Do you agree with Obama?

Agreed

I disagree. This has been around for much, much longer and isn't something new. The internet is just a modern version and BETTER version of it. Because they are exposed to more than just agreeing opinions. They also hear counter-arguments and can search them. Nothing destroys most ideologies like ten minutes of research.

I don't want to rewrite the essay I wrote below- but it says basically what you just said. This was more of a danger when people didn't have easy access to information. People can now instantly communicate cheaply from almost anywhere to anywhere else on earth. They have more opportunities to be exposed to new ideas and ways than ever in history. Building a shitty house isn't a danger of a hammer, you can do that without a hammer. It's a danger of the one using the tool.

If all, or even most, of the information on the web were true and helpful you guys would be on to something.
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Most people see what they want to see. If theyre addicted to opioids, they will find plenty of places online that make the addiction feel excepted. Same thing with racism, being, suicidal, pedophilia, even being overweight, short tempered, or ungracious .... the list goes on and on.
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If people do nothing their quality of life spirals down while improving takes intentionally and hard work. If you want to get better, you have to work at it. There are'nt many books on how to be less confident, lazy, unforgiving, angry, a victim etc. People can do those things naturally and it's unhealthy to have mass access to other people to reinforce their thoughts to the contrary (particularly when you're young and still emotionally developing).

Btw, im certainly not suggesting the internet is all bad. I am here after all.

That's pretty much been the continuing argument with every step to accessible mass media since the printing press. Many sub cultures had no way to know others like them existed, or a central source of information or rally points until they had circulars, magazines, later cable access shows, and then the internet. Now, people can seek out others like them to reinforce their negativity. But people who live in negative and prejudiced environments can also escape those through the internet to find tolerance elsewhere. You can use it for good or bad. The tool is not what does that but the one using the tool.

The internet is very different than a printed paper.

It is. And mass printed paper was very different than hand written papers. Spoken word via radio and phone was much different than mass printed words. To us it seems so tame but to those at the time advances in technology and concept which allowed the mass dissemination of information, storage and retrieval of records- it was world changing. Each version allows you to do all the things you could before, but faster, cheaper, easier, allowing you to reach more people with a message. Even the public library was a huge leap in making information available to the masses. They are all different, one thing that is the same though is people have always foretold doom and blamed ills on each advance, bemoaning the passage of the old and an age of idiots with too much information to use responsibly.

I don't think Obama was prophesying a doom from the internet, just acknowledging what you've already said, for some it can be a perilous trap.

I didn't say he was. That was largely irrelevant to the overall subject, I just threw it in because it was a commonality between all the mass communications breakthroughs, and the previous statement was they are different- the point being they are all different, but people have had the same reactions and seen danger in all of them despite the differences. The fact they are different doesn't matter. A gun is different from a bear and yet both can be dangerous no? In thy vein anything can be dangerous, waking up in the morning will expose you to many dangers, not waking up also has dangers, so really.... everything is danger. If we want to be less abstract though, the danger of isolating ourselves from other perspectives is not a danger inherent to a medium which by its nature exists to give access to the entire worlds collective knowledge and populace, it's in whoever is steering.

No, we got it.
It just wasn't funny.

Humor is subjective, you don't have a monopoly on deciding what's funny and what isn't

I'm not saying I have a monopoly, it's the will of the people of this comment section.

The +1 on my comments suggests otherwise.

Check again

Downvoting to prove your own point? That's very weak.

Think again, motherfucker

Me: *Makes a joke*
FS: STOP HAVING FUN!!!!! (You know, because apparently I'm not allowed to have fun on a website called FUNsubstance)
Seriously, who put the sand in your vaginas? If you didn't find it funny, move on and stop moaning.

Where's the fun in that?

Would we get a pearl then?

You inspire pokethebear.

Ewqua, you have worse timing than a pregnant woman's period.
Seriously, it would've been funny if there were comments like this.

That was, uh... almost English?
I can almost imagine Jacksfilms saying "oh Olga" while reading the second sentence.

The fuck do you mean "almost English"?

Read the second sentence again. You're probably just sleep deprived.
Speaking of periods, aren't you a bit defensive today.

Oh, thanks.
Sorry for being so defensive.