Kony 2012 Director Suffered 'Brief Psychosis'

The director of a video calling for the arrest of fugitive Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony suffered from a brief psychosis when he had a very public meltdown last week, his wife has said.
Jason Russell, who directed the 30-minute film Kony 2012 that went viral earlier this month, was detained by police last week after witnesses reported a man in "various stages of undress" who was "acting bizarrely, running into traffic" in public.
In a 30-second video on TMZ, Mr Russell bends over and slaps the concrete pavement before yelling out "iPhone Siri" and clapping quickly.
The gossip website published the mobile phone video after it was shot from a passing car in southern California last Thursday morning.
"Jason's incident was in no way the result of drugs or alcohol in his body," his wife, Danica, said in a statement on the same day an anti-Kony resolution came before the US Senate.
"The preliminary diagnosis he received is called brief reactive psychosis, an acute state brought on by extreme exhaustion, stress and dehydration."
Mr Russell's film Kony 2012 became an internet sensation this month, racking up more than 84 million hits on YouTube since it was posted and thrusting its director into the spotlight.
The video aimed to wake up the world to the atrocities committed by Ugandan rebel leader Joseph Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army, including kidnapping children and forcing them to fight.
On Wednesday, a bipartisan group of 33 US senators introduced a resolution condemning Kony, and his fighters, for crimes against humanity and supporting efforts to remove him from the battlefield.
US officials had already taken actions aimed at stopping Kony before Mr Russell's video hit the internet.
In October 2011, President Barack Obama notified Congress that he had authorised around 100 combat-equipped US forces to deploy to central Africa to help government forces battling Kony.
Nevertheless, the phenomenal success of Mr Russell's film has been hailed for inspiring young people to activism despite some criticism including that it oversimplified a long-standing human rights crisis.
The father of two was not arrested following what his organisation has called an "unfortunate incident" but officers took him to a medical facility where he was treated for "exhaustion, dehydration and malnutrition".
San Diego Police Department said Mr Russell was sectioned under what is known as a "5150 psychiatric hold" for authorities to assess his mental state.
"The doctors say this is a common experience given the great mental, emotional and physical shock his body has gone through in these last two weeks," Mrs Russell said.
The filmmaker will remain in hospital for a number of weeks, and his wife said the recovery process "could take months" before the director is able to resume his work with his charity Invisible Children.