Welcome

All throughout college and for a good portion of high school, I was judged for having an Android. Apparently, the mere existence of a green bubble is enough to terrorize both the integrity of a text chat and the eyes of the iPhone user, not to mention reluctantly considering remaking the entire conversation due to Apple’s refusal to remove their segregation policies.

I have witnessed all sorts of terrible acts against humanity, like misogyny, racism, and homophobia. But never in my life have I seen a group more marginalized than Android users. Everywhere they go, they get shunned for using a different, yet superior cellular device. If you make a racist or sexist remark, that would be perceived well within a certain similarly minded and possibly immature group, but the same remark will get you cancelled by mainstream society. But if you’re an Android user, not only is it widely accepted to bash their phone choice, but it is cool and expected of you to do so. It is a good thing to discriminate against Android users. Even worse than staying silent on such a crime against humanity, is possibly being the Android user in question also. You have to speak up.

Yet if you own an Android, you are not safe anywhere either. The social psychology concept of an ingroup, in which other members can protect you and help you feel a sense of belonging, becomes basically nonexistent when it comes to smartphone ownership. The reason comes from the remarkable phenomenon of other Android users judging each other for having these supposedly inferior phones, propped up by Apple’s omnipresent, elitist propaganda. One would think they would band together, but in fear of being found out they insist upon not. In a critical time when Android users could collectively find safe refuge in each other, and unilaterally strike back against the tyranny of iPhone users, they somehow find themselves capitulating into division and obscurity. 

They are also conditioned to staying silent when the supposedly normal and functioning members of society would immediately cast their spells of judgement if they became aware of such disgrace and depravity in their presence. It’s not much different than playing an Imposter in Among Us, watching the other Impostors get kicked off while you silently reflect on what it would mean if you revealed that you were also not a Crewmate. I know the population situation was grim, but I also knew for a fact you fellow Android users were out there in the shadows.

There were only two people I knew of in college that also had Androids. You would get a satisfying check mark at the bottom right if they also happened to be part of your nearly extinct species. I never saw that check mark except from one of those two people. The amount of random contacts I would have, especially at the start of the semester when you’re trying to hit up as many people to become homework buddies, somehow never yielded me any check marks.

I was delighted to finally hear someone else had an Android on campus. My friend had virtually the same Samsung Galaxy model too. It was a genuine pleasure to see that her messages had those coveted check marks. They were really pretty and I was happy. Except when I asked her what her favorite thing about Androids was, she replied it was that they don’t break as easily when you throw them really hard onto the floor and don’t cost as much if they broke. And of course within the same breath, around other people, she would immediately mention “Yeah, I know. I should get an iPhone.” Moral of the story, I was alone in college. The second person approached me at a party asking about the Android I was holding. She kept on talking about the one thing we were discriminated for constantly, and for whatever reason I can’t remember, all I did eventually was leave my kind. I was indeed no better than an iPhone user. 

In my last year of college I was open to considering the merits of owning an Apple phone, amidst previous judgement from iPhone users and my long held belief that Android was better. This was realized when I somehow dropped it on the pavement shortly after graduating college. No, I did not purposefully accidentally throw my phone into the ground like the heretic aforementioned. Because my silicone case was unable to prevent the phone from operating after being dropped from three feet high, I saw that unfortunate event as a silver lining to fully envision what Apple fans have been glorifying for well over a decade, that the iPhone was better in every conceivable way. I could finally see what iPhone users mean when they say that the aesthetics and operating system are so much nicer and that iMessage is undisputedly invented by the gods or whatever. And with the acquisition of a new phone marking the long-waited transcendance from depravity to purity, from naivety to maturity, I was finally going to become enlightened. I was finally going to become a better person. 

You guys were all wrong. 

I knew it the entire time, but I had to go through all five stages of grief within a time span of a couple days. I decided to sip the Kool Aid that you all were on and internalized the belief that the iPhone was actually better this entire time. Now, the sudden loss of my beloved phone became a redirection to realizing I was terribly wrong after all. You could say that I decided to speedrun the bargaining portion of the Kubler-Ross cycle with this neat tactic of reframing my once negative perspective. I trekked to my beloved computer parts store Microcenter and bought a refurbished iPhone 12. 

Apple users are going to say that I am highly influenced by my bias towards Android and sudden grief. But trust me, if anything I wanted you guys to be right all along. I would want a better phone and don’t want to buy a new one again. I patiently gave myself several months to keep up the delusion that the iPhone just needed a little more time to adjust to. 

So how does the iPhone absolutely suck? Almost every app looks outdated and clunky, and it made me realize how much I took the apps developed by Google for granted. The most egregious app is the clock app, because it asks for your sleep time and you also can’t set your alarm to the theme from Rocky, or whatever Spotify song your heart desires to wake you up in the morning. The rest of the operation system, especially the notification center, also has been sorely disappointing in looks and functionality despite Apple’s supposed reputation of modern simplicity. The cherry on top is that the app drawer is bizarrely organized into squares of squares. That’s too many squares. I understand that Apple truly believes in its software design to the point where you can’t alter much of the operating system like you can with third party launchers in Android, but its current iteration makes me never want to buy an iPhone again.

Despite the amount of times people have praised iMessage as one of the greatest things to grace their eyes, it is a genuine understatement to say that the iMessage experience has been a sheer letdown. Google Messages absolutely kills it over iMessage and it’s not even close. You take a look at Google Messages, and it looks polished and cute. Meanwhile everything in iMessage looks ancient. I can’t tell you the joy I’d feel to have a message come onto the lock screen on Android. I’ve lost track of the amount of times I’ve daydreamed, fully lost in thought, of seeing Android notifications roll in.

Then there were the reasons specific to the iPhone 12, and yet to fix many of these issues you’d have to pay over a thousand dollars for their more premium models. The Always On Display was sorely missed. Being able to immediately see the time when pulling out your phone is lovely. The refresh rate could be higher, and so the smooth scrolling is gone. The iPhone 12 has notoriously poor battery life. I feel slightly more crippled at the end of each day.

I know Steve Jobs would not stand for these questionable iPhone software decisions. I would have forgiven the judgement, harassment, and downright terrorism of Apple if they were right all these years, but I only felt even more betrayed and whiplashed deluding myself that they were somehow right. 

All I can say now is that if you own an Android, know that you are not alone. Know that many of your supposed comrades will turn to the dark side after accidentally throwing their phone to the ground. Know that you will be persecuted into oblivion, by friends, loved ones, and almost everyone you encounter. But you keep on going. Not just despite the injustice, but because of it.