Kony 2012: From a Christian Perspective

In case you happen to lack Facebook, or just haven't checked it in the past week, you've missed out on the latest and greatest viral video campaign known as KONY 2012. (Skip this paragraph if you've seen the video) In short, this 28 minute video is a campaign to bring infamy to Joseph Kony, the guerrilla leader of the LRA, a rebel army group in central Africa responsible for incredible amounts of  violence, death, and displacement.  The LRA is responsible for the abduction of 30,000 children for purpose of sex slaves and child soldiers.  The campaign calls on people to make the name of Joseph Kony known worldwide, so that the policy-makers of the western world resolve a push for the arrest and prosecution of Joseph Kony.  The video is indeed impressive, and well made, and certainly moving.  However, even more impressive to me is the battle it caused.


As soon as the video and campaign went viral, critics crawled out of the woodwork to point out flaws, misjudgments and criticisms of the effort.  The group putting on the campaign, a non-profit named "Invisible Children" came under fire for its finances, for its business model, for its insincerity, and the list goes on.  Ugandans, who are featured throughout the film, voiced protest that it came too late (Kony left Uganda several years ago), or is too ineffective, or just shows the laziness and ignorance of the American populace.   There's even a tumblr page with all the complaints against the campaign.  Others voiced concern that this takes away momentum from pro-life and pro-religious liberty movements at home.  For me, to see the violent rejection of this admittedly radical campaign was surprising, even perplexing.

Looking at the facts, its hard to deny that Joseph Kony is a man doing incredibly evil things, and I'm willing to bet that the overwhelming majority of people who have seen the video would agree with me.  Most people would even agree with me to say that it is a very noble goal to arrest Kony and disarm the LRA.  However, it seems as though this campaign could stall, or even fall on its face in the midst of the criticism, which of course accomplishes nothing but letting Joseph Kony live on in tyranny.

So, taking all of this in and praying, thinking, and praying a little more on it, here's my stand on KONY 2012:  I see it as good, though not perfect.  The critics seem to take shots at Invisible Children and the campaign, calling it a scam, calling it wasteful, calling it shallow, calling it God knows what else, and they may indeed be right.  However, there's still a man named Joseph Kony on the loose, and that man is still killing, raping, burning, and abducting his way across the central African jungle.  While the campaign may not be perfect, it still does something, and something tends to be better than nothing.

KONY 2012 was started to raise awareness (which also has been criticized as being ineffective) to an otherwise unaware society.  And I admit, I had no clue who Joseph Kony was 4 days ago.  Nor did most of you reading this.  And for that reason, the campaign has been successful.  We know Kony's name, we know his crimes, and the resounding majority of people want him to see justice.  In that sense, the campaign is successful.  It has brought awareness, and in many ways, that is half of the battle.  Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."  If we want peace on earth, we have to see that there is not peace on earth, and this campaign brings that to a very vivid light.

I think, as Christians, we ought to applaud the efforts, intentions, and success of KONY 2012 in bringing evil to a previously indifferent people.  Christians should celebrate this, because on a widespread scale, terms like "justice", "good" , "evil", and "peace" are re-entering our vocabulary, just as relativism seeks to push them out.  We see that it is necessary that we not be indifferent, that we cannot tolerate evil, and that we must be concerned beyond our self-interests.  However, Christians must also see KONY as merely a component, and not as the big picture.  We cannot be satisfied by merely re-posting the video, or wearing the bracelet, or even by slapping posters everywhere.  Even if Joseph Kony is brought before the International Criminal Court and sentenced, we cannot be satisfied.  We must demand peace, we must demand reconciliation, we must demand rehabilitation.  Justice served must coincide with hope given.  The Christian must pray, the Christian must express, with his/her time, effort, and money, a genuine concern for the well being of those suffering injustice, even those who he/she has never met.  And it must not stop in Africa.  We live in a suffering world, a bleak world, and nothing feeds the hardships of the world more than the indifference of good men.  I hope that KONY 2012, with its pros and its cons, is merely the wake-up call, that it serves as a wedge to crack our culture's self-centered shell and expose us to a much bigger world, a world brimming with opportunities for charity, mercy and reconciliation.