Visible Children

The YouTube video Kony 2012 made by the charity Invisible Children has received over 80 million hits since it was posted less than two weeks ago. The purpose of the video is to make Joseph Kony, a Ugandan warlord famous in order to create awareness and stop his recruitment of children into his rebel group. The video targets young people, policy makers and celebrities to raise awareness by sharing the video on Twitter and Facebook. Celebrities such as Rihanna, Bill Gates and Nikki Minaj have all shared the video to their fans through social media.

The video itself is cleverly made and is very powerful, even to the most cynical of people (me). The narrator of the video Jason Russell talks about the first time he found out about what was going on in Uganda and explains the situation to his son. He has used powerful imagery and music as long with brutal pictures of Ugandans with facial wounds caused by the child recruits.

The video specifically targets young people and how they can make a stand together - there is almost a cult-like feel about the video - images of hundreds of young people raising their fists in the air and chanting in unison '...we will not stop, we will not fear, we will fight war' made me feel a bit uncomfortable.  It almost feels like a propaganda video.

Nobody can argue that the video hasn't managed to raise awareness around the issue - not many people had heard of Joseph Kony before - but 80 million views have changed that.

The criticisms of the video are that it has over-simplified the issue and could actually do more harm than good. Kony is no longer believed to be operating in Uganda and he has an army of hundreds of followers - so just stopping the bad guy won't stop the whole situation that has been going on for years. The video does not encourage viewers to seek more information about the problem, but asks them to make a stand by going plastering cities with stickers and posters with Kony's face on them. Ugandan journalists have argued that the video paints a bad picture of Uganda, as it was seven years ago and that they have progressed since.

Whether or not the video highlights the right issues - it is probably the most powerful and fast-growing viral video there has been to date and Invisible Children have definitely succeeded in raising awareness of their cause. We will have to wait until April 20th to see what happens - but I have a feeling it may become part two of the London riots.