Former US President Barack Obama criticized cancel culture on the Internet, saying activists "should get over" their obsession with ideological purity tests, the Independent reported on Wednesday.

Speaking at the third annual Obama Foundation Summit in Chicago on Tuesday, the former president talked about the harmful impact judging others too rashly on social media can have.

“This idea of purity, and you’re never compromised, and you’re always politically woke and all that stuff, you should get over that quickly,” he said. “The world is messy. There are ambiguities. People who do really good stuff have flaws.”

Obama emphasized that the danger of being too judgemental is something he sees “particularly on college campuses.”

He explained the fallacy of thinking, “The way of me making change is to be as judgemental as possible about other people,” giving the example of “Like if I tweet or hashtag about how you didn’t do something right or used the wrong verb, then I can sit back and feel pretty good about myself. ‘Cause, ‘Man, you see how woke I was? I called you out.’”

But he stressed that this type of behaviour is not effective when trying to make a positive difference, saying “That’s not activism. That’s not bringing about change.” Obama added that “If all you’re doing is casting stones, you’re probably not going to get that far. That’s easy to do.”

Fox News pointed out that Obama’s statements were an expanded version of what he often said while president, “don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”

The comments also showed, according to Fox, that Obama is trying to embrace the image of a practical elder statesman as his party is drifting farther leftward.