Kony 2012

This is relevant

p.s. I don't.

Edgy

Is it bad to say that I'm already sick of seeing "Kony 2012" everywhere?

I'm glad people are trying to "do" something about it.

But from what I've been told, Invisible Children doesn't really spend a lot of the money they make on helping, but rather spend it on their wages and whatnot.

So the children are both invisible to me and the Charity trying to help them.

While feel-good (or feel-awful) techniques are very useful at viral marketing and raising awareness, follow the money trail, and look to see how this viral Kony 2012 bit started. It's been what, 24 hours?

Follow the money trail, unfortunately.

Not to worry

Angelina has it under control!

@Jinjo, these people are buying into a movie and idea that makes them feel good about themselves! Why do spoil it??

Kony tl;dr

Lots of bone-headed comments in this thread.

Yes, the YouTube video is propaganda, and it's biased, and it's an appeal to emotion ...

-- big deal --

... that doesn't change the fact that atrocities in Africa have been largely overlooked, ignored, and swept under the rug for a very long time. There is nothing un-factual or irresponsible about shining the proverbial spotlight on this issue, or imploring people to take action to stop such atrocities.

Think about it ... if your elementary-school-age child was abducted by a tyrannical militia-style "jungle" warlord, who openly condoned and encouraged rape, murder, disfiguration, and purposeless war .... don't you think you might have just a small problem with that?

It's so easy for critics to view this situation in Africa and say/feel "eh? it's not my problem" ... and maybe that's true ... but more importantly, maybe it isn't true. Think about it.

I get that people usually choose lesser of evils when deciding their candidate, but I don't think Kony is even allowed to be president of the US.

So then what do you propose? America to the rescue?

We would be in Africa for at least a decade trying to clean up all the messes there.

Remember before WW2 when america tried to stay out of other countries problems? Good times.

This is of concern to me....



Despite weather the Kony video is accurate or not. Congress and only congress has the authority to wage war. What Panetta is saying in this video (if you don't feel like watching the whole thing) is that the administration doesn't need permission from congress to take military action. That is simply stunning, not to mention incorrect.

This whole Kony video feels very much like propaganda. I bet within a few days you will see the administration again taking unilateral action to intervene. Again without congressional permission, and probably again calling it a "kinetic military action" like they did last year with Libia.

I think the argument being made is that the particular operation that'[s spreading these videos has a huge overhead and that very little of the money that they're gathering is going to go to actually helping something.

Direct help is never a bad thing when you're helping an issue, but in this case, I can't help but feel that people are getting taken advantage of.

read some of the post here but not all.
id like to ask a simple question: if africa's major export was crude oil, would the united states be more interested in the affairs of the afican people and/or children to ensure trade between the two countries?

Posted a link to that video three posts up and facebook deleted it.......tin foil hat on.

Direct help can sometimes be a bad thing if you don't watch the consequences. George Clooney used some of his money directly to build a well and huts for a community in Sudan. Great, huh? Now that village has water and places to live! Unfortunately, neighboring villagers came in and killed people to get to those luxuries.

Watched the video, felt compelled to do something. Figured with all the money they have going to this campaign a yard sign would be free. Noticed they have outrageously priced items for sale to "help the people." Read more posts like in this forum and saw they only give 34% to the effort while the rest go to travel/fees/salary. Yea... non-profit.

I agree with whoever said the pre-WWII thing. Our own economy is tanking and we're broke. Can we fix our decrepit house before we try and repair our neighbors?

That's another thing to note.. Uganda was recently found to be an oil rich nation.

So would American military involvement really be a boon to their nation or a means of securing more oil?

I must say, the title of this thread makes it sound like a presidential campaign.

thats the point, to give kony attention so this charity can raise awareness to the us ppl. this is so that they can send troops over as advisors to help catch the war criminal that is joesph kony.

hmm very interesting.

id like to note that the us was never attacked by terrorist before the the intervention of the us in the persian gulf war. in that situation the us was protecting its interest in kuwait's oil supply.

so based off the past, the idea behind helping these countries in the future could cause similar issues in the future.

And the other half of the point is that they're using the money to fund an army that's arguably equally as problematic. The Ugandan people don't want this ***, it's hurting them all the same, stop supporting it.

wrong.

Well it depends on semantics.

US soil definitely had terrorists attacks done on it in the past, the Revolutionary War comprised of many of the acts done by the revolutionaries.

It's what you do when you can't take an army head on.

Visible Children

From what I hear, 7 cents on the dollar goes to children, 93 cents goes to IC

I've been spreading around the link I posted to people who post the video :D