Who is Joseph Kony?

Idris

polaris_x wrote:

redrock wrote:

That would be fantastic, wouldn't it? But one would need to end conflicts before having elections.

When you look at Uganda and DR Congo, both in dreadful conflicts, both rich countries, both completely corrupt. The wealth is not for the benefit of the people but exploited by the rulers and big corporations - yes Western ones too. Things are way too violent and volatile, but if and when things settle - 'we' are straight back in and so is exploitation and corruption.

part of me believes some of these conflicts are driven by the west to ensure political instability in the region ... also, it creates a market for arms sales which is big motivation of foreign policy ...

Something the 'system' is fearful of is a 'United Africa'. So Keep them divided (in conflict/strife), provide weapons, keep the bloodshed going until they (the people/land who you seek to exploit) are weak enough for the empires to come in and conquer them, Coming in as the 'heroes'.

The President of Uganda 'Museveni' has been in power for 26 years, how much bloodshed is on his hands? Is he innocent of war crimes? Does it even matter? I mean he's friendly with us so why should it?

This right now is all about the Militerization of Uganda via what was passed A few years ago, the LRA Disarmament And Northern Uganda Recovery Act. Put troops and "advisers" on the ground. Slowly building up a force and pushing 'AFRICOM' (AFRICOM started during the G.W Bush era)

The US is interested in keeping China at a distance from the resources in Africa and of course making a strong foothold in The Pearl Of Africa which will help in it's fight against 'Al Shabaab'. Slowly but surely the 'western power structure' is moving in on Africa.

Kony is not unique in the world, he is one of many. He just currently fits in well being the bogeyman against US interests on the African continent right now and along with this 'kony 2012' propaganda marketing campaign being pushed around and gaining popularity and whatever.

This is a feel good conflict the public can get behind. A public who probably could not even point out 'Uganda' on a map.

inlet13

An interesting retort:


http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/

We got trouble.

For those asking what you can do to help, please link to visiblechildren.tumblr.com wherever you see KONY 2012 posts. And tweet a link to this page to famous people on Twitter who are talking about KONY 2012!

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.

~ Grant Oyston, <!-- e --><a href="mailto:visiblechildren@grantoyston.com">visiblechildren@grantoyston.com</a><!-- e -->

Grant Oyston is a sociology and political science student at Acadia University in Nova Scotia, Canada. You can help spread the word about this by linking to his blog at visiblechildren.tumblr.com anywhere you see posts about KONY 2012.

polaris_x

those are good points about the organization ... most charities need to be scrutinized a bit more ... it is why some of us here have said that although removal and capture of this man would be good thing - it still doesn't solve the underlying problems in africa ...

inlet13

polaris_x wrote:

those are good points about the organization ... most charities need to be scrutinized a bit more ... it is why some of us here have said that although removal and capture of this man would be good thing - it still doesn't solve the underlying problems in africa ...

Right. I don't claim to know the ins and outs of this situation or the organization behind it. But, I do think there are many charities/organizations (certainly NOT ALL) out there that take advantage of situations, most people would see as problematic (Kony, cancer charities, etc). So, organizations like this should be scrutinized a bit before we go posting everywhere.

It seems to me there's a lot of problems with this organization. Yet, people are touting it everywhere (not just here). I've seen it all over the place. I think it's trending on twitter as we speak. It would be pretty sad if it's just another way to make money. The under workings behind this seems slightly similar to the military industrial complex and their voice in the states toppling other horrid leaders, just a new way to build popular support.

Idris

inlet13 wrote:

polaris_x wrote:

those are good points about the organization ... most charities need to be scrutinized a bit more ... it is why some of us here have said that although removal and capture of this man would be good thing - it still doesn't solve the underlying problems in africa ...

So, organizations like this should be scrutinized a bit before we go posting everywhere.

It seems to me there's a lot of problems with this organization. Yet, people are touting it everywhere (not just here). I've seen it all over the place. I think it's trending on twitter as we speak. It would be pretty sad if it's just another way to make money. The under workings behind this seems slightly similar to the military industrial complex and their voice in the states toppling other horrid leaders, just a new way to build popular support.

'invisible children'..visible propaganda.

People passing it around, spreading like an african wildfire.

peacefrompaul

inlet13 wrote:

polaris_x wrote:

those are good points about the organization ... most charities need to be scrutinized a bit more ... it is why some of us here have said that although removal and capture of this man would be good thing - it still doesn't solve the underlying problems in africa ...

Right. I don't claim to know the ins and outs of this situation or the organization behind it. But, I do think there are many charities/organizations (certainly NOT ALL) out there that take advantage of situations, most people would see as problematic (Kony, cancer charities, etc). So, organizations like this should be scrutinized a bit before we go posting everywhere.

It seems to me there's a lot of problems with this organization. Yet, people are touting it everywhere (not just here). I've seen it all over the place. I think it's trending on twitter as we speak. It would be pretty sad if it's just another way to make money. The under workings behind this seems slightly similar to the military industrial complex and their voice in the states toppling other horrid leaders, just a new way to build popular support.

I am personally not endorsing the organization.... I haven't looked into it enough. I just want people to see what is going on over there. People need to understand what is happening in the world.

Idris

peacefrompaul wrote:

I just want people to see what is going on over there. People need to understand what is happening in the world.

Yea of course...We also need to understand what is happening here at home. See what's going on here in our countries, with our leaders. 2 my mind, I feel that when we understand our own issues here, our foreign policy towards other nations (and why it is the way it is). When we get a better grasp on that, then maybe we can focus on other areas.

and of course once we understand our foreign policy a bit better, we should be able to see that (for example) WE are 'Joseph Kony' to other countries. Know what I mean? We want to fix the world? Or want to know what's going on around the world? Then perhaps we Focus on the 'foreign policy' that is the root cause of much of the worlds issues.

fife

Idris wrote:

peacefrompaul wrote:

I just want people to see what is going on over there. People need to understand what is happening in the world.

Yea of course...We also need to understand what is happening here at home. See what's going on here in our countries, with our leaders. 2 my mind, I feel that when we understand our own issues here, our foreign policy towards other nations (and why it is the way it is). When we get a better grasp on that, then maybe we can focus on other areas.

and of course once we understand our foreign policy a bit better, we should be able to see that (for example) WE are 'Joseph Kony' to other countries. Know what I mean? We want to fix the world? Or want to know what's going on around the world? Then perhaps we Focus on the 'foreign policy' that is the root cause of much of the worlds issues.

While I agree that we also have to look at our foreign policy i do believe we also have to say that we have to see that many of the root causes of much of what is happening today has to do with greed and power.

Jason P

So, based on the overall sentiment, Uganda is screwed, right? Western influence has caused this problem, so I guess there is no way to fix it.

Or, how about we raise this issue to the world and allow Seal Team 6 and Bruce Willis to go take this asshole out. If the world carries out the death sentence, our drones will be more then glad to help out and ghost this horrible animal. It beats waiting for world policy to somehow make an instantaneous change.

Idris

fife wrote:

While I agree that we also have to look at our foreign policy i do believe we also have to say that we have to see that many of the root causes of much of what is happening today has to do with greed and power.

Right on, the foreign policy stems (based from) things like 'greed' 'ego' ignorance' 'power' etc.

I'm sure our foreign policy would look quite different if The Buddha wrote the policy and it was not written by power hungry oligarchs abusing positions they are in and twisting reality to manipulate people for greedy gains that in the long (and short) run do nothing to help the world, rather does everything to keep the world in a state of constant strife, perpetual war and then guise our own greedy involvement as acts of 'grace' and for 'general 'freedom' and/or for the 'betterment of humanity'.

peacefrompaul

Jason P wrote:

So, based on the overall sentiment, Uganda is screwed, right? Western influence has caused this problem, so I guess there is no way to fix it.

Or, how about we raise this issue to the world and allow Seal Team 6 and Bruce Willis to go take this asshole out. If the world carries out the death sentence, our drones will be more then glad to help out and ghost this horrible animal. It beats waiting for world policy to somehow make an instantaneous change.

That was kind of my thought... Gather intel, track him down, seal (no pun intended) the deal.

Idris

peacefrompaul wrote:

Jason P wrote:

So, based on the overall sentiment, Uganda is screwed, right? Western influence has caused this problem, so I guess there is no way to fix it.

Or, how about we raise this issue to the world and allow Seal Team 6 and Bruce Willis to go take this asshole out. If the world carries out the death sentence, our drones will be more then glad to help out and ghost this horrible animal. It beats waiting for world policy to somehow make an instantaneous change.

That was kind of my thought... Gather intel, track him down, seal (no pun intended) the deal.

Why Kony and not the President of Uganda? Of course go after the killer thug that is against foreign imperialism and support the killer thug that is in favor of the foreign imperialism. (so to speak)

Out of all the people to get, they are focusing on the one who is so against the western push for Africa via AFRICOM.

Killing Kony is just one step the US needs to secure itself better in the area. I say, if it really is about 'justice' then they (the western powers) should target the ones who have killed even more than Kony. But they won't

It's not in Americas Interest right now, and Americas interests in the region are not based on decency and justice. The Taking over of peoples lands and natural resources is not just nor decent.

peacefrompaul

Idris wrote:

peacefrompaul wrote:

Jason P wrote:

So, based on the overall sentiment, Uganda is screwed, right? Western influence has caused this problem, so I guess there is no way to fix it.

Or, how about we raise this issue to the world and allow Seal Team 6 and Bruce Willis to go take this asshole out. If the world carries out the death sentence, our drones will be more then glad to help out and ghost this horrible animal. It beats waiting for world policy to somehow make an instantaneous change.

That was kind of my thought... Gather intel, track him down, seal (no pun intended) the deal.

Why Kony and not the President of Uganda? Of course go after the killer thug that is against foreign imperialism and support the killer thug that is in favor of the foreign imperialism. (so to speak)

Out of all the people to get, they are focusing on the one who is so against the western push for Africa via AFRICOM.

Killing Kony is just one step the US needs to secure itself better in the area. I say, if it really is about 'justice' then they (the western powers) should target the ones who have killed even more than Kony. But they won't

It's not in Americas Interest right now, and Americas interests in the region are not based on decency and justice. The Taking over of peoples lands and natural resources is not just nor decent.

maybe it's someone else's turn.

eeriepadave

watching the video on youtube now. A whole bunch pf people and musicians were putting it on facebook so thought i'd check it out

eeriepadave

eeriepadave wrote:

watching the video on youtube now. A whole bunch pf people and musicians were putting it on facebook so thought i'd check it out

pretty touching. Anyone remember the movie Blood Diamond starring Leonardo DiCaprio about 5 or so years ago? This kinda reminds me of that movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtPX2kXhu7I

arthurdent

Kat wrote:

http://www.kony2012.com/watch

kony2012 is a fraud:

http://thedailywh.at/2012/03/07/on-kony-2012-2/

peacefrompaul

arthurdent wrote:

Kat wrote:

http://www.kony2012.com/watch

kony2012 is a fraud:

http://thedailywh.at/2012/03/07/on-kony-2012-2/

What's the credibility of the daily what?

Idris

peacefrompaul wrote:

maybe it's someone else's turn.

?

peacefrompaul

Idris wrote:

peacefrompaul wrote:

maybe it's someone else's turn.

?

To get involved

doolally

knoy2012.com "you say ya want a revolution yea!" Lennon/McCartney :geek: knoy2012.com