YouTube probably. There's some amazing stuff on YouTube that I enjoy, but I believe the bad outweighs the good. I think it promoted narcissism, greed and negativity more than most other sites on the internet.

Maybe I am misplacing my anger but I divide the internet into the pre-YouTube golden age and the post-YouTube hellscape. I know there are sites like 4chan that are much worse, but YouTube just seems like the ultimate corruptor of society just because it normalized some pretty awful behavior for recognition and money.

That said... Again, lots of good on YouTube too.

I say all of this as a YouTube addict!

It's hilarious to watch. Self-awareness-free socialist kids whining about being demonetized by monolithic corporations (that they voluntarily signed up with to make money), causing them to lose money while they play video games and ranting about needing more government regulations and higher taxes so everyone will have more time and money to play even more video games (again, owned by the very corporations that they rant about).

It's a maelstrom of contradictions. But that's what happens when you weaponize laziness. You get an entire generation of human beings who will eat their own grandmother for another subsidy check or patreon donation. The entire western world will soon be filled with narcissistic, self absorbed, tech-addicted lunatics lacking any principles or ethics.

I'm starting to envy those Amazonian tribes who spear-chuck any outsiders who try to visit them. Those people are damn sophisticated. They may be the most red-pilled of all.

Exactly. I am not denying that it takes some technical know-how and charisma to make YouTube videos, but they need to realize that they are fortunate and that the business model they are trusting their future into has always been a house of cards that could crumble at any time.

I am actually talking to a YouTuber on Discord sometimes and he's clearly not an evil guy or anything, but the way he talks about 'his career on YouTube' and the other people there and the drama shows just how far gone most of these Tubers (including him) are. They believe themselves some sort of leaders of their tribes, their highschool-like shitflinging to be wars of epic proportions, and just generally think they are moving society in a certain direction, even though what they cover is... Pokemon, of all things.

It's weird, it's scary and I wish we could erase it. You can see News media on TV being nuts and similarly narcissistic, but I'd say the average YouTuber is more far gone than the worst news anchors, reality show candidates and talk show hosts in terms of delusional self-aggrendizing.

It would make for an interesting social experiment to take them back in time before the days of monetizing and ad sense and all the rest of it and see just how dedicated they were to those 24 hour live streams and let's plays. My guess is the field would thin pretty fast.

In the old days the words 'don't quit your day job, kid' had a bit more bite than it does now, I'm afraid.

It's less that it's modified, it's more if it has side effects. Plus there was a presentation that explained all GMO strains go through in all combinations, unlike normal crossbreeding. So say you introduce a GMO sunflower, it will spread to all other sunflowers, and soon the original never will exist again. Later we find the strain of modifications to sunflowers makes it so it interferes with our ability to absorb calcium. Can we remove the GMO sunflowers? It's probably already spread to nearly all other plants.

That's just a scenario, i'm not aware of any GMO sunflowers but it's long term effects that you don't see for decades (or approximately one generation for it's full effects) that i'm worried about. But i've heard GMO potatoes causing cancer in rats, GMO corn where normally farmers let the cows eat the stalks, they outright die and the health organization refuses to investigate because it's a Monsanto product. That some GMO corn are now creating their own weedkiller INSIDE the food to keep bugs away.

I want good food. There's other ways to have good food without splicing/modifying it.

I'm all for modified crops that can survive with less water in harsh climates where people starve. Such crops could do much to ease human suffering as long as the company that produces the modified seed/crop doesn't play dirty.

I'm about to play devil's advocate a bit here, but:

(Also Warning: What i'm about to say will likely be unpopular here and sound like it's "promoting" certain 'taboo"/verboten sites. I only say it to prove a point, not to promote said sites beyond the points I make.)

Said sites(youtube[to a lesser extent due to censorship on that platform lately]/4chan/8chan/etc-chan) all serve a purpose. Such sites, though seen by many as evil/wrong/unneeded, serve the following needed purposes:

They allow for "wrongthink/"bad" opinions/controversial content(including such ideas as nationalism[the non-evil variety]/conservative viewpoints/radical left viewpoints/etc) to have a place to be/exist while being contained & kept away from everyone who doesn't want to read/view such. This allows people posting such(for good or ill, and rightly or wrongly) a place to express such(seeing as many sites have clamped down on such and saying such things IRL can have consequences) without fear of censorship/shunning/hate(within reason/US law).

By allowing such, people are given a place to vent and relieve stress/get stuff out of their system in a place away from the "normalized" masses, while being kept in check for illegal/threatening content(via mods/etc reporting such to the relevant authorities). These sites also allow those in censor-heavy lands(UK/South Korea-North Korea/Russia/etc) a chance to vent certain "illegal" views(via VPN, of course), and they provide a platform in case of future censorship actions in other countries.

Is that a thing/do you have a source? I ask as afaik the GMO crops mostly used "terminator" seeds(aka seeds that only allow one planting/season) and such wasn't possible.

Also, as I said, many crops have been modified(through older methods not considered GMO methods, but they still fit the term) for various qualities in the past(and oddly enough, many species/strains of such, both natural/GMO, still exist on earth today).
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Funny thing, rats/mice(while used in many lab studies/experiments) getting x symptom/illness/condition from y product doesn't mean humans will also experience/get such.

But I DO AGREE that some modification(terminator seeds and pesticide producing plants) are dangerous/unneeded.
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The problem is that, sadly, humanity cannot survive(with such increasing numbers) on "natural" foods alone.

Soil is becoming poorer over time(due to not rotating crops much anymore, among other things) Some modification is needed(plants that need less light/water/certain temps, greater yields, etc)to both grow enough to feed everyone and to allow growing in poorer soil/less hospitable land.

Crossbreeding via pollination is hardly the same as GMO.

Popular Science: Genetically modifying seeds Literally it's rolling the dice, and testing them over years to see if they are stable, then trying to get them legally allowed. Because assuming it gets inserted, you never know where and how it affects the plants as a whole.

Also the whole patenting a plant, or human DNA segments. I just wish it went away and we only had natural plants at this point. The whole system is unsafe and unstable.

Personally, I think it's best to buy a mixture of GMO and non-GMO food. This way, you'll keep supporting both, hopefully enough so that both are viable, and if some disease wipes out one of them, the other will still be an option.

Basically, this is a situation where diversity (of crops, in this case) is good; a monoculture can be wiped out with a single disease, while with more diverse crops, it's not so easy for that to happen. We don't want a repeat of the Irish Potato Famine, right?

Don't forget those who can lactate, but whose milk is not safe for the baby (for example, if the person lactating is carrying a nasty virus).

I could say that there are ethical issues with this as well.

Of course, a far worse problem is the patenting of organisms; in fact, I would say that both patent and copyright law have gone too far at this point. (In particular, copyright terms are way too long.)

In a nice world, all the mobile phone carriers would just agree to standardize their radio bands.

In this world, 5G's rollout in the US is probably going to be delayed thanks to screwballs.

They may be different methods, but they still achieve similar things(i.e. both can be/are used to select for certain traits[flavor/growing conditions/size/smell/etc] that are desirable).

Some of the main reasons GMO foods are considered bad/bad for people is because "x corporation is bad so y thing they do must also have bad effects on people/the planet by default and in all cases" style fear tactics and paranoia being spread.

This isn't to say some modifications aren't bad(like terminator seeds/pesticide producing plants/etc), and that some practices aren't bad(like lax testing of such modifications), but imo the benefits balance out the risks in many cases(high yield crops and the ability to grow in areas once considered not suitable for farming, both of which are needed in the ever growing population on planet earth)

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I agree that patenting plants is bad(because it leads to lawsuits via seeds crosspollinating via wind currents into other people's fields & it keeps people from building on those ideas or poorer people using them), but being against something because it's "unnatural" is insane.

That's like saying everything natural is safe/okay(examples: ingesting certain radioactives or other elements is dangerous, even though they're "natural"), and everything man-made is not(what about organ transplants/childhood vaccines/vehicles/gaming?).

I myself usually buy based on the following factors: price(because when you're on a budget "organic"/natural foods are the more expensive and unrealistic option)/variety-strain(specific flavors/textures/etc)/and lastly the company's policies(to a small degree).

In a nutshell, I eat whatever I can afford and that tastes good. Stuff that's "bad" for me I eat in moderation, but I still indulge.

And yeah, a variety of species helps to prevent species-endangering diseases(dutch elm/cocoa plant/banana tree diseases/etc), so more species helps.
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Agreed. Formula prevents infected mothers from spreading diseases(in the rare case the mother didn't do it via giving birth to them, anyways).
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Terminator seeds are a double edged sword. They are bad in that farmers must re-buy new seed every season(and can't simply use old crop's seeds to replant) and they could lead to the dying off of species based solely on terminator seeds.

They DO, however, keep the problem of lawsuits via crosspollination at bay(to a degree). They can also keep potentially bad species from spreading too far in the ecosystem.

As for patents: Yeah, they suck(in general as well).

Why the owners of Mickey Mouse/Bugs Bunny/etc can dictate such long terms for EVERYONE's IPs(and thus keep stuff out of the commons for way too long of a peroid, imo) I could never understand.

Heck, many games that are abandoned(as in truly abandoned titles with no IP holders left) cannot be legally hosted/downloaded in some countries because of such laws...even though there's no one left to legally object to such being distributed.

By making copyright terms so long, ideas that could be built upon by society(for good or ill) can't until 50+ years have gone by. (I get that IP holders worked hard and deserve the money, but 50+ years of it?!?)
It is? Happy day :D

But seriously, 5G is mostly untested(on human/animal life) and they want to erect towers every 100 yards or so to propagate signals(thereby messing with the local wildlife that may be affected and forcing some to sell their lands or right on their lands to build these things).

If they did quality/quantity testing and it was proven safe/safeish I wouldn't care.

To be fair(albeit a bit harsh/blunt) I don't really give a fig as to a plant's "consent" as I don't view them as sentient/intellectually similar to man. I do respect nature to a good degree though(one world and all that).

As for the downsides to terminator seeds: that thing could happen, but it wouldn't be an unknown issue/fear if more testing were done on such first.

(But, sadly, companies gotta profit. :\)
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Not to sound x-phobic or anything(or go too offtopic here), but i'm pretty sure only pregnant(and those slightly after pregnancy) can lactate. This is why women in the past who couldn't lactate always went to those who were pregnant/those who were recently pregnant as surrogate feeders.

(It's also, sadly, why milk farms have to keep cows pregnant alot to make milk.)
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All IP laws with insane limits/terms are insane...full stop...imo.