I assume you're referring to this line:
I think the author means that IC defends their work with the army, not that they defend the rape and looting. However, it is poorly worded, and possibly intentionally to give the impression that IC defends the rape/looting.
That section, and this one:
Still, the bulk of Invisible Children’s spending isn’t on supporting African militias, but on awareness and filmmaking
Sure, the bulk of their spending isn't on supporting African militias, because they don't use spending to support African militias
at all. There is no point saying that unless you want to imply that they do in fact financially support militias to some extent.
The other article, from Foreign Policy, I'm not sure what you take issue with. The man is very well-informed on Ugandan problems and I think his concerns are legitimate.
Most are covered by IC's response, but still, I'll cover them here.
First is the "Kony is not in Uganda" point. As he admits, IC's video actually says this. No, they don't repeat it a lot, but they don't need to since it's largely irrelevant. Doesn't matter whether he's in Uganda, the Congo, or anywhere else, he's a mass murderer that abducts children to serve as child soldiers and sex slaves, and should be permanently stopped.
Second is how, when he references the Visible Children tumblr, he doesn't even do so accurately.
Also, apparently it's never been externally audited.
No, that's not even what the VC said, nor is it true. They have been audited by Considine and Considine, for
the past six years.
Then there's the ridiculous "white man's burden" comment, which doesn't have any place in this discussion. What, white people can't help black people anymore? If a white person cares about black children being abducted, it's apparently only because of our "burden".
He also acts like since there's no immediate threat of the advisors being pulled out, they shouldn't be doing anything about it at all. That sort of attitude, that unless something is literally about to fall apart, you shouldn't do anything about it, is the sort of attitude the American government uses in dealing with our debt, unless we're about to default and crash the economy, they do nothing, and this
should not be encouraged. Criticizing IC for being proactive and making sure that their concerns don't become forgotten is facepalm worthy. Ironically, it also oversimplifies IC's position, since while making sure the advisors is part of the purpose for this campaign, it's not the whole point.
Finally there's his ending, which points out other problems in the region and says that stopping Kony won't fix those. Of course not, they're not claiming it will. Kony 2012 is merely supposed to be an entry point for people who didn't really know about the problems over there, and hopefully not be the end of action in that section of the world. He also says:
if more hardware and money flow to Museveni's military, Invisible Children's campaign may even worsen some problems.
Their campaign is NOT to send money and hardware into the Ugandan miltary. Nowhere have I seen them say that it was, so this statement is pure fear-mongering. They've called for organizational/information support in finding Kony, and diplomatic efforts in getting the local governments to cooperate in hunting him down. A good report on it can be found
here.
I probably shouldn't have stated "Invisible Children is not the way to go," with such absoluteness in my post. It isn't the way to go for me, but I respect the agency of others to make up their own minds. I do think the counter-arguments against this particular campaign are sufficient to look for other charities to support.
Not saying the IC is perfect, but a lot of the complaints I've seen are either inaccurate or irrelevant. The main reason one should look for other charities to support is if there's one that focuses on a cause you find more important. There's plenty of causes that need help in the world, and like basically all charities, IC doesn't work with all of them. If IC doesn't focus on the one/ones you find the most important, I totally agree you should spend your money on a charity that does. IC obviously got people's attention though, so people with other causes to support should be tapping into that, working together to build on it, not standing in a metaphorical corner, dismissing IC's efforts because IC's cause isn't the cause they have.
