Why I find the Stop Kony 2012 campaign so offensive
By Francis Moran
I first became aware of the Stop Kony 2012 campaign late on Wednesday evening and, from my very first viewing of the video, I had a sharp visceral objection to what I was watching.
The marketer in me objected to the video’s manipulative emotional hard sell whilst acknowledging with no small amount of awe the incredibly slick and effective manner in which it was done.
The informed citizen in me objected to the video’s simplistic reductionism of a complex, multi-dimensional and long-standing and intractable issue.
The journalist in me objected to the video’s factual misrepresentation and cheap sensationalism, and cried over the tragic African illiteracy of too many westerners that would allow this sort of intellectual pablum to be swallowed as truth.
The due diligence streak in me objected to the video’s expensive and lavish production values, and further investigation confirmed the charity behind the video has a superb track record at fund-raising and a less-than-superb track record of spending that money on front-line programming.
And, most viscerally, the Africaphile in me objected violently to the video’s deeply offensive subtextual narrative that Africans are helpless savages who must be rescued by some white man.
