President Obama delivered the commencement address at Hampton University in Virginia today, and after he spoke about the importance of education, he launched into his old-man routine, railing against technology and the media for “putting new pressures on our country and on our democracy.”
“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.
Wow, those are some serious claims. And it’s a little weird for Obama to place the blame on the devices that allow people to access content that doesn’t “always rank all that high on the truth meter,” rather than blaming the content itself. But even weirder is acting like he doesn’t know how to work an iPod. The man has been an Apple fanboy for years.
Obama bemoans ‘diversions’ of IPod, Xbox era [AP via Google]
