After KONY
2012 video attracted over 82 million views on YouTube up to date, the local
people of Lira town in Uganda finally got to see the video that the world
was talking about. A local charity “The
African Youth Initiative Network” organized a screening of the movie and invited locals to come and watch the most important video of that week or maybe of
the year. Many of them were looking forward to watch this video
since it was the central discussion in social media, shared/watched
all over the world, what they looked forward was to see a video that would present their struggle and
problems. Yet, what they found was
different from what they expected I guess. Malcolm Webb, a journalist of
Aljazeera explained that the people he spooked to “anticipated seeing a video
that showed the world the terrible atrocities that they had suffered during the
conflict and the ongoing struggles they still face trying to rebuild their
lives after two lost decades.” However, after
watching the video he noted that the mood changed in the crowd and many saw this video as “inaccurate account that belittled and commercialized their
suffering, as the film promotes KONY bracelets and other fundraising merchandise,
with the aim of making KONY infamous.”
So what do you make out of the KONY 2012
camping then? As I stated in my previous op-ed about KONY, I have countless
question and continue to ask more about the video and the NGO itself. But also
want to understand more about how much of an impact this video might have on
locals and outside of Uganda. If this video was done with its best intention
for the local people, then how come the locals are so angry about that? I guess
sometimes awareness is important because at list out of this video many people know that “Uganda”
is a country and “Joseph Kony” exist. If the people that shared/watched the
video about Kony have no power or refuse to do anything about it and just give money
to Invisible Children for awesome camping of poorly portrayed Ugandans who is winning
here?
Here is the link that will take you aljazeera video:
I think that the people of Uganda have a right to be angry about the KONY video. This video was made by people who had never been involved in this particular situation nor have ever experienced a tragedy of this caliber in their lives. Put simply, the KONY video is a way for people living comfortably in the first world countries to feel good about themselves and think that they are doing something to change the world. Sure, a wave of social media could be beneficial to the cause, but does anyone even know where the profits are going to? How do these people plan on stopping KONY and the whole army that has been recruiting children for years and years? Personally, I believe that the only way that he can be stopped is through an inside effort by the people of Uganda. An outsider to the country can only do so much. The United States cannot solve every problem.
ReplyDeleteI am sure the people who put the video together have the best intentions. I watched a bit about the KONY sensation on MSNBC and they had a watchdog organization come on and discuss the group. He said that their organization is pretty legitimate the only thing they have a problem with is that they do not have five independent members on their board of directors. I agree that most people are just watching the video, posting it on the Facebook profile, and never thinking about it again. Most people have not cared about this situation and only "care" now because it is the trendy thing to do.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46768543/ns/local_news-clarksburg_wv/t/leader-kony-video-group-focus-health/#.T2fq-xFDtvI
ReplyDeleteI think that people need to look at what activism really means. Getting the attention of a lot of people for a week is cool, but it hardly does anything to help anyone. Being an active part of an organization is different than sharing a video through facebook and twitter. In the last opinion about this subject, I talked about the large sums of money that the charity organizers make off of this charity. It seems to me that this is conflict of interest. The more people who know, the more who donate. The more donations that come in, the more money the organizers make. The whole things just seems pretty fishy to me.
ReplyDeleteI still do not know what authority and audacity these people have or had to make such a video. And, I am inclined to say that some of the content of the video is not even true....I am a pissed off Ugandan.
ReplyDelete