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[kaijyuu]

This whole controversy strikes me as a massive excuse for everyone to think they're better than other people.


On one side, you've got the people trying to show how awesome they are for donating to charity and spreading awareness.
On the other side, you've got cynical jerks shouting "hipster," "poser," etc and exclaiming how above it all they are.
And all over the place you've got people trying to discredit everyone else, including the charity itself.
Then you've got sadly apathetic people like me watching it all, going wtf.


It's a massive ego stroking clusterfuck. The people that actually care about charity aren't going on about how much a difference they're making, nor are they going on about how little a difference other people are making. They donate, volunteer, do their part to raise awareness, and otherwise shut up.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Why do people see this one as a scam?

A. The 1.1 Million dollar annual travel budget.

B. The fact that Invisible Children has never been independently audited.

C. The actions of IC's founders after people started rightfully criticizing them, and Jason Russell's apparent psychological breakdown.

D. That they spread horribly outdated and outright incorrect data about Uganda and the LRA. Kony might actually be dead right now, and if he isn't he definitely isn't in Uganda.

I understand that you were really hopeful about this movement, but it's bad news, no doubt about it.

[Leafsnail]

This whole controversy strikes me as a massive excuse for everyone to think they're better than other people.


On one side, you've got the people trying to show how awesome they are for donating to charity and spreading awareness.
On the other side, you've got cynical jerks shouting "hipster," "poser," etc and exclaiming how above it all they are.
And all over the place you've got people trying to discredit everyone else, including the charity itself.
Then you've got sadly apathetic people like me watching it all, going wtf.

It's a massive ego stroking clusterfuck. The people that actually care about charity aren't going on about how much a difference they're making, nor are they going on about how little a difference other people are making. They donate, volunteer, do their part to raise awareness, and otherwise shut up.

This is really confusing me.  I don't think anyone is "trying to discredit" the charity - it's done a very good job of discrediting itself by doing nothing but making self-aggrandizing videos and lying to people instead of actually helping anyone.  I'm pretty sure in this case those who are saying to charity is bad say it because it's clearly bad and not because they're trying to think of themselves as better than anyone else.

And if you are "apathetic", surely that would mean you don't know enough/ don't care enough about the situation to comment on who you think are being jerks?

[kaijyuu]

I'm not THAT apathetic Just apathetic enough to not do anything, you know, useful.


And I know the charity itself is shady. My understanding is that it's not really that uncommon; most charities spend more on advertising than directing their funds toward what they're endorsing/fighting.


My problem with it all, though, is the people being condescending about it. You can point out issues with the charity; that's fine. What's disturbingly common though is using those problems as ammunition to throw at people who donated; "lol ur stoopid for supporting this" is something I see all the goddamn time, far more often than more benign attempts of education as to what they're actually donating to.

And of course the people who are showing off how awesome they are that donated, but you didn't bold that part. No side is free of ego stroking here, and no side to any real greater degree as far as I can tell.

[Leafsnail]

The fact that you've also said something about the other side does not justify saying something unfair about people criticising the charity.  The reason I didn't respond to that I don't think "ego stroking" is really the issue here at all anyway, and I do not really care one way or the other if people are doing it.  People can stroke their egos if they like, it isn't hurting anyone.  The problem is that the charity in question is wholly corrupt/ unbelievably ridiculously staggeringly naive to the point of causing way more harm than good.

The charity is not "shady" - its very cause is irrelevant (Kony is not active anymore) and it seems that 100% of its funds go towards videos that aggrandize its owners/ straight to its owners, since they sure as hell aren't going to stopping a warlord who left Uganda in 2006.  Some of the worse charities do spend more on advertising than what they're meant to do, but this charity isn't directing any of its money towards what it's meant to do, partly because what it wants to do has already happened without their help.

With so much evidence that the charity is simply useless I can see why you'd just get frustrated at people who nevertheless support it.  If you do start to insult people supporting it that's probably more out of exasperation than necessarily "ego stroking", although as I said before I'm not sure why that's such an issue when you're not using supposedly charitable funds to do it.

[nenjin]

Everything I saw about these guys indicated to me that their charity was a means to an end. And not the end of Joseph Kony, which they damn well know the timeline of. And no charity should be putting money directly into the hands of armed combatants. That makes it seem more like a schill so both partners in the relationship can enjoy a revenue stream. (A revenue stream built on a hunted and almost totally neutralized bogeyman who can't refute any of their claims, even to say "I've been hiding in the woods dying for the last 5+ years.")

Hey, you know what else is going on Uganda right now, right in Joseph Kony's old stomping ground? Nodding Disease. CNN just reported on it not three days ago. It's been around since the 1960s, and they've started seeing large numbers of cases turning up this year.

Man, wouldn't it be nice if they had more hospitals, more trained physicians, more anti-seizure medication.....some money for that would be mighty useful.

[Megaman]

Indeed, it's not ego stroking. It's trying to make sure the charity money goes to people in need.

[Flying Dice]

Indeed, it's not ego stroking. It's trying to make sure the charity money goes to people in need.

Quite. It isn't about being cynical, or taking the chance to bash on people who are doing harm for profit, for a "goal" which was reached without their help years ago (though goodness knows I've enjoyed it a bit too much), but to make sure that (funnily enough) people are aware that money going to IC is doing absolutely no good, is likely doing harm, and certainly isn't doing anything related to the stated purpose of getting rid of Kony. There are good charities out there, and one of the last things they need is for money to be diverted to the jokers behind IC instead of a charity that could use at least part of it to help people.

[Solifuge]

IC was misguided, and went about their goal in entirely the wrong way. I don't and have not had illusions about that.

Still, everyone who parrots this rant I keep hearing (that they lied or mislead the public, or are "hording donations for themselves") are full of crap. They clearly stated that donations paid for the videos and multimedia (posters, swag, and whatever) they produced and distributed to attain their stated goal of "raising public awareness". Moreover people are upset that they "paid donation money to themselves", when what they did was pay production costs to someone to make them a video; even if he was a douchebag making a bad infomercial, I fail to see how it's wrong of the organization to spend money that way. Still other people are angry that they "mislead the public about Kony being in Uganda" when once again, the video everyone's upset about CLEARLY STATED that Kony wasn't in Uganda anymore, that the anecdotes they used were many years past, and that the situation was different now. Once again, they never stated that their money was being donated. There was no misleading going on but that which people did to themselves, by their own laziness, lack of reading comprehension, or assumptions.

I'm not frustrated that people find the organization questionable... as I said, I myself find them a misguided expression of White Man's Burden, and I find some of their efforts laughable. What bothers me is that people are repeating lies as facts, and attacking a non-profit organization in ways that are both unfair, and detract from the very real human rights violations (if things of the past) that the organization drew attention to.

[Leafsnail]

So they're raising awareness of an issue that does not exist anymore in order to get more people to pay money to raise awareness of the issue that doesn't exist anymore?  With apparently full awareness that they're doing so?  I'm just struggling to believe that anyone could be THAT "misguided", although I guess it's possible.  I mean, if the issue actually existed, or if they were trying to raise awareness of some way to actually help people then it would make more sense.

[Bloxace]

 I really hate the term "white man's burden." I,for example, am not (entirely) white. Must this mean I can sit around and not do anything on the matter? Surely not, and I feel it is a term that people should stop using.
 Back on topic, someone should step up and show IC where it's focus should be directed, and not just sit around whining at them. Might do more in the long run.

[nenjin]

You mean like the disease ravaging the people Kony once victimized? It speaks to how closely connected they honestly are to Uganda if they have to be told how to find problems in developing African nations.

[G-Flex]

I really hate the term "white man's burden." I,for example, am not (entirely) white. Must this mean I can sit around and not do anything on the matter? Surely not, and I feel it is a term that people should stop using.

I'm not sure you understand the term. When people talk about IC that way, they're doing it sarcastically, to criticize them, because the term relates to a certain kind of imperial white ethnocentrism. There's a Wikipedia page on it; it's named after an old poem.

[Leafsnail]

I'm not sure if I really like the way it's being applied here, though.  Even if it is true, I don't think it's the problem with IC.  If IC were talking about an issue that was actually happening and had some way of helping to prevent that issue then that would, as far as I'm concerned, be fine, "white man's burden" or not (I don't really get how it applies here anyway... I mean, the fact that you're saying people might need additional help from those who are better off doesn't necessarily mean you're saying they can't help themselves).

[G-Flex]

I mean, the fact that you're saying people might need additional help from those who are better off doesn't necessarily mean you're saying they can't help themselves

Judging by how IC talks about it... yeah, that basically is what they're saying. They're incredibly patronizing, and that's part of the problem.