Now is the Time

KONY 2012 from INVISIBLE CHILDREN on Vimeo.

Any one who knows me would know that I've been harping about Joseph Kony of the LRA since 2008, and the one response I get most often was. "That's awful, some one should do something about it."

In 2001 the Forgotten Children's Project made a startling discovery that people in west Africa have known and lived through for years, they discovered the existence of a group called the Lord's Resistance Army.
A group led by a man named Joseph Kony who believes God has given him all of Uganda to rule over.
To accomplish this Kony built an army, an army that is manned by the people he kidnaps and brainwashes from villages all over Uganda.
That sounds horrible enough as it is, but the part that really makes my stomach turn is that a great number of these soldiers are children.

If the thought of a child with a machine gun is enough to make you squeamish you may want to skip from this next part.
Many of these children as an initiation have been forced to do horrible things, things that most 'civilized' people would consider sins or unforgivable acts.
Once such story is of a school teacher who 'stood up to' Kony, to teach the children Kony was taking from this teacher that this was inappropriate behavior he had the children eat the teacher a live.
In other instances Kony had young boys rape an kill their own sisters or mothers, or watch as he did.
And thats just the tip of the ice burg.

My heart aches for the children of Uganda, and I have friends who have and are there now- not working with Invisible Children but coming in contact with kids who may have once been part of that life.
So to me the troubles in Uganda are very real and are relevant every day.
So you can never guess my surprise when I logged on to Twitter and Facebook this morning and saw what was trending between
#thingsmufasadidntdiefor and #KimKarsaianSaid.
#Kony2012, and #StopJospehKony.
Mouth agape I clicked through the posts and tweets and soon I was absolutely in raged.
The absolute garbage spilling out of the keyboards of people who were 'supporting' this movement.
From petitions to ask Joseph Kony to step down to people thinking he was a pimp who sold children into prostitution.

Let me stop here to say I totally 100% support the Kony2012 movement. I'm not going to jump on the band wagon and go posting posters every were because I just don't have the time or funds. But I am right there with them. This needs to get out and you can sure as hell believe I'll be sharing the link on my wall and tweeting it as often as possible, change needs to happen.
But what I don't support is the coffee shop bandwagon support that this movement has drummed up.

Back to my point, I won't lie, I cried while watching the Kony2012 video, but I cry every time I even talk about the children in the LRA.
Don't have an emotional response to this video, have a heart response.
This is really happening, right now, and there is no easy fix to it.
No amount of poster posting will make Kony give up what he believes is a God given right. No amount of Face Book hatred will make him feel shame for what he's done.
If he hasn't disbanded the LRA after the multiple request and peace talks offered and began by the UN and Ugandan government he's not going to do so just because a 20-something college student puts up a banner at his or her community college.
But what this movement is doing is making an awareness that this cause hasn't seen since the LRA started in the 70's/80's.

So please, put up your banners and share the link, but remember this is real life for a lot of kids. This isn't a fad. Lives depend on this ending, not just lives but the futures of survivors depend on the end of the LRA.
This can't just be a bandwagon, coffeeshop cause you talk about with your friends while waiting to be bailed out of jail after occupying the Ugandan Embassy.
This has to be a focus that drives like no other.
If your heart was torn for the the children of the LRA don't argue why it's important, go do something to change it.