence has a direct relationship with the carving up of Africa by Europe and a direct relationship to the raping of Africa, and to the meddling of the Western super powers in Africa; celebrities swinging their dicks won't stop poverty or war lords - only emancipation from the system that keeps them as slaves to tyrants and the rich will.



That is a fucking awesome. People who were not interested in politics became interested because there was an appeal to them they could identify with because the right media was used in the right way?
It's a lesson. It also demonstrates that not everyone is an apathetic prat, even those who parade about as being so are capable of some kind of political consciousness.
Let's not pretend that it's all good, but thats a positive step. It means that changing people opinions and enlightening them to the vast inequalities inherent in global capitalism, and the disastrous consequences of this system, is absolutely possible.

don't burst a fucking blood vessel man - if you were paying attention you would have noticed i was referring to an image that suggested that the campaign was set up by/the work of/for "hipsters"

if you look over my posts on the subject elsewhere i feel entirely the same about the word "hipster" as you do

fuck you

[Crux]

I knew about the LRA before it was cool. Now I want to make trollposts about Kony fighting the good christian fight, what with him being a prophet and all. It might be taken the wrong way though. But backing the ugandan regime...really now because their war crimes are somehow more humane? Oh please...

[Crux]

It's almost amusing how the "humanitarian imperialists" are a mirror image of a certain kind of "anti-imperialists". Indeed the founders of doctors without borders, who has defended every "humanitarian intervention" to date, had their background in the french maoist left.

[Enragé]

soooooo

clicking 'like' on facebook and having 'stop kony nights' is gonna stop a murderous lunatic?

thats whats insane about this nonsense. Apparently people are thinking you will change the world by acting in a world of texts and images (internet).

Hopefully it wont take too long before they realise you need to act in the world of people and things.

[Crux]

Another point I'd like to make is given the IC's, mostly, singular goal of having Kony arrested their support for the ugandan military and sending US "advisors" to help is kind of inevitable. And even "regular" charities have to a bigger or lesser extent cooperate with the governments in the areas where they work. So the sharp edge of criticism against IC should actually be aimed at the core aim of their campaign. Taking Kony down will not end the use child soldiers.

[Bilan]

don't burst a fucking blood vessel man - if you were paying attention you would have noticed i was referring to an image that suggested that the campaign was set up by/the work of/for "hipsters"

if you look over my posts on the subject elsewhere i feel entirely the same about the word "hipster" as you do

fuck you

Yeah, I saw that after. I'd been seeing shit like that all morning and my blood was boiling. My apologies.

[Bilan]

Alright, I've been arguing with these people all day (that is, some of their followers).

Fuck them.

Infact, one of them said to me "You should do more than just talk".

So I liked his post.

Maybe I can be an activist too now?

[Bronco]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/www.invisiblechildren.com/critiques.html

Invisible Children's rebuttal to the accusations levied against it.

Thoughts?

I think their rebuttal regarding the Ugandan human rights abuses is incredibly flimsy. It's a we "don't defend it but" response, even though they claim no money goes directly to the Ugandan government that's missing the point, they're still placing full trust and uncritical support in a military that has plenty of blood on their hands themselves and have also been involved in the use of child soldiers. But hey, forget that, it's "the only feasible and proper way to stop Kony" and they are "more organized and better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries", that's alright then

There's also still no mention at all of the Ugandan President and the fact he has presided over the country for 26 years, similar to the amount of time that Kony has been active. Yet nobody is questioning why Kony was allowed to get to the position he did, or examined the conditions that has made such a thing possible, not just for Kony but for numerous warlords across Africa.

They also neglect to give any importance to the fact that the LRA hasn't been active in Uganda for 6 years and have nowhere near the presence they did a decade or two ago, nor do they go into the complexities of the conflict in the region. Arresting Kony won't change anything, it might give a bit of a feel-good factor to those in the West who will pat themselves on the back at having shared a video and put up a few Kony 2012 posters, but the situation in Africa won't change, there will be plenty more Kony's and most people will go back to not giving a shit in a few months time.

[bricolage]

http://focusedambiguity.tumblr.com/post/18947331875/stop-kony

[R_P_A_S]

I think their rebuttal regarding the Ugandan human rights abuses is incredibly flimsy. It's a we "don't defend it but" response, even though they claim no money goes directly to the Ugandan government that's missing the point, they're still placing full trust and uncritical support in a military that has plenty of blood on their hands themselves and have also been involved in the use of child soldiers. But hey, forget that, it's "the only feasible and proper way to stop Kony" and they are "more organized and better equipped than that of any of the other affected countries", that's alright then

There's also still no mention at all of the Ugandan President and the fact he has presided over the country for 26 years, similar to the amount of time that Kony has been active. Yet nobody is questioning why Kony was allowed to get to the position he did, or examined the conditions that has made such a thing possible, not just for Kony but for numerous warlords across Africa.

They also neglect to give any importance to the fact that the LRA hasn't been active in Uganda for 6 years and have nowhere near the presence they did a decade or two ago, nor do they go into the complexities of the conflict in the region. Arresting Kony won't change anything, it might give a bit of a feel-good factor to those in the West who will pat themselves on the back at having shared a video and put up a few Kony 2012 posters, but the situation in Africa won't change, there will be plenty more Kony's and most people will go back to not giving a shit in a few months time.

Why did the LRA leave Uganda?

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Guys, any advice on what I can do?
My school has a really strong Invisible Children club and they have "KONY 2012" posters absolutely EVERYWHERE.
Counter-posters about the implications of intervention and the Ugandan government?

Generic anti-imperialist talk will do the trick. Remember to include that if military intervention does happen than all those child soldiers are going to be killed. Say that it is hypocritical to support intervention on these "humanitarian" grounds as you would be literally blowing apart those who want to save.

[Luc]

my update:

here are the articles my friend gave me (it's not leftist and neither is my friend so just focus on the article please)

http://guyism.com/lifestyle/advice/kony-2012-viral-video-scam.html

http://blog.joerenken.com/2012/03/07/invisible-children-and-kony-2012-exposed/

give these to your libreal friends mayeb it'll calm them down

[A Revolutionary Tool]

Why did the LRA leave Uganda?
Because they effectively got the shit kicked out of them and retreated into other neighboring countries.

[ed miliband]

good libcom piece:

http://libcom.org/blog/kony-2012-public-emoting-sessions-08032012

as much as the whole thing has frustrated it's pretty fascinating

[ed miliband]

the best thing to come out of the whole thing was my friend making this up:

"Kony West - My Beautiful Dark Twisted Infantry"

[Nox]

It's fucking pathetic and hopefully it will die down in a week or so.

[ed miliband]

it's already dead isn't it? the only kony stuff on my feed now is articles exposing the whole things and memes making fun of it

[Luc]

it's already dead isn't it? the only kony stuff on my feed now is articles exposing the whole things and memes making fun of it

well that lasted long :/

good ridance

[NewLeft]

There's a KONY 2012 poster on the main bulletin board at my school. I used a sharpie to scribble out KONY to write OCCUPY. I'm such a badass, I know. :rolleyes:

[TheGodlessUtopian]

There's a KONY 2012 poster on the main bulletin board at my school. I used a sharpie to scribble out KONY to write OCCUPY. I'm such a badass, I know. :rolleyes:

I suspect capitalism will fall any day now, thank you comrade! :che:

[Optiow]

Interesting thing I think. My sister rattled on about it last night and spent $75 (where she got it I don't know) buying t-shirts and stuff to support it.

I think Kony's an arse, but I do think that this could be used to further imperialism.

[ed miliband]

best critique yet: http://hipsterrunoff.com/altreport/2012/03/joseph-kony-being-cyberbullied-social-media-lamestreamers-kony2012-stopkony.html

[Red Commissar]

Either most of my friends ignored this or I didn't notice them talking about it, wasn't aware of this going around until I saw this thread the other day. Then again I've not been active on FB for a long time. It bothers me though how this one managed to get viral when we have many other similar 'causes' going around, including many of ours. Guess it helps when you are tied in some way to those pushing for foreign involvement in Africa and marketing strategies to make things go 'viral'.

I remember reading a lot about Musevini and the LRA- the mess on both ends, the crisis of the Second Congo War, and so on. Kony definetely simplifies the whole mess into making LRA seem to be a massive force these 'poor' governments can't deal with and the US ignores- despite the fact that these governments do fight it and AFRICOM has backed many operations to that end.

I ran across Koby yesterday at another community I go to. Most of them were eating out of its hands to its objectives. I scribbled some of my thoughts down here (http://theredcommune.wordpress.com/), after reading criticisms of the program. Probably'll flesh it out over time, but I'm sure it's mostly familiar stuff to you all. Targeting it more at people unfamiliar with the topic, so it has to be argued differently with people who've bought into this hook, line, and sinker. Including self-professed 'progressives' who apparently don't look behind the groups pushing these things.

[MustCrushCapitalism]

You know Uganda just discovered last year that they have oil?

[Comrade Samuel]

You know Uganda just discovered last year that they have oil?

You know Americans just discovered Uganda like 2 days ago?

[TheGodlessUtopian]

You know Americans just discovered Uganda like 2 days ago?

Discovered meaning "Invade!"

[Lenina Rosenweg]

Kony is obviously a bastard warlord but the Invisible Children NGO is basically a scam.Most of the money they rake in goes to their own projects, very little of it goes to anything directly connected with specific relief work.

Charity Navigator fives them a rating of 51 which isn't that great.


Before the Kony 2012 campaign, Invisible Children had a poor rating that displayed how corrupt the organization truly was. Yet the moment all the fauxtivists learned about the movement, they boosted IC's rating. All they have done is proven they are subject to a mass-bandwagon that clouts their minds and disregard all facts. Its no better than religion.

I don't have exact stats but something like out of 13$ million raised, 8million$ went to "expenses".

This is similar to Greg Mortensen's "Three Cups of Tea" scam

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Mortenson

or the "Hunger Project"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hunger_Project

Their goal wasn't to end world hunger but to get people to "visualize" the idea that endimg world hunger was possible.

[Misanthrope]

http://29.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m0iy96hunL1r76f0so1_500.jpg

#Netanyahu2012

[AmericanCommie421]

Point? Kony is no more than a fascist, reactionary that uses the innocent to fight to advance fascism. Imperialism is wrong, and anti-imperialism is good, except when these "anti-imperialists" are fascists and murderers.

[Misanthrope]

Point? Kony is no more than a fascist, reactionary that uses the innocent to fight to advance fascism. Imperialism is wrong, and anti-imperialism is good, except when these "anti-imperialists" are fascists and murderers.

:laugh: revleft in 2012 everyone.

Kony is not a fascist. Fascism is a socio-economic system. Kony is the military leader of the LRA. How would sending the largest military in the world to already war torn Uganda liberate the children. The children have been taking orders to kill for this long, why would they suddenly stop with imperialist presence?

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

It's not just commie pinkos criticizing Kony 2012, even the bourgeois media smells a rat.

http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/03/07/guest_post_joseph_kony_is_not_in_uganda_and_other_ complicated_things


Guest post: Joseph Kony is not in Uganda (and other complicated things) (http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/03/07/guest_post_joseph_kony_is_not_in_uganda_and_other_ complicated_things)


Posted By Joshua Keating (http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/blog/68) http://www.foreignpolicy.com/images/091022_meta_block.gif Wednesday, March 7, 2012 - 5:18 PM http://www.foreignpolicy.com/images/091022_meta_block.gif http://www.foreignpolicy.com/images/091022_more_icon.gif Share (http://www.addthis.com/bookmark.php?v=20)


http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/files/kony_0.jpg
Thanks to an incredibly effective social media effort, #StopKony (https://twitter.com/search/%23stopkony) is trending on Twitter today. The campaign coincides with a new awareness-raising documentary by the group Invisible Children. Former FP intern Michael Wilkerson, now a freelance journalist and Ph.D. candidate at Oxford -- who has lived and reported from Uganda -- contributed this guest post on the campaign. -JK

By Michael Wilkerson:
"Joseph Kony is basically Adolf Hitler. He has an army of 30 000 mindless children who slaughter innocent people in Uganda."
Have you seen something like that (http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/03/07/guest_post_joseph_kony_is_not_in_uganda_and_other_ complicated_things#%21/codyharrisonn88/status/177469044167942144) fly across your Twitter or Facebook feed today? Or perhaps this (http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/03/07/guest_post_joseph_kony_is_not_in_uganda_and_other_ complicated_things#%21/QuentonRichards/status/177441811638394880)?:
"#TweetToSave the Invisible Children of Uganda! #Kony2012 Make Joseph Kony Famous!!"
"Kony 2012 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc&feature=youtu.be&noredirect=1)," a video posted by advocacy group Invisible Children (http://www.invisiblechildren.com/about) to raise awareness about the pernicious evil of Lord's Risistance Army (LRA) leader Joseph Kony, has already been viewed over 8 million times (http://vimeo.com/37119711) on Vimeo and more than 9 million times on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc&feature=player_embedded#%21) (and surely more by the time you read this) since its release this week.
It would be great to get rid of Kony. He and his forces have left a path (http://www.crisisgroup.org/en/regions/africa/horn-of-africa/uganda.aspx) of abductions and mass murder in their wake for over 20 years. But let's get two things straight: 1) Joseph Kony is not in Uganda and hasn't been for 6 years; 2) the LRA now numbers at most in the hundreds, and while it is still causing immense suffering, it is unclear how millions of well-meaning but misinformed people are going to help deal with the more complicated reality.
First, the facts. Following a successful campaign by the Ugandan military and failed peace talks in 2006, the LRA was pushed out (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/19/why_can_t_anyone_stop_the_lra?page=full) of Uganda and has been operating in extremely remote areas of the DRC, South Sudan, and the Central African Republic -- where Kony himself is believed to be now. The Ugandan military has been pursuing the LRA since then but had little success (and several big (http://www.enoughproject.org/publications/finishing-fight-against-lra-strategy-paper) screw-ups). In October last year, President Obama authorized (http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/136673/mareike-schomerus-tim-allen-and-koen-vlassenroot/obama-takes-on-the-lra?page=show) the deployment of 100 U.S. Army advisors to help the Ugandan military track down Kony, with no results disclosed to date.
Additionally, the LRA (thankfully!) does not have 30,000 mindless child soldiers. This grim figure, cited by Invisible Children in the film (and by others (http://www.un.org/events/tenstories/06/story.asp?storyid=100)) refers to the total number of kids abducted by the LRA over nearly 30 years. Eerily, it is also the same (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15317684) number estimated for the total killed in the more than 20 years of conflict in Northern Uganda.
As I wrote for FP in 2010, the small remaining LRA (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/19/why_can_t_anyone_stop_the_lra?page=full) forces are still wreaking havoc and very hard to catch, but Northern Uganda has had tremendous recovery in the 6 years of peace since the LRA left.
So why is "Uganda" trending on Twitter?
Unfortunately, it looks like meddlesome details like where Kony actually is aren't important enough for Invisible Children to make sure its audience understands. The video, narrated by Invisible Children co-founder Jason Russell, says its purpose is to intensify pressure on the U.S. government to make sure Kony is brought to justice this year, and as the message broadcast throughout says, what is important is simple: Stop Kony.
Among other emotive shots, the video features Russell's attempt to explain the LRA to his toddler son, enthusiastic (and mostly white) volunteers putting up posters and wearing Kony 2012 bracelets, and some heart-wrenching footage of children who walked for miles to sleep in a safe place at the height of the LRA's power in Northern Uganda. The latter comprised much of Invisible Children's namesake first film and brought the organization to prominence.
But in the new film, Invisible Children has made virtually no effort to inform. Only once, at 15:01 in the movie (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc&t=14m58s), over an image of a red blob on a map leaving Northern Uganda and heading West, is the fact that the LRA is no longer in Uganda mentioned, and only in passing:
"As the LRA begain to move into other countries, Jacob [one of the children filmed in Northern Uganda in 2003] and other Ugandans came to the US to speak on behalf of all people suffering because of Kony. Even though Uganda was relatively safe they felt compelled to tell the world that Kony was still out there and had to be stopped."
That's it, in a 30-minute movie. And with both the graphic and reiteration of how awful the LRA is, you might think reasonably "move into other countries" meant expanding rather than fleeing. In any case, the focus, seconds later, is on Invisible Children's activities in the U.S. at the time, not what was happening back in Africa. I can see why some of P. Diddy's followers might be confused.
Award-winning Ugandan journalist Angelo Izama is among those not thrilled (http://thisisafrica.wordpress.com/2012/03/07/acholi-street-stop-kony2012-invisible-childrens-campaign-of-infamy/):
"To call the campaign a misrepresentation is an understatement. While it draws attention to the fact that Kony, indicted for war crimes (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/k/joseph_kony/index.html) by the International Criminal Court in 2005, is still on the loose, its portrayal of his alleged crimes in Northern Uganda are from a bygone era. At the height of the war between especially 1999 and 2004, large hordes of children took refuge on the streets of Gulu town to escape the horrors of abduction and brutal conscription to the ranks of the LRA. Today most of these children are semi-adults. Many are still on the streets unemployed. Gulu has the highest numbers of child prostitutes (http://allafrica.com/stories/201202200227.html) in Uganda. It also has one of the highest rates of HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis.
If six years ago children in Uganda would have feared the hell of being part of the LRA, a well documented reality already, today the real invisible children are those suffering from "Nodding Disease" (http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/africa/120229/nodding-disease-uganda-battles-mysterious-ailment). Over 4000 children are victims of this incurable debilitating condition. It's a neurological disease that has baffled world scientists and attacks mainly children from the most war affected districts of Kitgum, Pader and Gulu."
Along with sharing the movie online, Invisible Children's call to action is to do three things: 1) sign its pledge, 2) get the Kony 2012 bracelet and action kit (http://invisiblechildrenstore.myshopify.com/) (only $30!), and 3) sign up to donate.
There is intense criticism out there (http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/) over Invisible Children's finances, including that it spends too much money on administration and filmmaking, while still touting its on the ground NGO-style projects. Also, apparently it's never been externally audited. I'm going to stay out of that, other than to say you can check out IC's own financial disclosure information here (http://www.invisiblechildren.com/financials).
What worries me more is that it's unclear what exactly Invisible Children wants to do, other than raise a lot of money and attention. Here's Russell in the video (21:40):
"We know what to do. Here it is, ready? In order for Kony to be arrested this year, the Ugandan military has to find him. In order to find him, they need the technology and training to track him in the vast jungle. That's where the American advisors come in. But in order for the American advisors to be there, the American government has to deploy them. They've done that, but if the government doesn't believe the people care about Kony, the mission will be cancelled. In order for the people to care, they have to know. And they will only know if Kony's name is everywhere.
So the goal is to make sure that President Obama doesn't withdraw the advisors he deployed until Kony is captured or killed. That seems noble enough, except that there has been no mention by the government of withdrawing those forces -- at least any I can find. Does anyone else have any evidence about this urgent threat of cancellation? One that justifies such a massive production campaign and surely lucrative donation drive?
There are many reasons uninformed and oversimplified advocacy can cause trouble, and Siena Antsis catalogues some of them here (http://siena-anstis.com/2012/03/07/on-invisible-childrens-kony-2012-campaign/), noting that Invisible Children expertly "commodifies white man's burden on the African continent." Buy a bracelet, soothe some guilt.
But as researcher Mark Kersten notes (http://justiceinconflict.org/2012/03/07/taking-kony-2012-down-a-notch/), after "stopping Kony", then what? Or what if the activism just results the the 100 U.S. advisors staying but no Kony?
One of the biggest issues with a simplistic "Stop Kony" message is that discussions of Navy Seals or drone strikes are inevitable when patience runs out with Ugandan-led efforts . But what about the dozens or hundreds of abducted and brainwashed kids? Should we bomb everyone? Will they actually stop fighting after Kony is gone? What if they shoot back?
Coming back to the "Kony 2012" video and its celebrity endorsements, what are the consequences of unleashing so many exuberant activists armed with so few facts? Defining Uganda in the international conversation by issues that are either geographical misfires (Save northern Uganda!) or an intentional attempt to distract the international community (Death to the gays!), do a disservice to the many critical problems Uganda has.
In addition to the problems of poverty and nodding disease Izama highlights, Uganda is barely (if at all) democratic, and the president Yoweri Museveni ushered (http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/02/17/heads_i_win_tails_you_lose) himself to a 4th term last year, taking him to over 25 years in power. Corruption is rampant, social services are minimal, and human rights abuses (http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/04/28/guest_post_will_ugandas_protests_play_out_like_egy pt_or_libya) by the government common and well documented (http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/03/23/uganda-torture-extortion-killings-police-unit). Oh, and oil is on the way.
Stopping Kony won't change any of these things, and if more hardware and money flow to Museveni's military, Invisible Children's campaign may even worsen some problems.
Here's to hoping Kony hands himself in tomorrow and that the fear of the U.S. "cancelling" its LRA-hunt support is misplaced. But if the most impactful the result of Invisible Children's campaign is to cause millions of viewers to think Northern Uganda is a war zone, even if it's not their intent, it's hard to defend.
Funny how the video doesn't actually talk about the fact that the LRA left Uganda.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-deibert/invisible-children_b_1327417.html?ref=tw


Recently, a new video produced by the American NGO Invisible Children (http://s3.amazonaws.com/kony2012/kony-4.html) focusing on Joseph Kony and the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has been making the rounds. Having just returned (http://mondediplo.com/blogs/in-northern-uganda-a-difficult-peace) from the Acholi region of Northern Uganda myself, where the LRA was born, I thought I might share some of my thoughts on the subject, for what it's worth.
I think it is easy for Invisible Children and other self-aggrandizing foreigners to make the entire story of the last 30 years of Northern Uganda about Joseph Kony, but there is a history of the relationship between the Acholi people from whom the LRA emerged and the central government in Kampala that is a little more complicated than that.
Kony is a grotesque war criminal, to be sure, but the Ugandan government currently in power also came to power through the use of kadogo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upITVcXw_Gk) (child soldiers) and fought alongside militias employing child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo, something that Invisible Children seem wilfully ignorant of.
The conflict in Acholi -- the ancestral homeland of the ethnic group who stretch across northern Uganda and southern Sudan -- has its roots in Uganda's history of dictatorship and political turmoil. A large number of soldiers serving in the government of dictator Milton Obote (who ruled Uganda from 1966 to 1971 and then again from 1980 to 1985) came from across northern Uganda, with the Acholis being particularly well represented, even though Obote himself hailed from the Lango ethnic group. When Obote was overthrown by his own military commanders, an ethnic Acholi, General Tito Okello, became president for six chaotic months until Yoweri Museveni's National Resistance Army took over. Museveni became president, and has since remained so, via elections -- some legitimate, some deeply flawed.
Upon taking power, the Museveni government launched a brutal search and destroy mission against former government soldiers throughout the north, which swept up many ordinary Acholi in its wake. Some Acholi began mobilizing to defend themselves, first under the banner of the Uganda People's Democratic Army (largely made up of former soldiers) and then the Holy Spirit Movement.
This movement, directed by Alice Auma (http://www.economist.com/node/8584604), an Acholi who claimed to be acting on guidance from the spirit Lakwena, brought a mystical belief in their own invincibility that the soldiers of the Kampala-based government at first found terrifying: Holy Spirit Movement devotees walked headlong into blazing gunfire singing songs and holding stones they believed would turn into grenades. The movement succeeded in reaching Jinja, just 80 km from the capital Kampala, before being decimated by Museveni's forces.
Out of this slaughter was born the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), led by Joseph Kony, a distant relative of Alice Auma. Kony added an additional element of targeting civilian Acholi to his schismatic blend of Christianity, frequently kidnapping children and adolescents to serve in his rebel movement. The Museveni government responded by viewing all Acholi as potential collaborators, rounding them up into camps euphemistically called "protected villages (http://www.theresolve.org/history)", where they were vulnerable to disease and social ills, and had few ways to carry on their traditional farming.
The LRA's policy of targeting civilians (though not the Museveni government's draconian measures) eventually drew international condemnation and in 2005 the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants (http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/moy.pdf) against Joseph Kony and several other seniors LRA commanders for crimes against humanity and war crimes. Ironically, one of those commanders, Dominic Ongwen, was himself kidnapped by the LRA while still a small boy.
After peace talks between the LRA and the Ugandan government collapsed in 2007, the group decamped from its bases in southern Sudan to the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic.
Following the end of negotiations, the Museveni government launched its Peace Recovery and Development Plan (PRDP) (http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/Ug.PRDP.pdf), an effort to stabilize northern Uganda after years of war. Since then, according to the United Nations, 98 percent (http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2012/jan/24/northern-uganda-displaced-people-out-in-cold) of internally displaced persons have moved on from the camps that once sheltered hundreds of thousands of frightened people.
Despite criticisms from the Acholi that the government's program has been insufficient, local initiatives and the work of some foreign organizations have helped restore a sense of normality and gradual progress to the region, with people returned to their homes and travel between once off-limits parts of the region now facilitated with relative ease.
Now a thousand miles from the cradle of their insurgency, the LRA would appear to have little hope of returning to Uganda, though their potential to wreak havoc on civilians remains little diminished. In Congo's Haut-Uele province, between December 2009 and January 2010, the LRA massacred 620 civilians and abducted more than 120 children (http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/drc.pdf).
In October 2011, U.S. President Barack Obama announced that he was sending 100 Special Forces soldiers (http://articles.cnn.com/2011-10-14/africa/world_africa_africa-obama-troops_1_obama-orders-south-sudan-central-african-republic?_s=PM:AFRICA) to help the Ugandans hunt down Kony. By the end of the year, the Ugandan army confirmed that the troops had moved along with the Ugandan army to Obo in the Central African Republic and Nzara in South Sudan.
The problem with Invisible Children's whitewashing of the role of the government of Uganda's president Yoweri Museveni in the violence of Central Africa is that it gives Museveni and company a free pass, and added ammunition with which to bludgeon virtually any domestic opposition, such as Kizza Besigye and the Forum for Democratic Change (http://www.fdcuganda.org/).
By blindly supporting Uganda's current government and its military adventures beyond its borders, as Invisible Children suggests that people do, Invisible Children is in fact guaranteeing that there will be more violence, not less, in Central Africa.
I have seen the well-meaning foreigners do plenty of damage before, so that is why people understanding the context and the history of the region is important before they blunder blindly forward to "help" a people they don't understand.
U.S. President Bill Clinton professed that he was "helping" in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the 1990s and his help ended up with over 6 million people losing their lives (http://michaeldeibert.blogspot.com/2008/09/congo-between-hope-and-despair.html).
The same mistake should not be repeated today.

[Burn A Flag]

The way I see it, first it's Kony, then they have to "protect something" or "help" someone else right by the strategic resources. Sure no one likes Kony, but getting rid of Kony(who is just one man) is not going to do much for Africa. It's going to take people power, not some sketchy liberal emotional group to fix their situation.

[Franz Fanonipants]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/www.invisiblechildren.com/critiques.html

Invisible Children's rebuttal to the accusations levied against it.

Thoughts?

those are some p. slick infographics

since they're basically contractors for the us state dept i bet that whoever worked them up got paid like half a mil

[Burn A Flag]

Anyone interested in hearing Kony himself speak?

http://craftkevin.com/2012/03/08/somebodys-lying-proof-that-the-most-hated-man-in-the-world-right-now-joseph-kony-is-not-a-bad-guy-interview-with-him-his-troops/

[Leftsolidarity]

God damn it. I brought this up to my gf cuz she posted the link and all she did was get pissed and hang up.

But yeah, this is just another excuse for US imperialism. No doubt Kony is a shit excuse for a human being and deserves a terrible death but that needs to be by the hands of the Ugandan's, not US imperialists.

[commieathighnoon]

This campaign is INSANE!! Insane as of the attention it has received and the tactics/methods. WOW! When you get apathetic people to "do their part" you are on to something. How the fuck can we make a similar campaign against capitalism now? :rolleyes:

Find a way to get Oprah, P. Diddy, and Justin Bieber retweet class war slogans.

[Turinbaar]

:laugh: revleft in 2012 everyone.

Kony is not a fascist. Fascism is a socio-economic system. Kony is the military leader of the LRA. How would sending the largest military in the world to already war torn Uganda liberate the children. The children have been taking orders to kill for this long, why would they suddenly stop with imperialist presence?

Fascism is a religious system, plain and simple. It centralizes the capitalist state and economy (which Marx originally criticized by its analogy to religion), within the hands of the military and the church, and creates a cult out of the leader and the soldier. The original fascist regimes began with a concordat with the Vatican, the Catholic Church being the prototype monopolist corporation and a perfect model for fascist economics and society.

Kony is a former Catholic alter boy who has convinced some within his zombified child militia that he has magic powers. His campaign is for Uganda to be ruled by the Ten commandments, these being enforced by himself and the LRA. The western presence in Uganda for years has largely consisted of camps organized to rehabilitate and protect the many runaways from the ranks of this sadistic fascist army, so your question is not even relevant.

Killing Kony would be like killing Hitler or Hirohito, in that the air would be let out of the LRA's ballon if their all powerful leader turned out not to be as magic as he said. His system is held together by a leader cult and brute force administered by a few at the top, aimed at the lower ranks, which are populated by kidnapped children. A few well aimed shots at some psychotic adults does indeed have the potential to save these children and all of the other children who they would otherwise be ordered to kidnap, rape, torture and kill.

[Connolly Was There1916]

My view on this is that everything should be done to support the capture of Joseph Kony. However, if KONY 2012 is, as the figures posted earlier in the thread suggest, an organisation that makes profit out of what is supposed to be a charity it should not be supported. Particluarly if it is also dedicated to furthering US Imperialist interests in Africa.

[Dennis the 'Bloody Peasant']

Is it completely inconceivable to despise Krony, the LRA and thei actions without also supporting the US government / US imperialism in general? I think it is because...that's how I feel..you can oppose a person / group / idea without automatically supporting it's polar opposite. You can hate the DPRK regime without supporting the US government. You can oppose the Conservatives and not support Labour.

I don't care if he gets killed or who by b/c I despise his actions and ideas, but I won't be happy about it and waving the stars and stripes either.

[TheLeftistVoice]

I believe that this is a prime opportunity to spread the revolution across the world. In two weeks I will be personally visiting the north of the DRC, to try and inflitrate Kony's militia.

If responsive I believe Kony can convert to socialism and use his child soldiers to spread the word among easily persuaded africans. If not, I will kill him and assume control of the LRA.

Because remember, Kony puts the infant into infantry.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

I think this campaign could actually be a great victory for socialists. A bunch of naive white middle class people think they can save africa by buying t-shirts and 'liking' a documentary. They get called on it and start discussing whether or not the information provided for them has legitimacy.

One of my flatmates, who previously would roll their eyes at me if I tried to point out the flaws of capitalism, actually listened to what I was saying and agreed. People are not only discussing a little known murderer but also whether or not information given to them is valid and how best to use information to bring about change. I've basically been talking to people who supported it and tried to make them understand that people like Kony are symptomatic of the capitalist exploitation of africa and white charities providing military support is a ridiculous way to change a system that thrives on exploitation and war.

I think it's great that people are discussing this shit, criticising it and researching more about the situation. I would like to say that maybe this would lead to more people not taking the propaganda the capitalist system drums up at face value but I might be too optimistic.

[Franz Fanonipants]

Fascism is a religious system, plain and simple[. . .] Killing Kony would be like killing Hitler or Hirohito, in that the air would be let out of the LRA's ballon if their all powerful leader turned out not to be as magic as he said. His system is held together by a leader cult and brute force administered by a few at the top, aimed at the lower ranks, which are populated by kidnapped children. A few well aimed shots at some psychotic adults does indeed have the potential to save these children and all of the other children who they would otherwise be ordered to kidnap, rape, torture and kill.


haha look at this fucking imperialist

[#FF0000]

words.

i don't think you understand what fascism is. i don't think you understand how african warlords work. i don't think you understand that imperialist countries don't go into other countries for free. i don't think you understand a lot of things.

[Franz Fanonipants]

i don't think you understand what fascism is. i don't think you understand how african warlords work. i don't think you understand that imperialist countries don't go into other countries for free. i don't think you understand a lot of things.

yes but killing him will be like killing hitler, a strike for

e: note all this from someone w/an orwell avatar. i bet this dude also weeps big fat tears about that circular firing squad in catalonia.

[NewLeft]

Killing Kony would be like killing Hitler or Hirohito, in that the air would be let out of the LRA's ballon if their all powerful leader turned out not to be as magic as he said. His system is held together by a leader cult and brute force administered by a few at the top, aimed at the lower ranks, which are populated by kidnapped children. A few well aimed shots at some psychotic adults does indeed have the potential to save these children and all of the other children who they would otherwise be ordered to kidnap, rape, torture and kill.
"When the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he destroys."

[A Revolutionary Tool]

Anyone interested in hearing Kony himself speak?

http://craftkevin.com/2012/03/08/somebodys-lying-proof-that-the-most-hated-man-in-the-world-right-now-joseph-kony-is-not-a-bad-guy-interview-with-him-his-troops/
Not really.

[Turinbaar]

i don't think you understand what fascism is. i don't think you understand how african warlords work. i don't think you understand that imperialist countries don't go into other countries for free. i don't think you understand a lot of things.

So in other words, you don't think? I could have told you that. Why don't you demonstrate for us this unthinking approach to historical analysis and explain how Mussolini didn't call Fascism a religious system (and how Marx doesn't say the same of capitalism), and how Kony's system and goal differs from Fascism? And please explain how things would be better in Uganda if the US allowed Kony to keep going with the loud endorsements of Rush Limbaugh.

[CommunityBeliever]

This video seemed okay until they started to talk about solutions. The only way we are going to beat commander Cody (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/CC-2224) and other bad Star Wars people is by organising Luke Skywalker and the rebel fleet to destroy the death star, not by putting up posters all over the place.

[Brosa Luxemburg]

This whole campaign is ridiculous. The organization creating the whole Kony 2012 thing supports the Ugandan Army and the Sudan People's Liberation Army which have both been responsible for the same crimes as Joseph Kony. The group, Invisible Children, also supports direct U.S. intervention in Uganda to take out Joseph Kony. I know around these parts I don't need to explain why U.S. intervention in a country is bad, but there is something else to it too. If we send our troops to fight against Kony's troops, and Kony's troops are children, then won't U.S. forces be killing the same children they are trying to protect? Kony is a horrible man, but Invisible Children is also ridiculous!

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

Anyways, I think everyone on this website should be able to logically draw from this whole movement that it is based on nothing more than the brainwashing of the ignorant sections of our youth. Those people (the followers of the movement) who think they suddenly know how the fix the world's greatest problem will actually aid in the creation of a new problem: increased American imperialist involvement in Africa. These liberal elitists use the soft minds of the politically uneducated youth as a platform to support imperialism. Even at my high school, you hear people talking about how they are going to support the movement, but yet I had to tell them which country they were supporting and what the Lord's Resistance Army was!

I guess I can say that a few American advisors to Uganda is not that bad, but no, these people are calling for more American involvement. This whole movement is a perfect example of one of the things that makes revolutionary leftists so sick about the bourgeois oriented left. And the funny thing about the movement and video is that they try so hard to connect with the peace and neo-yippie youth movements, yet they use all traditional methods of gaining support and money: relying on rich people and trying to get political support from Washington. They are hypocrites. They hide behind what seems, to the untrained mind, to be a grassroots movement, but is instead a perfect example of a traditional bourgeois, capitalist, and elitist movement.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Anyways, I think everyone on this website should be able to logically draw from this whole movement that it is based on nothing more than the brainwashing of the ignorant sections of our youth. Those people (the followers of the movement) who think they suddenly know how the fix the world's greatest problem will actually aid in the creation of a new problem: increased American imperialist involvement in Africa. These liberal elitists use the soft minds of the politically uneducated youth as a platform to support imperialism. Even at my high school, you hear people talking about how they are going to support the movement, but yet I had to tell them which country they were supporting and what the Lord's Resistance Army was!

I guess I can say that a few American advisors to Uganda is not that bad, but no, these people are calling for more American involvement. This whole movement is a perfect example of one of the things that makes revolutionary leftists so sick about the bourgeois oriented left. And the funny thing about the movement and video is that they try so hard to connect with the peace and neo-yippie youth movements, yet they use all traditional methods of gaining support and money: relying on rich people and trying to get political support from Washington. They are hypocrites. They hide behind what seems, to the untrained mind, to be a grassroots movement, but is instead a perfect example of a traditional bourgeois, capitalist, and elitist movement.


It is not simply only youth as there are many adults who endorse it as well.The ignorant include many portions of the "grown up" section as well.

And no, even one U.S adviser to Uganda is one too many.

[∞]

There is only a few hundred people in the LRA. Quite frankly, I don't care. Theres plenty of more pressing matters right now. I for one am going to follow these protesters and clean the streets of all their posters.

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

It is not simply only youth as there are many adults who endorse it as well.The ignorant include many portions of the "grown up" section as well.

And no, even one U.S adviser to Uganda is one too many.

That is why I made sure to add in paremthese at one point "followers of the movement," to make sure that I included older people in this movement that I did not talk about in my post though. I am just giving testimony and drawing opinions from what I am seeing on the youth side of the issue, since I am also young and a high schooler. I also made sure to differentiate between the "politically educated youth" and "not politically educated youth." I do not really know how older people are reacting, so I just did not address them. Plus, the video had sort of a youth feel to it, in my opinion.

And with that last part, I really do not know how to address that issue. I have to read up on the imperialist aspects and potentials of American involvement in Uganda at such a small level.

[#FF0000]

So in other words, you don't think? I could have told you that. Why don't you demonstrate for us this unthinking approach to historical analysis and explain how Mussolini didn't call Fascism a religious system (and how Marx doesn't say the same of capitalism)

Nah, I don't know what Mussolini nor Marx said of Fascism to be honest. Personally I think of it as a strictly historical phenomenon but I think I'm alone in that. At least, any 'fascism' we see today probably wouldn't look anything like the fascism of the past.

But how would you define fascism, exactly? As any government you don't like and that you find tyrannical enough?

I wonder what you'd describe Museveni's Uganda, then.


and how Kony's system and goal differs from Fascism?

I wasn't aware that Kony had any kind of system in mind, honestly. What is his system, then?


And please explain how things would be better in Uganda if the US allowed Kony to keep going with the loud endorsements of Rush Limbaugh.

The US wouldn't be in their country, for one, funding another tyrant's armed gang (that is, army). Of course, the US not being involved doesn't stop American Christian Fundamentalists from keeping close ties with the Museveni government anyway.

But yes, it would be better, because military intervention for humanitarian purposes is a spectacular failure and one only needs a most basic understanding of history to know this.

I mean, just ask yourself -- why is it that so many of these bloodthirsty tyrants, dictators, and warlords were christian altarboys when they were young?

[∞]

Simply being bad doesn't make you a fascist.

[The Young Pioneer]

Three years ago I was really involved with Invisible Children...before they were all infamous and shit for this facebook venture.

It's not like this is some fly-by-night group that popped up yesterday with the influence of an imperialist government and the creation of a single status update. The organisation has had this level of awareness as their goal for many years; their cause is a good one, they've made a ton of progress, and I say good on 'em for making it a better known global issue.

People are getting way too political about something that is an entirely humanitarian cause. Sure, there are people who are probably using this to their political advantage, but IC itself is, IMHO, awesome.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Three years ago I was really involved with Invisible Children...before they were all infamous and shit for this facebook venture.

It's not like this is some fly-by-night group that popped up yesterday with the influence of an imperialist government and the creation of a single status update. The organisation has had this level of awareness as their goal for many years; their cause is a good one, they've made a ton of progress, and I say good on 'em for making it a better known global issue.

People are getting way too political about something that is an entirely humanitarian cause. Sure, there are people who are probably using this to their political advantage, but IC itself is, IMHO, awesome.

No, to everything you just said.

[Turinbaar]

Nah, I don't know what Mussolini nor Marx said of Fascism to be honest. Personally I think of it as a strictly historical phenomenon but I think I'm alone in that. At least, any 'fascism' we see today probably wouldn't look anything like the fascism of the past.

But how would you define fascism, exactly? As any government you don't like and that you find tyrannical enough?

I wonder what you'd describe Museveni's Uganda, then.

Fascism is a system that, as Mussolini says, makes a religion out of war, the warrior, and the all powerful Commander, and organizes capitalist society and the economy under the military and the church for perpetual war against the lower classes and peoples of neighboring states. It claims that it has the means of perfecting humanity by a waging war as a religious process of spiritual transformation.

Museveni resembles this to a degree, though not to the degree Kony does (especially in the last point), and is the perfect client to sell weapons to as long as he has people like Kony to fight. He is also the perfect client in this way if (as it did) the west refused to intervene in the Rwanda genocide, which helped to cause the war in the Congo, of which Museveni was a part. Why not leave the status quo in place then, surely the maintenance of military industrial relations can't be described as imperialist now can it?


I wasn't aware that Kony had any kind of system in mind, honestly. What is his system, then?

It's very simple, its called the Ten Commandments, supplemented by further scriptural interpretation by Kony as a template to organize society through sheer force by his army.


The US wouldn't be in their country, for one, funding another tyrant's armed gang (that is, army). Of course, the US not being involved doesn't stop American Christian Fundamentalists from keeping close ties with the Museveni government anyway.

But yes, it would be better, because military intervention for humanitarian purposes is a spectacular failure and one only needs a most basic understanding of history to know this.

I mean, just ask yourself -- why is it that so many of these bloodthirsty tyrants, dictators, and warlords were christian altarboys when they were young?

So this is how unthinking analysis plays out.

If empire wanted to keep the Museveni government as a permanent military industrial client in need of weapons to fight people like Joseph Kony, wouldn't it make more sense not to send 100 troops to eliminate uganda's main internal enemy? Wouldn't it make more sense to keep Kony alive and use him as an excuse for arming Museveni to the teeth at top dollar? A US military presence in Uganda is not necessary to maintain a trade in weaponry to the Ugandan army.

But no, military intervention for humanitarian purposes is much too blood stained in comparison to the beautiful results in Rwanda and Darfur, two genocides which helped to greatly exacerbate the tyrannies of both Musevini and Kony.

[CommieTroll]

Fascism is a system that, as Mussolini says, makes a religion out of war, the warrior, and the all powerful Commander, and organizes capitalist society and the economy under the military and the church for perpetual war against the lower classes and peoples of neighboring states. It claims that it has the means of perfecting humanity by a waging war as a religious process of spiritual transformation.

Museveni resembles this to a degree, though not to the degree Kony does (especially in the last point), and is the perfect client to sell weapons to as long as he has people like Kony to fight. He is also the perfect client in this way if (as it did) the west refused to intervene in the Rwanda genocide, which helped to cause the war in the Congo, of which Museveni was a part. Why not leave the status quo in place then, surely the maintenance of military industrial relations can't be described as imperialist now can it?

You are certainly right that Kony and his ideology share a lot of the characteristics of Fascism but you certainly can't base these assumptions on the brand of Fascism that plagued Europe in the inter-war period. A fascist regime led by any warlord in Africa or even Aisa that isn't necessarily Kony simply can't resemble the systems of Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy or even Franco's Spain

[Leftsolidarity]

Verbal diarrhea

White Man's Burden
Liberalism
Calling for imperialist intervention
Non-materialist or historical analysis
Sensationalism (this shit has been going on for a long time)


Basically what I'm trying to say is that you're dumb.

[Turinbaar]

babble

Yes and a list of pejoratives is the mark of a genius. You might even skip a grade in your elementary school if you keep this up.

[Leftsolidarity]

Yes and a list of pejoratives is the mark of a genius. You might even skip a grade in your elementary school if you keep this up.

If the boot fits.....

[#FF0000]

So this is how unthinking analysis plays out.

I want to stop you right here and point out that you're the guy suggesting western countries get involved in Africa again but that it'll all work out this time.


If empire wanted to keep the Museveni government as a permanent military industrial client in need of weapons to fight people like Joseph Kony, wouldn't it make more sense not to send 100 troops to eliminate uganda's main internal enemy? Wouldn't it make more sense to keep Kony alive and use him as an excuse for arming Museveni to the teeth at top dollar? A US military presence in Uganda is not necessary to maintain a trade in weaponry to the Ugandan army.


Except from what I understand, the US wants an actual presence in Africa, on the ground. Apparently, they're worried about the Chinese doing the same, gaining access to some important resources -- oil and tantalum in particular from what I understand.


But no, military intervention for humanitarian purposes is much too blood stained in comparison to the beautiful results in Rwanda and Darfur, two genocides which helped to greatly exacerbate the tyrannies of both Musevini and Kony.

You, uh, realize that Darfur itself happened specifically because of imperialist meddling in the first place? Sudan was run as two separate colonies by the British, who just sorta slammed them together before they left as they did with every colony. Why? So these places would be in turmoil and in a situation where they could not exert themselves, making them really easy to exploit for resources.

Anyway, what's wrong with your little baby thinking is that you really believe that the US intends to get Kony anyway -- they don't. If the US goes in, Kony is secondary (just like OBL was when we went into Afghanistan -- despite the fact that his being in Pakistan was an open secret for years).

This situation isn't as simple as "oh we should go get a bad guy". No one's saying Kony isn't bad or that someone shouldn't do something about him -- it's just that it's not as simple as just sending in the army and getting him. Powerful countries do not work that way. They do not seek to right wrongs. They are out to protect their geopolitical and financial interests.

this isn't a comic book, guy

[#FF0000]

tl;dr you act like arming and training dictators and armies just to knock them down years later to install a puppet or justify a presence isn't the bread and butter of the united states

[The Young Pioneer]

No, to everything you just said.

Telling me why might be more constructive.

[#FF0000]

Telling me why might be more constructive.

because they're talking about getting the US military involved in Africa when the US military already happens to have interests in that very region of the world.

It is very much a political thing.

[Pretty Flaco]

i thought kony wanted to establish a theocracy? also i think that it's worth noting that invisible children is a for-profit organization. something like only 1/2 of their money actually goes to their cause. can anyone back this up?

[Leftsolidarity]

i thought kony wanted to establish a theocracy? also i think that it's worth noting that invisible children is a for-profit organization. something like only 1/2 of their money actually goes to their cause. can anyone back this up?

I read that it was only about 30 percent actually

[Turinbaar]

I want to stop you right here and point out that you're the guy suggesting western countries get involved in Africa again but that it'll all work out this time.

The last time the west were involved in Africa it was to arbitrate its governments and borders and put its land resources under the ownership of white settlers. Can you tell me where I suggested that 100 US troops should or could do any of these things in Uganda?


Except from what I understand, the US wants an actual presence in Africa, on the ground. Apparently, they're worried about the Chinese doing the same, gaining access to some important resources -- oil and tantalum in particular from what I understand.

I wonder if "anti-imperialists" would oppose the Chinese if they were to do this, or even call it by its correct name.


You, uh, realize that Darfur itself happened specifically because of imperialist meddling in the first place? Sudan was run as two separate colonies by the British, who just sorta slammed them together before they left as they did with every colony. Why? So these places would be in turmoil and in a situation where they could not exert themselves, making them really easy to exploit for resources.

As I said above, can you explain how military intervention against clerical fascism is equivalent to organizing a white colonial government over the africans to draw boarders that would ensure further wars between them?


Anyway, what's wrong with your little baby thinking is that you really believe that the US intends to get Kony anyway -- they don't. If the US goes in, Kony is secondary (just like OBL was when we went into Afghanistan -- despite the fact that his being in Pakistan was an open secret for years).

According to your kindergartener's scheme of how empire works, Bin laden should still be alive as a bogey man for US imperial uses, and pakistan should still be the recipient of US military aid. Osama bin Laden is dead after all, so neither he or Kony are the Goldsteins you make them out to be. Your pseudo-anylisis leans more towards cretinism than fact.


This situation isn't as simple as "oh we should go get a bad guy". No one's saying Kony isn't bad or that someone shouldn't do something about him -- it's just that it's not as simple as just sending in the army and getting him. Powerful countries do not work that way. They do not seek to right wrongs. They are out to protect their geopolitical and financial interests.

this isn't a comic book, guy

It was true on the grand scale that in World War II the allies were protecting their imperialist interests by fighting fascism, but that did not negate, or at least negate fully, the fact that wrongs were righted, in spite of whatever empire had in mind. After all would you be making these same idol noises against allied intervention if you were to point out the truth that it had nothing to do with saving jews or gypsies, and that these were a mere secondary order of consideration?

[#FF0000]

The last time the west were involved in Africa it was to arbitrate its governments and borders and put its land resources under the ownership of white settlers.

Uh, no that's not the last time the west was involved with Africa.

Have you not heard of the IMF or the World Bank?


I wonder if "anti-imperialists" would oppose the Chinese if they were to do this, or even call it by its correct name.
Er, yeah they would. Everyone with sense would.


As I said above, can you explain how military intervention against clerical fascism is equivalent to organizing a white colonial government over the africans to draw boarders that would ensure further wars between them? Er, I never said it was the equivalent. I'm saying that Kony is a bogeyman, and not a particularly scary one at that.


According to your kindergartener's scheme of how empire worksNah I never said "THIS IS HOW EMPIRE WORKS" beyond some very broad and general statements but okay.


Bin laden should still be alive as a bogey man for US imperial usesWhy? The US is already established in Afghanistan and Iraq. And, to be honest, he isn't all that necessary anyway since you just have to say 'terrorism' and you're golden. I mean, shit, the US is doing its saber rattling with Iran over nuclear weapons when literally everyone knows they stopped working towards nuclear armaments years ago.


pakistan should still be the recipient of US military aidWhy


Osama bin Laden is dead after all, so neither he or Kony are the Goldsteins you make them out to be.Nah, maybe OBL wasn't since, after all, you could've just said 'terrorism' and justified anything in the Middle East.


It was true on the grand scale that in World War II the allies were protecting their imperialist interests by fighting fascism, but that did not negate, or at least negate fully, the fact that wrongs were righted, in spite of whatever empire had in mind. After all would you be making these same idol noises against allied intervention if you were to point out the truth that it had nothing to do with saving jews or gypsies, and that these were a mere secondary order of consideration?I don't 'support' any of the imperialist powers in world war 2 anyway, but even if I did, it is absolutely insane to conflate kony, a warlord with less than 500 men under him, all starving in the Congo, with adolf fucking hitler. especially since the guy we support is a big fan of ethnic cleansing himself.

but yeah i don't know what to tell you anymore if you don't think this has anything to do with good ol' fashioned colonial maintenance, keeping western hegemony in Africa secure, gettin' some oil and keeping the Chinese out of Africa and away from America's interests.

[ABMarx]

This is just a highly-publicized campaign of outdated, oversimplified misinformation.

[Martin Blank]

I am very happy to say that I did not have to endure the Facebook onslaught. In fact, the two places where I saw stuff about Kony the most was here and in the last few minutes of the NBC Nightly News last Friday.

I just spent the last 30 minutes watching the video. Here is my assessment: The video is like warm vomit in your mouth -- slick and sickening.

I cannot even begin to express my support for those who have been the most critical of this video, this campaign and its backers. I think that if Cecil Rhodes were alive today, he'd be financing/making videos like this. The whole thing reeks of "white man's burden" and vile imperialist hubris. I would not be surprised if the real source of funding for this came from USAID and/or the State Department.

That said, I think it is incumbent on us to observe what happens on April 20, when these Kony Klowns do their dusk-to-dawn postering and stickering. Whether it succeeds or fails, the result will have lessons -- positive or negative -- we all can learn.

[ArseCynic]

the whole thing is a plot to justify further occupation of africa.

the LRA is no longer in Uganda and a lot of people are saying he is already dead.

only 31% of the donations to the corporate invisible children ink, goes to uganda, and that money is given to it's government, which has commited similar attrocities to what the LRA suposedly has done.

Also, he should not be killed, he deserves a fair trial. look up his 2006 interview, he claims he is innocent of all crimes which gives him the right to fair trial.

[KurtFF8]

Sorry if this has been posted already

KLVY5jBnD-E

[pastradamus]

I honestly couldn't care what happens Kony as long as he dosent come to power. He's a sick bastard that needs to die a painful death.

[piet11111]

So a religious extremist that uses child soldiers ?

And people look at me funny when i first thought this Kony 2012 was a republican presidential nominee.
I can see those guys being in favor of child soldiers.

[CommunityBeliever]

He's a sick bastard that needs to die a painful death.

No sentient being ever needs to experience pain even in death. The abolitionist project is researching how we can create a world free of pain and suffering using biotechnology:

http://www.abolitionist.com/

This talk is about suffering and how to get rid of it.
I predict we will abolish suffering throughout the living world.


It was true on the grand scale that in World War II the allies were protecting their imperialist interests by fighting fascism, but that did not negate, or at least negate fully, the fact that wrongs were righted, in spite of whatever empire had in mind.

Kony controls a few men in central Africa, not the entirety of Europe. As such, intervening in Uganda to depose of Kony is not at all comparable to the allies intervention in Nazi Germany to depose Hitler.

[Orlov]

The real sickening part of this entire thread is that it's been 9 pages and no one at all has recognized the fact that the Ugandan leader is in actuality a dictator that has used the Lord's Resistance Army for years in order to stay in power, the man has been in control of Uganda since the late 1980's and has held onto power for 26 years. He uses the Lord's Resistance Army as his boogie man to stay in power, not to mention General Yoweri Museveni was the one that pioneered the use of child soldiers in Uganda in his own personal fight against Idi Amin in fact this is the same man that kidnapped 3,000 children within the period of a single year to use as fighters with the Tanzanians backed by the United States, Great Britain and China. This is also the same dictator that on a daily basis funnels the money of the Ugandan people in order to buy fancy private jets and other Western goods for himself. In fact, he's also the same one who committed more war crimes in the Democratic Republic of Congo than the Lord's Resistance Army could even begin to dream of, he's singlehandedly been responsible for the slaughter of millions of Congolese in the Congo's second civil war.
The other funny part is the other organization that Invisible Children promote doing business with which is of course the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement of South Sudan who uses child soldiers and is known to engage in war rape. The other really sad part is how some psuedo-leftists with pictures of Orwell manage to turn Kony into Hitler and consider the Ugandan dictator who's a proxy of the United States a lesser evil.
Some of you should be ashamed to call yourselves leftists when you let your petite-bourgeois morality run free without control instead of engaging in materialist analysis of the situation with no regard of morality. Honestly, I'm shocked that some people even on here would support US intervention in support of the Ugandan dictator who has done much worse to the people of Northern Uganda and Uganda in general against the boogie man Kony.

[∞]

No sentient being ever needs to experience pain even in death. The abolitionist project is researching how we can create a world free of pain and suffering using biotechnology:

http://www.abolitionist.com/

This talk is about suffering and how to get rid of it.
I predict we will abolish suffering throughout the living world.


Why do you always post such weird shit?

[Lenina Rosenweg]

The Abolition Project is missing the point.Its Western/capitalist dualism carried to extremes.Pain and pleasure are ultimately the same thing, you can'rt have one without the other.

Nietzsche said, live life not in spite of the pain but because of it. A life without pain or death would be ,,,horrible beyond words. Life itself would become deathlike.

How's that for a thread derailment?

[A Revolutionary Tool]

The real sickening part of this entire thread is that it's been 9 pages and no one at all has recognized the fact that the Ugandan leader is in actuality a dictator that has used the Lord's Resistance Army for years in order to stay in power, the man has been in control of Uganda since the late 1980's and has held onto power for 26 years. He uses the Lord's Resistance Army as his boogie man to stay in power, not to mention General Yoweri Museveni was the one that pioneered the use of child soldiers in Uganda in his own personal fight against Idi Amin in fact this is the same man that kidnapped 3,000 children within the period of a single year to use as fighters with the Tanzanians backed by the United States, Great Britain and China. This is also the same dictator that on a daily basis funnels the money of the Ugandan people in order to buy fancy private jets and other Western goods for himself. In fact, he's also the same one who committed more war crimes in the Democratic Republic of Congo than the Lord's Resistance Army could even begin to dream of, he's singlehandedly been responsible for the slaughter of millions of Congolese in the Congo's second civil war.
The other funny part is the other organization that Invisible Children promote doing business with which is of course the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement of South Sudan who uses child soldiers and is known to engage in war rape. The other really sad part is how some psuedo-leftists with pictures of Orwell manage to turn Kony into Hitler and consider the Ugandan dictator who's a proxy of the United States a lesser evil.
Some of you should be ashamed to call yourselves leftists when you let your petite-bourgeois morality run free without control instead of engaging in materialist analysis of the situation with no regard of morality. Honestly, I'm shocked that some people even on here would support US intervention in support of the Ugandan dictator who has done much worse to the people of Northern Uganda and Uganda in general against the boogie man Kony.
Da fok? Almost everybody here seems to be on your side and almost all of those things you say we haven't "recognized" have been talked about...
Maybe you should read through the 9 pages before you make claims dude...
I mean seriously there was like TWO guys who were even in favor of this campaign and they've been ridiculed...

[urstaat]

The real sickening part of this entire thread is that it's been 9 pages and no one at all has recognized the fact that the Ugandan leader is in actuality a dictator that has used the Lord's Resistance Army for years in order to stay in power, the man has been in control of Uganda since the late 1980's and has held onto power for 26 years. He uses the Lord's Resistance Army as his boogie man to stay in power, not to mention General Yoweri Museveni was the one that pioneered the use of child soldiers in Uganda in his own personal fight against Idi Amin in fact this is the same man that kidnapped 3,000 children within the period of a single year to use as fighters with the Tanzanians backed by the United States, Great Britain and China. This is also the same dictator that on a daily basis funnels the money of the Ugandan people in order to buy fancy private jets and other Western goods for himself. In fact, he's also the same one who committed more war crimes in the Democratic Republic of Congo than the Lord's Resistance Army could even begin to dream of, he's singlehandedly been responsible for the slaughter of millions of Congolese in the Congo's second civil war.
The other funny part is the other organization that Invisible Children promote doing business with which is of course the Sudanese People's Liberation Movement of South Sudan who uses child soldiers and is known to engage in war rape. The other really sad part is how some psuedo-leftists with pictures of Orwell manage to turn Kony into Hitler and consider the Ugandan dictator who's a proxy of the United States a lesser evil.
Some of you should be ashamed to call yourselves leftists when you let your petite-bourgeois morality run free without control instead of engaging in materialist analysis of the situation with no regard of morality. Honestly, I'm shocked that some people even on here would support US intervention in support of the Ugandan dictator who has done much worse to the people of Northern Uganda and Uganda in general against the boogie man Kony.

See post #23. Snorewell guy has been about the only person I've observed with any emotional investment in this goofy movement.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

From the get-go there was something about the whole Kony 2012 campaign that didn’t sit right with us. Maybe it was just that it was so slick, so commercial, so intentionally viral without telling you what it was all about. Or maybe it was Invisible Children seemed focused on the crimes of Joseph Kony to the exclusion of the sins committed by the group’s partners in the Uganda government.
http://queerty-prodweb.s3.amazonaws.com/wp/docs/2012/03/Picture-231.png (http://queerty-prodweb.s3.amazonaws.com/wp/docs/2012/03/Picture-231.png)We should always trust our instincts: B.E. Wilson of Alternet (http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2012/03/11/invisible-children-funded-by-antigay-creationist-christian-right/#disqus_thread) sifted through annual reports and tax forms filed by Invisible Children and its donors and discovered serious connections to anti-gay groups like the Caster Family Foundation and the Call (both major players in the push for California’s Prop 8).

One of The Call’s major donors in 2008 also gave, that same year, over 400,000 dollars to Invisible Children. These links weren’t anomalies. They were part of a pattern.
What does Invisible Children share in common with James Dobson’s Focus on the Family, the Family Research Council (pegged (http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report/browse-all-issues/2010/winter/the-hard-liners) by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “hate group”)…
What does IC have in common with the ministry of California evangelist Ed Silvoso, who works directly with leading Ugandan author and promoter of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill (also called the “kill the gays bill”) Julius Oyet—who claims (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZKTgjNd9-Y#t=5m20s) that “even animals are wiser than homosexuals”?
The answer? All of these ministries—the Discovery Institute, Focus on the Family, the Family Research Council, The Fellowship Foundation, The Call, Ed Silvoso’s Harvest Evangelism, and Invisible Children—received at least $100,000 in 2008 from what has emerged in the last decade as the biggest funder of the hard, antigay, creationist Christian right: the National Christian Foundation (http://www.nationalchristian.com/home).
Gee, we wonder if Oprah, Lady Gaga and Ellen DeGeneres—all of whom have been targeted by IC’s appeal—are aware of its links to known hate groups. We’re gonna guess not.
So, does this mean we should assume any effort to bring a human-rights violator to justice is part of a anti-gay conspiracy? Of course not. But maybe we should all do a little digging before we start forwarding links or changing our names on Facebook.
Besides, we think Invisible Children works better as the name of a ’90s Brit-pop band than an activist group anyway.


Full story here: http://www.queerty.com/if-you-were-looking-for-a-reason-to-hate-on-invisible-children-and-the-kony-2012-campaign-here-it-is-20120313/#ixzz1p23tl6gJ



I am somehow less than surprised. More ammo for the cappies to choke on.

[Hiero]

I honestly couldn't care what happens Kony as long as he dosent come to power. He's a sick bastard that needs to die a painful death.

Well he is not in a position to come to power (if you mean run a government).

[Princess Luna]

rU_1jnrj5VI

[Ostrinski]

Someone do this
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/kony-2012#carlweathers

[Raúl Duke]

I like how in the Al-Jazeera video the guy tries to counter the idea of the whole thing being some sort of "slacktivism" but really I can't see it as anything else but just that.

[CommieTroll]

I had to sit through Invisible Children's piece of shit propaganda video in school today, TWICE!!!! FUCKING TWICE!!! And I'm called an insensitive asshole when I pointed out the crimes of the Ugandan military and Yoweri Museveni. Liberals fucking sicken me, it's saddening when I see so many of my friends taking that propaganda at face value and believing it to be true.

[brigadista]

just for you CommieTroll.....:):)

VpuB11d0Gog

[CommieTroll]

just for you CommieTroll.....:):)

VpuB11d0Gog

This is just what I needed to see :laugh:

[TheGodlessUtopian]

I had to sit through Invisible Children's piece of shit propaganda video in school today, TWICE!!!! FUCKING TWICE!!! And I'm called an insensitive asshole when I pointed out the crimes of the Ugandan military and Yoweri Museveni. Liberals fucking sicken me, it's saddening when I see so many of my friends taking that propaganda at face value and believing it to be true.

Jesus fucking christ... under what pretense did they justify showing that?

[∞]

My current america teacher showed it to us but criticized it as well. Almost everyone in class was critical of it. :thumbup:

[TheGodlessUtopian]

My current america teacher showed it to us but criticized it as well. Almost everyone in class was critical of it. :thumbup:

That is great, here I was beginning to think that humanity was a ignorant creature when there was bastions of intellect.

[CommieTroll]

Jesus fucking christ... under what pretense did they justify showing that?

Well first my History teacher (who is a typical Liberal who likes to toss around the persona of being a Socialist and a Nationalist at the same time while wearing a Che Guevara t-shirt) claimed that ''everyone needed to see this'', I wasn't gonna let that shit slide. Then in Religion we were mindlessly told how ''inspiring'' this video was. Propaganda in school always makes me sick but today I swear I nearly threw up in my mouth a few times.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Well first my History teacher (who is a typical Liberal who likes to toss around the persona of being a Socialist and a Nationalist at the same time while wearing a Che Guevara t-shirt) claimed that ''everyone needed to see this'', I wasn't gonna let that shit slide. Then in Religion we were mindlessly told how ''inspiring'' this video was. Propaganda in school always makes me sick but today I swear I nearly threw up in my mouth a few times.

How on earth did your religion teacher justify showing it? How was it "inspiring" in relation to your studies?

[brigadista]

68GbzIkYdc8

[ColonelCossack]

I don't know anything about it, but I've been told it's fake.

[CommieTroll]

How on earth did your religion teacher justify showing it? How was it "inspiring" in relation to your studies?

We never do anything in Religion, it's basically a free class. Most people just do their homework and just simply talk to each other. I'm more productive with my free time in that class by carefully spending it flirting or slandering the Catholic Church :laugh:

[L.A.P.]

I remember when Obama's sending of 100 troops to Uganda was posted on RevLeft. Uganda led by the current National Ressistance Army government was basically a Libyan puppet state before the overthrow of Gaddafi, it's obvious that these events coincide with each other. You'll also notice that the whole "documentary" places a big empasis on promoting social networking and electronics industry, the companies of these industries also happen to be the main provocateurs in a lot of African conflicts for resources such as coltan. Not to mention that the fact that this is just purely a propaganda campaign is shown that this video was posted almost a year after Obama sent troops to Uganda, so what the fuck else do you want me to do? Buy our posters and t-shirts, of course.

[The Machine]

The Al jazeera video basically says it all. Essentially some shithead liberal playing to the white guilt of American liberals and the missionary/savior complex of conservatives to further what amounts to a white man's burden project.

[ed miliband]

AMAZING twist in the tale:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/16/jason-russell-arrested-invisible-children-kony_n_1354455.html?ref=world

[urstaat]

That's a twist if I've ever seen one. Bony 2012!

[RedZero]

That's a twist if I've ever seen one. Bony 2012!

Horny 2012

[Comrade Jandar]

amazing twist in the tale:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/16/jason-russell-arrested-invisible-children-kony_n_1354455.html?ref=world


Kony 2012: Legalize Public Masturbation!

[Sasha]

AMAZING twist in the tale:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/16/jason-russell-arrested-invisible-children-kony_n_1354455.html?ref=world

How much you want to bet he was coked out of his brain...

[NewLeft]

He was teaching his son..
32PBZ870ymg

[Vyacheslav Brolotov]

Only sickos and imperialists masturbate in public. This guy is both.

[Krano]

People will use this scandal to claim that he has been set up to derail attention from Kony 2012, anyway my personal opinion on the movement is that it's just a sad attempt to try and expand US hegemony to Africa.
Leader of Uganda is a war criminal himself who used child soldiers as well, but no one seems to care about him only this one guy who isn't even in Uganda anymore and most likely isn't even alive anymore.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

haha... seems that weirdos like this co-founder are prone to being arrested for the strangest things at the most opportune times. More ammo for us to use I suppose.lol

[REDSOX]

I thought kony was dead. Certainly the so called lords resistance army does not even operate in Uganda today. I find this video patronising and paternalistic giving the impression that only outsiders mainly white can solve Ugandas problems. No wonder the Ugandans are upset about it. This nonsense could give the imperialists the excuse to meddle in africa no doubt to nick their resources before the chinese get them.

[Leftsolidarity]

We're doing a little project on this for my American Problems class. Good thing is my teacher is doing it in a way where we have to go to all these different websites and look at how IC operates and the history behind this conflict. It totally ripes the Kony 2012 shit to pieces. All through the student's own research too. I must give him a high-five.

[Franz Fanonipants]

i'm p. sure IC is an evangelical christian front org.

[The Intransigent Faction]

Had a discussion about this in my Political Sociology course today. Found a pretty good article on this:
http://www.trinicenter.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2385