前段时间在网络上疯传的视频《科尼2012》的制作人杰森 鲁塞尔上周四因在道路上裸奔并扰乱交通而被圣地亚哥警方拘留，后被送往医院。杰森的妻子表示，他的此番行为并不是酒精或药物作用，而是因为那段30分钟的视频引起了太多关注，同时也引发了众多针对他个人的攻击，杰森因此承受了巨大的压力。在《科尼2012》中，杰森通过自己的视角讲述了乌干达圣主抵抗军（LRA）首领约瑟夫 科尼自1986年以来绑架并强制3万多名儿童加入其军队，强迫这些儿童用枪射杀自己的父母，迫使女童沦为性奴等罪行。该视频被上传至网络之后，引发无数网友转发，也引来不少资金支持。与此同时，批评人士指出，科尼目前已不在乌干达境内，数百万出发点良好、却遭受误导的网民能否帮助解决复杂的现实问题也是未知。
The wife of Jason Russell, co-founder of the Invisible Children charity, has blamed her husband's sudden hospitalisation on stress pought about by the extraordinary global attention garnered by the organisation's work exposing Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony.
Russell, a devout evangelical Christian, was detained by police in San Diego at about 11.30am on Thursday after being spotted apparently nude in the street, screaming and interfering with traffic. Police said they had received several reports of him making sexual gestures or masturbating.
The development came at the end of a remarkable few weeks for Invisible Children and its trio of telegenic young American founders. After one of the charity's videos about Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army went viral across the internet, the organisation found itself at the centre of massive global attention. While millions of supporters flocked to its cause, especially over social media websites, the group also faced a torrent of criticism from aid groups, academics and media figures.
Russell's wife, Danica, issued a statement to American TV network NBC in which she said the pressure had simply become too much for her husband. "We thought a few thousand people would see the film, but in less than a week millions of people around the world saw it. While that attention was great for raising awareness about Joseph Kony, it also pought a lot of attention to Jason. And, because of how personal the film is, many of the attacks against it were also very personal, and Jason took them very hard," Danica Russell said.
NBC reported that she also said that Russell's behaviour was not down to drug or alcohol abuse.
After spending more than six years largely under the media radar in its work highlighting the problem of Kony, a single 30-minute video, Kony 2012 – narrated by Russell who features in the film with his son – has now been viewed more than 80 million times.
Cash flowed into the charity as new supporters bought Invisible Children's "action kits". Scores of groups popped up across America, especially on college campuses, highlighting Kony's use of child soldiers, rape and mutilation of civilians.
They are preparing for a day of action next month when organisers hope to put up more than a million posters across the US under the "Kony 2012" slogan. The group was even able to get a resolution in the US Congress calling for more to be done to ping Kony to justice. The group's work was hailed as a triumph of online activism in the modern media age.
But critics jumped in too. Analysis of the group's accounts raised questions over financial transparency and just how the group was spending money, forcing Invisible Children to release a new video defending its operations. Some critics, including elements of the Ugandan government, slammed it for over-simplifying a complex problem, not least because Kony is no longer active in Uganda itself. Attention was paid to hefty donations to the group from rightwing American fundamentalist groups, including those who fund anti-gay rights campaigns. A photograph also emerged of the children's founders posing with guns with soldiers in southern Sudan, which sparked widespread criticism.
But no one can have expected the next twist in the story to take the shape it did, with Russell's apparent and very public naked meltdown.
Now, in a grim mirror image of the group's initial burst of viral internet success, Invisible Children's cause again trended on Twitter. Hollywood gossip website TMZ swiftly obtained an alleged video of the incident in which a naked, blond man can be seen shouting and angrily pounding the pavement with his fists. That video too has gone viral.
In San Diego, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times, the group's offices were besieged by journalists while young activists inside wept. Invisible Children chief executive Ben Keesey appealed for privacy for his colleague. "We are devastated to see him dealing with this personal health issue. We will always love and support Jason, and we ask that you give his entire family privacy during this difficult time," Keesey said.
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