You're presuming that getting people "excited" is a valuable goal in and of itself, regardless of the means. What's the gain?
-Clint On Thursday, March 8, 2012 at 5:26 PM, Varun Arora wrote: > I respect what all of you are saying in terms of critique - but there is no > way on earth he (the movie maker) would have been able to get people so > excited and energetic in 30 minutes if he had cared only to be > developmentally and logically and theoretically and politically correct. That > doesn't resonate with youth who are too lost in their social media lives. > They need quick, invigorating, actionable, triggered media on their face to > feel provoked. I felt provoked. There is a reason why UN supported > documentaries are not shared by every other teenager over 3 days on a viral > social network - they struggle to be compelling, and are terrible story > tellers. I highly doubt the folks at Invisible Children are not aware about > the implications of their approach. They tried to tell a good story here - > and they did an excellent job at it. And the fact that we are having these > discussions on an important listserv is a blessing in disguise; we are > learning more about policy implications of in ternational peace efforts, than we would have ever cared to learn about had we not heard of Kony. > > I am an entrepreneur myself, and know how when you sell stuff, even if it is > a social product and if it's going to challenge the Solow model of growth, it > doesn't matter: you got to put it in lay man terms (sometimes very > embarrassing) and over simplify what you are doing and offering. And often > end up taking a completely different politically incorrect (not wrong, > though) approach to resonate with your audiences. None of our research > evidence and learnings are ever useful to any partner or investor or > customer. None of our proven theories on economic development are even looked > at. The only people who question you about that are people at conferences and > classrooms; we are living in bubbles, and if we cannot learn to communicate > important and proven theoretical ideas in crisp and pervasive media, we will > be left behind. > > > Varun > > On 03/08/2012 08:04 PM, Abraham D. Flaxman wrote: > > to make this critique a slogan, "Know Why 2012" > > > > Sent from phone > > > > ----- Reply message ----- > > From: "Amer Dahmash" <adahmash at gmail.com> (mailto:adahmash at gmail.com) > > Date: Thu, Mar 8, 2012 4:27 pm > > Subject: [change] Kony 2012 > > To: "Yaw Anokwa" <yanokwa at gmail.com> (mailto:yanokwa at gmail.com) > > Cc: "Change Group" <change at change.washington.edu> (mailto:change at > > change.washington.edu) > > > > I think the Invisible Children response is great but I feel that it fails > > to address one of the biggest problems with their campaign which one > > of my friends captured by referencing Paulo Freire's theory of False > > Generosity: > > > > "When a system is structured so that there are oppressors and oppressed, > > some of the oppressor class feel genuine compassion toward the suffering of > > the oppressed. > > They move to isolate that suffering and to aid it, not to address the > > structures of society which > > are the root causes. Thus, to the extent that they relieve any suffering > > they do so by hiding from > > themselves the genuine causes, their own privilege as oppressor class > > members." > > > > An over-simplification perhaps but that's what the Kony 2012 campaign > > smacks of to me. > > -amer > > > > On Mar 8, 2012, at 3:56 PM, Yaw Anokwa wrote: > > > > > Invisible Children has written a response at > > > http://s3.amazonaws.com/www.invisiblechildren.com/critiques.html > > > > > > http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/post/18954353409/not-alone has links > > > to other critiques. > > > > > > On Wed, Mar 7, 2012 at 19:32, Yaw Anokwa <yanokwa at gmail.com> > > > (mailto:yanokwa at gmail.com) wrote: > > >> You may have heard about Kony 2012. It is a film and campaign by > > >> Invisible Children that aims to make "Joseph Kony > > >> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Kony) famous, not to celebrate > > >> him, but to raise support for his arrest and set a precedent for > > >> international justice." The film is at > > >> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc. > > >> > > >> While almost everyone agrees that Joseph Kony is a bad person, > > >> Invisible Children has been criticized for their approach. Grant > > >> Oyston lays out some of those arguments against Kony 2012 at > > >> http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/post/18890947431/we-got-trouble. The > > >> follow on posts are also informative. > > >> > > >> The spread of the Kony meme, both for and against, has been possible > > >> only because of social media. In that sense, it's quite relevant to > > >> those of us interested in leveraging technology for change... > > >> > > >> Yaw > > > _______________________________________________ > > > change mailing list > > > change at change.washington.edu (mailto:change at change.washington.edu) > > > http://changemm.cs.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/change > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > change mailing list > > change at change.washington.edu (mailto:change at change.washington.edu) > > http://changemm.cs.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/change > > _______________________________________________ change mailing list change > > at change.washington.edu (mailto:change at change.washington.edu) > > http://changemm.cs.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/change > -- > Varun Arora > Information Systems Management | Class of 2012 > Carnegie Mellon University > Mobile/Cell: +1-412-478-2164 > varora at andrew.cmu.edu (mailto:varora at andrew.cmu.edu) > http://www.varunarora.com > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > change mailing list > change at change.washington.edu (mailto:change at change.washington.edu) > http://changemm.cs.washington.edu/mailman/listinfo/change > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 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