Kony 2012

If you've been on any news site or Facebook within the last few days, you've probably heard of Kony 2012. For those of you who haven't here's the scoop: Kony 2012 is a video launched by Invisible Children. This group uses creativity to produce visual messages in support of ending child armies.


The actual Invisible Children are child soldiers whose lives are living hell. Most are kidnapped from their homes/villages when they are very young (sometimes as young as 5), then they are forced into the military and drugged so that they have no fear. If they try to escape, they are captured and killed in front of other children to set an example. These children are raped (many girls serve as sex slaves), treated like servants and are the first sent into battle. They are offered up as sacrifices against trained armies in an effort to save older soldiers lives.


Back to Kony 2012 though. The intention of the video was to harness the powers of social media and make a change in the world. Joseph Kony (the man at the top of this blog) has been in hiding since 2006, and this video is an effort to familiarize the entire world with his face and the travesties he has committed in an effort to capture him. High aspirations, but it seems to be working.


According to an article by wtop.com (based out of Washington, D.C.), the video was posted to YouTube on March 5 (2012). By Thursday morning (March 8) the video had already been played 30 million times. When I looked at 7:30 a.m. March 9, the video had over 55 million views.


I have seen opposition to this ideas behind this video and don't understand. Although I am well aware of the issues faced in the U.S, we are all apart of one global community. I agree we need to "fix" the issues at home, but we don't have an issue like this at home. We don't have children being forced off to war at 5, our children sign up at 18 if they WANT too. It takes five seconds to share a video on Facebook, 30 minutes to watch the entire video, and then you can choose if you want to act based on the information you've heard. 


If the United States were ever in a position to have these types of horrors on our soil, I pray that other parts of the world would respond the way I have seen most of my friends respond- by sharing the information and helping to spread the world. This is a call to action; something as small as sharing the page is answering that call and helping to support the child soldiers of Africa. I hope that this video makes it harder for Kony to stay underground. Maybe someone will have the courage to disclose his hideout information now that there is global support and we can all hope, for the sake of the children, that this comes to an end.


I have also seen debates about the negative ramifications of the video. Mainly, the timing of its release and the validity behind the information used in the video. Many question the timing because there are already U.S. troops in Uganda looking for Kony, they also question it because most of the resistance is no longer in Uganda, but in places such as the DRC. Regardless, this video raises awareness of child soldiers. No matter where they are, it needs to be stopped. 


Regarding the informative content of the video, it started with pictures/videos of the producers son. What makes anyone think that this wouldn't be opinion based? If I wanted the straight facts, I wouldn't be relying on social media to spit this into my lap. The video was not designed to show you the efforts taken by Ugandan government because that's not the point of it. The point was to show you the travesties faced by child soldiers and for the global community to respond in order to rid the world of child soldiers.