Cellphone: Man’s New Electronic Master

By Apolinario Villalobos

Unconsciously, man has enslaved himself to his own invention – the cellphone and its “siblings”, the ipad, ipod, telpad, etc. that keep on popping in the market, sporting new looks but still with almost similar attributes. So as not to make this ridiculous and glaring fact so obvious, the reason given for such so close an attachment, to put it lightly, is necessity. Or, is it?

The manufacturers in connivance with programmers have practically hooked the users to this gadget so that they never ran out of models in a span of a few months after the “latest” ones have hit the market, during which those issued earlier have virtually become outdated. The manufacturers have banked on the requirements of buyers with fashion statement to satisfy, and who compete with each other for the first ownership of the latest models with limited editions. Some manufacturers even go to the extent of coming out with weird designs to make their creations unique.

The young use the gadget to put forward their fashion statement, so manufacturers come up with different colors and shapes of housing. The vain use it as a status symbol, so manufacturers come up with expensive models, although, their attributes are not much different from the old ones. And, the overall winners in this show-offness among consumers are of course, the manufacturers!

It could be true that the cellphone has become a convenient tool, especially, when it has also got camera, voice recorder, music player, radio, calendar, calculator, international clock, flashlight, games, etc. And, with those attributes, man has indeed, justified the gadget’s necessity. But anything taken in excess means abuse, and anything abused is no longer nice. Food for instance, is a necessity but its abuse results to disease, and so does medicine which if abused could be fatal.

How about the ears on which are plugged the cellphone at least 14 hours a day? What will happen to the fingers that tick the keypad regularly within the same length of time? What about the brains that accumulates radiation at least 8 hours a day? And, most especially, what about the time wasted in useless chats and texting?

Before it’s too late, we should think twice before totally enslaving ourselves to this contraption which seems to be already in control of some people’s senses.