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Are We Too Dependent on Smartphones?
We became dependent on the internet. Individuals rely on it, and I believe not many people of our society are able to imagine the world if the internet would suddenly disappear. Decades ago we became dependent on car to accelerate transportation. The same story with lightbulbs, trains, clocks and and a long list of inventions with which we could go back hundreds of years. As the world evolves we take for granted and become dependent on everything that makes our lives more comfortable. And smartphones are no exception.
Smartphones are no longer a means to be connected to the world, they are extensions of our minds, of ourselves. To illustrate with an example, cab drivers in London to earn their licenses spend up to four years driving around the city and memorizing a labyrinth of 25,000 streets and 100,000 landmarks. "The Knowledge," as it is called, the world’s toughest taxi exam. Uber arrived to the streets of London in 2012 and turned “The Knowledge” into an app. In this case there is no need to rely on our brain’s power, but depend on the smartphone.
Having an external memory is convenient, but it should be added that smartphones are in our lives almost by default for more reasons. Once the immediacy to make calls or send text messages has been exceeded, we are currently looking for the feeling of being connected to the digital world. However, feeling connected through our smartphones is making us feeling more isolated. Studies show that teenagers are more likely to suffer from depression, insomnia and mental health issues than past generations due to frequent smartphone use.
Dependency and addiction are not only a thing of teenagers. There is evidence of an increasing number of users who fear of not being able to use these smart devices and it is harming our brains. For instance, we are more vulnerable to distractions and it affects to the ability to focus while working, studying and even driving.
As well as exposed with memory, smartphones are taking over a whole bunch of the functions of the brain. This convenience at our fingertips has turned us into lazy thinkers. If we think of the future, humans tend to spare the effort of problem-solving and it seems likely that we will increase the use of smartphones as an extended mind. For this reason it is important to understand how they affect and relate to human psychology and their mental capacity.
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Definition of feminism
Cambridge dictionary defines feminism as “the belief that women should be allowed the same rights, power, and opportunities as men and be treated in the same way, or the set of activities intended to achieve this state”. Leaving aside that, in my opinion, the word belief should be changed by a variety of political, cultural, economic and social movements; the core of the definition assigned to this term is deeply androcentric which means centered on male values, interests, and views, the male as measure of all things.
According to this meaning, the man is the archetype to which woman should aspire to be. But do feminists actually fight for women to have same rights, power, and opportunities as men? Women are actors of their own lives and men are neither the model to be equated or compared nor is the neutral by which can be used male as a synonym for person. It is our duty to build a society in which women are free human beings and owners of their own destiny, as well as to eliminate male domination of the patriarchal model. From this definition it follows that women go one step behind men to achieve rights or recognition, that women are inferior to men.
This definition is not accurate either, in the sense that misses that women have specific problems, derived from their reproductive capacity, that require the existence of specific rights for the female population – such as abortion or maternity rights. Do feminists, according to Cambridge, think women have no right to abort because men cannot abort?
To sum up, feminism is the fight for equality of human beings, but never for the equality of women to men – since that would imply to accept the androcentric model.
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Traducción: "a finales de Mayo" y "a principios de Junio"
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