The World's Most Wanted

You know how big a hit “America’s Most Wanted” was and how successful its efforts were to ferret out bad guys by making it almost impossible for them to hide. But now we have the Internet, so it’s time for “The World’s Most Wanted.”

And the first suspect appears to be Joseph Kony, leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army. A video on Kony issued by a group called Invisible Children has gone viral, and if you’d never heard Kony’s name before, chances are, you know it now. The LRA has been on a murderous rampage for decades in central Africa, kidnapping children, teaching them to fight and leading them to kill their parents.

There has been some criticism of this campaign by those who say the world is a little late getting on this train. The LRA is much smaller and more fragmented than it once was, and Kony may be hiding out somewhere in southern Sudan. The question is, will all this attention lead to his capture?

It certainly can’t hurt. Nothing focuses the world’s attention faster than two things: disasters and villains.

If there’s a problem with this, it’s that the world seems to be able to focus on only one villain at a time. A spotlight has a narrow beam, and while it’s shining on one bad guy, it draws attention away from others. In addition, the spotlight shining on the leaders sometimes ignores the fact that they are supported by many others and are part of a system.

Does Kony-mania mean we’ll be distracted from the deeds of other prime suspects, say in Syria or Iran? I hope not.