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That's not what he said
And he makes an arguable point
He is kinda like Jimmy telling americans they waste too much electricity at a time when noone was mature enough to handle the cold hard truth.
Obama bemoans 'diversions' of IPod, Xbox era
(AFP) – 3 hours ago
HAMPTON, Virginia — US President Barack Obama lamented Sunday that in the iPad and Xbox era, information had become a diversion that was imposing new strains on democracy, in his latest critique of modern media.
Obama, who often chides journalists and cable news outlets for obsessing with political horse race coverage rather than serious issues, told a class of graduating university students that education was the key to progress.
"You're coming of age in a 24/7 media environment that bombards us with all kinds of content and exposes us to all kinds of arguments, some of which don't always rank all that high on the truth meter," Obama said at Hampton University, Virginia.
"With iPods and iPads and Xboxes and PlayStations, -- none of which I know how to work -- information becomes a distraction, a diversion, a form of entertainment, rather than a tool of empowerment, rather than the means of emancipation," Obama said.
He bemoaned the fact that "some of the craziest claims can quickly claim traction," in the clamor of certain blogs and talk radio outlets.
"All of this is not only putting new pressures on you, it is putting new pressures on our country and on our democracy."
Obama, who uses the handful of Commencement addresses that he delivers each year to meditate on societal developments broader than the minutiae of everyday politics, warned the world was at a moment of "breathtaking change."
"We can't stop these changes... but we can adapt to them," Obama said, adding that US workers were in a battle with well-educated foreign workers.
"Education... can fortify you, as it did earlier generations, to meet the tests of your own time," he said.
Hampton University is a historically black college, and Obama noted the huge disparity in educational achievement between African Americans and other racial groups in the United States and the world.
But he urged the graduates to take inspiration from the example of Dorothy Height, a civil and women's rights icon who died, aged 98, last month, who fought racial prejudice to secure a college education.
"A black woman, in 1929, refusing to be denied her dream of a college education," Obama said, reprising Height's life story.
"Refusing to be denied her rights, refusing to be denied her dignity, refusing to be denied... her piece of America's promise."
Obama argued that from the days of the pioneer politicians who founded the United States, until the modern day, education and knowledge had been the key to progress and US democracy.
He drew a line between Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence, and today's challenges.
"What Jefferson recognized... that in the long run, their improbable experiment -- called America -- wouldn't work if its citizens were uninformed, if its citizens were apathetic, if its citizens checked out, and left democracy to those who didn't have the best interests of all the people at heart.
"It could only work if each of us stayed informed and engaged, if we held our government accountable, if we fulfilled the obligations of citizenship."
Copyright © 2010 AFP. All rights reserved. More »
Teh Republicans, Ipads, Teabaggers and teh xbox machines are ruining america!!
That's not what he said
And he makes an arguable point
He is kinda like Jimmy telling americans they waste too much electricity at a time when noone was mature enough to handle the cold hard truth.
SO while he has; Rahm Emmanuel on staff, made campaign advertisements making fun of McCain's age, had Hope 'N Change Inc, told the opposition party he doesn't care to cooperate because he's the WON, through all that he's blaming the political landscape on the Xbox???
dude! he like said Emancipation. That's powerful stuff.
so does this mean the government is going into home entertainment?
Will a new law state that I will be forced to buy a government approved and run XBOX from now on?
Wow... people are desperate to throw at Obama when they need to reduce a point about the decentralization of media and proliferation of outlets for un-verified (at best) and outright fictional (at worst) information to a complaint about the kids and their new-fangled videogame doo-hickeys.
The internet, and all things associated, that caused the "decentralization of media and proliferation of outlets" is the greatest thing to happen to America in a long time.
It will save this Republic.
Hitler would have had a much harder time if he had to combat the free flow of information via the internet.
Godwin law you say? You only know about that law because of....
The Internet.
I wish I shared your optimism. For every truthful utterance on the internet, there are 10 absurd fantasies, and with the enormous volume of information deluging us every day, we scarcely have time to verify what we read. The internet is marvelous, but it also allows opinion to pass as fact, and that is dangerous.
That can't be challenged, what you say is true
but it's all perspective IMO
I see it as a good thing. Jog your brains, teach you the hard way to discern what is wrong and what is right on your own, to learn to double check for yourself, etc.
A population that has the world's history of wisdom and knowledge at it's desktop + bombarded with "news" all the time, is sure to create a well informed, wiser population. It just works itself out. There will never be a shortage of grammar nazi's and fact checkers on the internet.
Give the truth a platform, and it's voice will be the loudest, every single time.
also
anyone else think it's ironic that Obama is annoyed by the very thing that funded his campaign and drove him to the white house?
Obama is literally the spearhead of the next breed of politician.
"CroflBama blames the political mess on Ipads, Interwebs and Xboxes"
that's not what Magic Negro said, but keep up the ankle-biting trivial bull spew, which is the right-wing/Repug/conservative bad-faith strategy to confuse and lie about all the major problems facing American today, the "mess", rather than participate in a good-faith, adult effort to work on solutions.
Last edited by boutons_deux; 05-09-2010 at 03:56 PM.
oh so he's not blaming it on the ipads, interwebs, and xbox. But he's blaming it on spending too much time on ipads, interwebs, and xbox.
Nuance.
It already has. They found the Kenyan birth certificate!
Several of them!
That's a nice sentiment, but your argument depends on people ACTUALLY wanting to unearth the truth as opposed to finding a "truth" that confirms their own beliefs and prejudices. How many people do you know who are content to just watch Fox or MSNBC as opposed to looking for news all over? I know lots.
Since nazis have already been invoked twice in this thread, I may as well say the people's voice failed in Hitler's Germany. And even with the benefit of the internet, we weren't able to see past the bull smokescreen Bush laid on us in the lead-up to Iraq. What I have noticed since the internet's rise to primacy are an endless supply of conspiracy theories that vastly outnumber anything I've ever seen in my life, and conspiracy theories drive people to stupid actions.
Conspiracy theories never thrived under bush and 911.
Instead they should have been faking do ents on Bush's National Guard service gosh darn it!
So as Gore would say, the science has settled.
Obama's ideas <<<<< Call of Duty & Facebook.
Exactly.
Thanks for proving my point.
I agree, traditional News like CBS is just a bad a culprit as the interwebs.
Of course they did... that's exactly what I'm arguing.
Don't you wish it was back to the good ol' days when the NYT, Washington Post and Dan Rather had all the power?
So you also agree Fox News is as well.I agree, traditional News like CBS is just a bad a culprit as the interwebs.
Thanks.
. Centralized Govt want Centralized News. No surprises here.
So you also agree Huffington Post as well.So you also agree Fox News is as well.
Thanks.
Thanks.
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