[pullquote quote=”I want indicted war criminals to enjoy the same level of celebrity as me.” credit=”George Clooney”] It’s a campaign that has swept the nation, bringing almost 26 million YouTube views in just two days! But you may be wondering “what exactly is this whole thing about?” Well, here’s a quick look at the Kony 2012 craze taking over the world.
Invisible Children is a charity based out of California that has one mission and one mission only… to stop the use of children as military combatants in Uganda. Sounds awful, right? Well the man behind the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), who take these children from their parents in the middle of the night, is Joseph Kony. Kony has been in power for 26 years in Uganda and has blatantly said his only objective as a powerful official is to stay powerful. Not promote peace, not change the country for the better but just to mainly stay in power.
Though Invisible Children has been fighting this already for eight years, founder Jason Russell has decided this year to use the power of the Internet to stop Kony, so he made a 27 minute documentary that explains everything Kony 2012 is about. In a nutshell, here’s what you need to know:
- Joseph Kony is a Ugandan war leader who has stolen and enslaved over 30,000 children for his own army just so he could be feared and stay in power.
- Invisible Children has spent years fundraising to rebuild schools so these children who have escaped or not been taken yet will be able to get an eduction to arm them with the ability to get out.
- Once Joseph Kony got wind of Invisible Children’s mission, he fled to an unknown location in Africa.
- In October 2011, President Obama deployed 100 US Military advisors to help in the aid of finding Kony
- The purpose of Kony 2012 is not to celebrate Kony’s mission but to make him famous. Why famous? So everyone will know him and can help find him. Though 100 of our advisors are there, it’s not nearly as strong as the 100 million activists being educated on this campaign.
So how can you get involved? On April 20, 2012, Invisible Children and all of their millions of new volunteers around the world will Cover The Night! They will put up hundreds of posters, stickers, yard signs and materials to get the message known. If you want to help, here‘s where you can get the posters and promotional materials!
The more people who know, the quicker we can help thousands of children in Africa not fear for their lives every night.
If you want to watch the documentary, watch it below.
