Saturday, December 7, 2013

Phony 2012


PHONY 2012
Jason Thomas

                The Kony 2012 campaign promoted by Invisible Children gained infamy after releasing a promotional video on YouTube in March 2012.  The thirty minute video features the story of Jason Russell, his five year old son, oh yeah, and children suffering in Uganda under a military regime.  The first five to ten minutes of the video seem to focus more on Russell’s story rather than calling out his humanitarian goals; if you can call them that.  Russell’s story goes on, telling of his trip to Uganda and a boy named Jacob, a former child soldier captured by Joseph Kony.  Kony, a militant tyrant, was capturing children and forcing them to be in his army; forcing them to kill.  After telling the story of Jacob and Kony, Russell calls the viewer to act by “making Kony famous” and by making donations to the Invisible Children Organization.
While this video seems to have good intentions, there are underlying messages and information gaps peppered throughout.  Overall, the video seems to be more about a white family (Russell and his five year old son) feeling obligated to help poor defenseless black Ugandans, rather than focusing on the situation in Uganda.  It seems as if Russell wants us to know he and other white people are acting as a voice for a disadvantaged people more than the real situation.  This has been a problem since the beginning of humanitarian efforts in Africa.  Instead of working with the local government, we feel we know what “they” need because we feel we are superior.  Some of the outrage from the film came from the “make Kony famous” ploy which was intended to eventually lead the U.S. government to find and eliminate him as a threat.  Many Ugandans argued that this would solve nothing except to put more fuel on the fire. After watching this video, Ugandans were outraged by its content and how they were portrayed.  Several response videos were posted by Ugandans declaring they do have a voice and they are not helpless just because they are black or because they are African.

                           Residents watch the premiere of

Like other humanitarian media coming out of Africa, this video creates a racial stereotype of Africans, specifically black Africans, as weak, inferior, and desperately in need of help. This creates racial stereotypes just as easily by showing another race as inferior and unable to self-govern.  This has been the case with images coming out of Africa since the early twentieth century.  We have been using negative images to label an entire continent of black humans as inferior beings.  All while making ourselves feel good because we feel we are saving them from themselves.  White Americans have been programmed by videos like Kony 2012 to believe that whites are superior  because of the simple fact that we are white. 
In the Justin Bieber era of YouTube and self-regulated social media, it is easy to become misinformed simply by clicking play.  Anyone from anywhere can post anything on the internet.  If it gets enough traction and “shared” enough times, it somehow gains credibility.  While this video does misinform it does create a call to action.  It is our responsibility as viewers to do additional research to get the full story.  Videos like Kony 2012 should only be used as a catalyst for increasing ones knowledge on a subject otherwise unknown to them.  After having a full understanding of the cause and the context of the situation, only then can one truly make an educated decision.  Without contextual knowledge the viewer of videos like this will only become more partial to their own superiority.  This video is just one example of the social media’s role in forming our perception of others.



No comments:

Post a Comment