When the typical American is asked to name a charity, he or she would probably pick something like The American Cancer Society because it is so prominent. Invisible Children, on the other hand, is a seemingly invisible charity. Started by three young men in the early 2000s, Invisible Children strives to end a long-running conflict with one man, Joseph Kony, rebelling against the Ugandan government. Because few support him, he abducts children from their homes, brainwashes them, and uses them as soldiers instead. As child soldiers, they are asked to kill their family members because their new family is the army. If they do not follow orders, they are physically punished by crippling, amputation, blinding, machete, and several other ways. Kids in the area that are not yet abducted stay away from their homes and live on the streets. If you're already curious about the history of this conflict, all of the information can be found here: http://www.invisiblechildren.com/about.
After watching a documentary about Invisible Children and learning about this charity for the first time, I am rather shocked. I thought human beings by now would know better than to do something so completely unethical like this. What Joseph Kony is doing is an act of pure evil, and somehow, someway, he needs to be stopped. I'm not saying that we Americans have a duty to stop him; you shouldn't feel guilty about not participating in any charities. Charity is a completely optional action; it should not be a requirement. I just respect these young people out there that have the desire to help others. It also goes to show that even stereotypically insignificant people can make a big difference in the lives of others.
Personally, I believe that Invisible Children is a substantial charity with a great cause. However, there are other charities I would choose over this one. At our high school, in these few weeks between Thanksgiving break and winter break, we hold an annual gigantic fundraiser for a charity that the entire school votes for. We call this fundraiser School Chest; every year, we manage to raise around $100,000 dollars. We choose our charities carefully because we want to see our money have a large, visible impact. Our final two charities that we had to vote for were GSD (Glycogen Storage Disorder) and, of course, Invisible Children. GSD is fairly self explanatory; it's a genetic mutation that prohibits the body from storing glycogen, a source of energy, properly. So far, they have found a cure within dogs, which means that they're very close to finding a cure, but they don't have enough funding. The Invisible Children representative for our high school, a man named Jedidiah Jenkins, said that if we chose Invisible Children as our charity, they would be able to afford an entire radio tower to broadcast to the child soldiers. The thing is though, wouldn't the LRA find out about this tower and try to eliminate it? And, if they found these children's radios broadcasting a way to escape, wouldn't they break the radio and/or punish the children? This radio tower that we're funding seems too sketchy for me; I originally voted for GSD. The reason is because, like Invisible Children, it is not a well-known disease and kills hundreds of people. However, if we gave them the money we normally make for School Chest, we could fund research for a cure. Our school could have made history, and we could have saved hundreds of lives in our country. Don't get me wrong, Invisible Children is an excellent cause, but I believe that GSD would have better fit School Chest.
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