KONY 2012

After having both my Twitter and Facebook accounts assaulted by the Kony 2012 video (if you have not seen it I am shocked, but here is the link), I felt compelled to write a blog post about it. I wouldn't consider myself an Invisible Children "hater" per-say, but I am definitely among their skeptics.

I'll start with some of the positives. The video has proven widely successful at raising awareness with over  86 million views since it's release less than one month ago. The organization set out to prove that young people can have an impact and change things, and so far they have proven that. They also helped add to the growing evidence that social media can be a power tool for social change. As a member of their target audience, I am comforted and emboldened by the fact that my voice can actually be heard. However, the organizations propaganda feeds into American misperceptions about Africa to gain support and attention.


The following is a quote from one of several open letters written to the CEO of Invisible Children, Jason Russell written by Penny Carothers , "By positioning yourself as the mouthpiece for this cause, you have denied the people of Uganda the opportunity to speak for themselves. You have depicted them as voiceless, hopeless, and at our mercy. Nothing could be further from the truth". The Uganda people are portrayed in this video as helpless, starving, and child-like, a stereotype that Americans are very comfortable with. I've written about this stereotype before in Simba doesn't live in Nairobi, and here again we see the same stereotype being used by an aid organization to try and garner support. It disgusts me a little bit that people with such big ideas would resort to such dehumanizing stereotypes to sell their ideas. Carothers goes on to say, "Jason, your video is slick and well produced, and it has garnered attention because it’s emotionally appealing and tragic. But it gives Americans the idea that they are the solution to the conflict, when they simply are not". That is what annoys me the most about this video. The message is: Americans must be the solution because Ugandans haven't fixed it yet.


The video also makes some fairly outrageous claims. They claim that no one cared about the issue and that the children were invisible before their organization came around, but that is complete specualtion. Also why are they invisible until recognized by a Western audience? Do they not truly exist until America cares? They also claim that the president could withdraw the military advisors from Uganda at any moment and then they would fail, so we have to keep pressuring the government. I am highly skeptical of this logic. First, I do not believe Obama would be so quick to pull out the 100 military advisors; he has nothing to gain from that. Second, the removal of those 100 military advisors would not ensure the failure of this campaign. The video seems to assert that without US military assistance the Ugandans cannot win. This patronizing view point frustrates me. 


In another open letter to Jason Russell by Amber Ha of the Acholi Times, she ends with this, "There is an Uganda saying that goes, 'The grass will always suffer when two elephants fight.' Isn't it time we let the grass grow?". 

Simba doesn't live in Nairobi...

Consider for a moment the two attached pictures; which one best represents Africa?

My gut reaction was to chose the UNICEF advertisement with the despondent-looking children. But taking that stance infantilizes Africa. The second picture is one of Nairobi, Kenya, which although it may not be Chicago or New York is a functioning “modern” city that is also a part of Africa. I began to question what made me view Africa as a continent of starving orphans and not a place with a wide variety of people and problems? I came to the conclusion that American media coverage makes Africa appear helpless, childlike, and unable to solve its own problems.

To test this theory, I went to the New York Times and browsed through the articles of their Africa section. To my surprise, only one of the articles listed was about progress in Africa, and the rest were about either political unrest, violence, and natural disaster (I invited you to follow the link and see for yourself, that hardly any of the articles pertain to progress). To further support for my hypothesis, when I clicked on a link to read about Ugandan government officials stepping down amidst scandal, the following advertisement appeared at the top of the screen...

“Children are dying in East Africa”, and cue photo of a despondent child.

Now I don’t mean to dismiss the tragedies and suffering in Africa, but I would like to make clear that there are modern cities and capable adults in Africa. Until I was about twelve years old, I believed Africa was essentially The Lion King or The Jungle Book and I believe that kind of ignorance is dangerous. There has been a recent back lash against foreign aid in Africa and I would have to agree with it. The people of Africa are perfectly capable of solving their own problems, they only need capital and international support to do so.

Since most of our exposure to Africa is through ad campaigns such as UNICEF, Heifer, or the Red Cross, which want to illicit guilt through their photos, we are left with a distorted sense of Africa. For one we categorize the whole continent as one, like I have done throughout this post, even though there are innumerable tribes, languages, customs, and cultures throughout the continent. We also tend to cast Africa in victim narratives because of our media perception. We look to give handouts instead of advice, and want to intervene instead of assist. Our media perception causes us to act a certain way in regards to Africa; so if we alter the media image or Africa, maybe we can shift people’s thinking as well?

I am curious to see how Africa appears to other people, feel free to comment!