6 THE VOICE, THURSDAY, MARCH 22, 2012

EDITOR MATT HYNDMAN

Social media
Job site not a
solution for
the job hunt

n this digital age more and more

fo-cve are turning to the Internet
for everything from dating to

advice, and now even to find a job.

Another site has popped up on the
market, Ayoudo.com, allowing users
to get someone to help with their
yard work, teach them to play
guitar, or act as their full-time
marketing consultant.

Based out of Vancouver, the site
launched in January calling itself a
social media site that lets you “tap
into the collective help of those
around you.”

Ayoudo is both a website and is
available as an app for the iPhone.

The application makes you sign in
with your Facebook account in order
to reply to postings, reducing the
possibility that users will fall for
scams.

But will Ayoudo.com be the next
Monster.ca or Workopolis.com? I
don’t think so.

With so many big name sites out
there, as well as major companies
that already have
online job
application forms
on their own
websites, I can’t
see Ayoudo.com

nae taking off as the
\ next big thing.
0 P| N 10 N While I myself
have looked for
HAYLEY DOCTOR =—s jobs on websites

such as Craigslist

or Monster.ca, I
don’t think that integrating social
media to help you find a babysitter
is really the way of the future.

Ayoudo.com seems to be more for
odd jobs around the house and
chores that people don’t want to do
themselves (taking someone’s trash
to the dump for $100 for example).
Rather than a way to find full-time
careers, it is just another site out
there in the miasma of the internet.

According to a study published by
Pew Internet Project in 2002, 52
million Americans admitted to using
the Internet for a job search at some
point in their careers. That same
study revealed that over 60 per cent
of people aged 18-29 used the
Internet to help them find a job.

If, on the off chance Ayoudo.com
does stick around, I can’t see it
being more than just a place to find
students who are willing to earn
pocket money.

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Nicholas Read oversees
The Voice. Email him at
nread@langara.be.ca

Lack of reaction to child

drawings Is concerning

Child’s View from Gaza was an
Ae hosted by Langara

depicting pictures from kids in
the Gaza Strip and how they view
their surroundings.

Unsurprisingly, the majority of
the images on display depict scenes
of extreme violence: rockets blowing
up a playground with a child
running away, missiles falling onto a
school building and an Israeli tank
killing civilians, just to name a few.

In today’s post-modern, desensi-
tized society, depictions such as
these are so commonplace that most
people do not even stop to raise an
eyebrow anymore.

It is common knowledge that, yes,
there has been a constant state of
quasi-war between Israel and the
Palestinian people for the last 64
years. And yes, there have been over
14,000 casualties as a result. But, the
world’s in a bad way right now.
There are a lot of wars being waged

all across the globe, so there’s
nothing to be done, right?
Wrong. Those images on display
at our college were horrifying, and
the fact that the
mainstream news,
and people in
general, do not
give these events
even aniotaofthe |
attention they @

SS
deserve is, ia ng f
frankly, unaccept- a
able.
These images OPINION
drawn by children ALEX SKERDZHEV

may look colour-

ful and playful,

but they depict actual, real events.
Joseph Stalin, the communist

leader of Russia during WWII

responsible for the murder of tens of

thousands of Russian citizens,

famously said, “The death of one

man is a tragedy. The death of

millions is a statistic.”

This is unfortunately true. We see
so much violence around us that we
aren’t overtly bothered by news of
child casualties in a distant country.

But every single digit increase in
the number of children killed living
in a war-zone should spark a
firestorm that consistently places
more and more pressure on Israel
and the Palestinian people to finally
settle on some kind of peace treaty.

It is not even a headline anymore:
Israel seeks peace with Palestine,
peace negotiations break down.

There are, of course, many factors
that play into these peace talks, and
ending such a long-running feud
sparked by religion is no easy
maiter.

However, more attention must be
paid to the suffering of the less
fortunate. We cannot be complacent
and simply do nothing. This matter
has to get resolved.

Kony activists disenchant public

and his organization Invisible

Children launched the Kony
campaign for the wrong reasons.

Joseph Kony is a terrible person.
Using child soldiers is wrong. And
he’s right that North Americans
easily ignore war
crimes in far-off
countries.

But the way
this information
is brought to light
does matter and
Invisible Children
got it wrong.

In October 2011,
months before the
Kony 2012 video
was released, the
U.S. Council on
Foreign Relations criticized groups
like Invisible Children for altering

[: not as though Jason Russell

OPINION

MATT HYNDMAN

facts and exaggerating the atrocities
of conflicts in Africa.

The council concluded that this
activity had helped pressure the U.S.
government into sending troops to
central Africa in October last year.

Russell should have known that if
his project reached the level of
awareness he was hoping for it
would be thrust under intense
scrutiny.

It did, and there was plenty for
critics to feast on.

There’s the $84,377 salary Russell
takes out of the charity.

There are the photos of the
group’s founders holding weapons
and posing with the Sudan People’s
Liberation Army.

And then there was the outrage in
Uganda when the video enraged
locals who complained that the facts
were simplified and the country’s

violence was hardly shown in lieu of
shots of Russell and his kid.

It leaves skeptics with the picture
of an egotistical man who will do
whatever it takes to draw money to
his organization so that he can gain
fame and impress his son. That may
not be the truth but how it’s inter-
preted is all that matters in the end.

But more dangerous is the
simplification of such a complex
issue, especially considering that
Kony is now in another country, and
any effort to catch him would involve
the invasion of a sovereign country.

The fallout from the Kony 2012
video produced by Invisible Chil-
dren does damage on two levels.

It misinforms the public and
leaves people disillusioned about
internet-based activist campaigns,
especially in conjunction with the
sour end to the Occupy movement.

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