comment by Saydrah

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comment by Saydrah

Saydrah · 4646 days ago · link · · parent · post: Not so fast on the KONY2012 thing. Please get the facts before you give.

What have they done to help the children, besides enrich themselves and make movies? I'm interested in seeing an independent source showing that Invisible Children is a more effective use of funds than an org like Amnesty International that has been established for decades and does not fund militias.

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cynthianews · 4646 days ago · link ·

They have built schools, given the people radio communication to warn about raids by rebel forces to kidnap their children. They have gotten both sides of congress behind their effort, and the president. That's certainly a lot.

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GoatFood · 4646 days ago · link ·

This reminds me a bit of the Greg Mortenson scandal from about a year ago. http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2066239,00.ht... For those of you who are unfamiliar, this guy started a project to build schools in developing Middle Eastern nations. People loved him and gave him boatloads of money. Many people in my community, including my family, were moved by his struggle and advocated his cause. Turns out, he distorted many of his stories and occasionally flat out lied. True, he did build some schools, and many of them were effective. But a substantial amount fell into disuse, were never completed, or weren't given enough support to succeed. What's more, the majority of the funds he raised went towards book tours and publicity. To return to Saydrah's point, it was easy (and effective) for Mortenson to profess that he was helping children in Afghanistan, but third party review revealed that his work wasn't as effective or honest as he claimed. It appears to me that KONY could be a similar situation. I agree that third party review is critical for judging the efficacy of an organization.

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cynthianews · 4646 days ago · link ·

Then let's wait and see, it seems very legit, but I could be wrong.

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Saydrah · 4646 days ago · link ·

Do you have a source confirming that? I usually use Charity Navigator to investigate charities, and CN makes them look pretty bad -- Fundraising Efficiency is $0.02, one-ninth of Amnesty International's efficiency.

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thundara · 4646 days ago · link ·

http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=glossary.word&...

Fundraising Efficiency: The amount spent to raise $1 in charitable contributions. To calculate a charity's fundraising efficiency, we divide its fundraising expenses by the total contributions it receives.

Smaller is better

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Saydrah · 4646 days ago · link ·

Well, shit. I was thinking of the fundraising efficiency coefficient used in the org I worked with years ago -- amount of each $1 raised that goes directly to aid recipients -- $0.02 of every dollar raised would not be that abnormal after fundraising expenses, salaries, etc., so it didn't look that outlandish. At lot of orgs spend hardly any money on aid. I've been looking at this wrong looking at CN for at least three years. Don't I feel stupid. (I'd still like to see some sort of independent confirmation that Invisible Children does anything besides make movies and pay $90,000 salaries to their founders though.)

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thenewgreen · 4646 days ago · link ·

This brings up a question. Lets say that an organization does tremendous work and its efficacy is indisputable. Would you find fault in their founders earning $150,000 a year?

I'm sure you know that this is not a lot of money for a CEO or founder to make in the private sector. I would also assume that the reason the organization is so well run and effective is largely in part to the founder. This means that this person is good at what they do, which means they could likely earn $200k+ in the private sector. So, they have effectively taken a $50k pay cut to work on something they think is commendable and are also (likely) working much greater hours on their charity than they would in the private sector.

I guess my point is $90k isn't that much money for a CEO or a founder of an organization. It IS a lot of money for one that isn't doing squat... but then so would $50k.

Why do we expect people that start charitable organizations to make demonstrably less money than they could in the private sector? This makes no sense to me.

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Saydrah · 4646 days ago · link ·

I don't really have a problem with high salaries in the nonprofit sector, IF the organization paying the high salaries can show ROI. Many founders of organizations work for a small stipend or volunteer their time, then using donations to hire an experienced Executive Director. There's a little bit of a conflict of interest, IMO, if someone founds an organization, solicits funds for charitable work, and then insists on being the recipient of the highest salary in the organization. I don't know that these two young filmmakers are necessarily the best people to direct an international nonprofit. They might be the best people to make movies about Joseph Kony, but they're paying themselves from donor funds to make movies that represent the organization as directly aiding children in Uganda, when it may or may not do that at all.

Call me old-fashioned, but these guys just strike me as more interested in their personal fame and going on an exciting crusade (have you seen that pic of them posing with assault rifles and the Ugandan army?) than in actually helping Ugandan children. Especially when Kony is no longer even active in Uganda, I wonder why else they would continue to fund an army that is itself known for sexual assault and other atrocities.

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cynthianews · 4646 days ago · link ·

You must not have even watched the video, it's in their video.

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Saydrah · 4646 days ago · link ·

Yes, but I could make a video saying I won the Nobel Peace Prize, and if someone asked for an independent source confirming that, it would be a little silly to say, "Didn't you watch her video?"

As anyone who's ever seen reality TV can attest, just because someone said it on camera doesn't make it true. Is there any independent entity that has reviewed their work and can confirm that donor funding is applied to building schools, for instance? All I could find in a cursory search was some anonymous comments from people saying they worked with Invisible Children on a book drive that raised over 9,000 (!!!) books. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and to believe that this lesser known charity which spends a significant portion of its funds on moviemaking and founders' salaries is a better choice than an established charity with nine times its fundraising efficiency, I would like to see more than a video made with donor funds by people paying themselves with donor funds requesting more donor funds be sent their way.