I grew up on PCs. I bought my first Apple product, an iPod, in 2004. Despite that purchase, I made it through four years of college avoiding the rest of the Apple family of products, even the admittedly sexy MacBooks my fellow students and future ‘artists’ toted around campus like a badge of honor. There was something about “Apple product people” that I detested – a perceived elitism that I wanted no part of. Soon, they were growing in numbers, these Apple loyalists. People I knew and loved, they were Pod people. And then Pad people.
What I had to learn the hard way is that if you hang with zombies long enough, you’re bound to become one yourself. Accepting my “friends,” the Pod/Pad people, was my downfall. I used to look at iPhone people with disgust over their unabashed pride in something they hadn’t even created – something they paid for that somehow spoke to their value as a person. But now? I look at my BlackBerry and its 2.0MP Digital Camera screams, “I’M GONNA TAKE SHITTY PICTURES THAT YOU’LL NEVER SHARE ON FACEBOOK; ABORT NOW!” Its incapability of having more than one browser tab open is pathetic. I’m just over it. I want an iPhone. I want an iPad for when my MacBook gets too heavy to cart around. Fuck it. l’m coming out of the closet: I’m a freak-a-leek for Apple.
But when I read this morning that a Chinese student sold one of his kidneys to be able to afford an iPad 2, I had a “homie, whaaat?” moment. The 17-year-old was promised a cool 22,000 Yuan (about 3,393 USD) in exchange for his kidney – and now, his health is declining. “I wanted to buy an iPad 2 but could not afford it,” the boy told the Shanghai Daily. The Chenzhou No. 198 Hospital, where the surgery took place, is not qualified to perform such a surgery; according to the Shanghai Daily. There is no word as to whether or not the boy received his iPad 2.
This is troublesome on so many levels. Essentially, this kid pimped his body out for a fuckin’ TABLET DEVICE. I wanted whatever the ‘hot’ sneakers were when I was a kid, and my mom was like, “We’re going to Payless. You don’t need namebrand sneakers.” And you know what? She was fuckin’ right. Parents need to teach kids that they have to work for the things they want, especially when those things are completely unnecessary. They should be teaching their kids that real value is found in the person they are, not in what they can buy. Instead, parents drop their kids off with a sleeping bag at the Apple store so they can camp out and wait for the new gadgets to go on sale. “Pick up two, Johnny!” Gross out.
I’m still looking forward to buying my iPad 2, but I won’t be selling my body parts in the process.
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