5 ms·

We can’t eternally keep the status quo just to avoid opening cans of worms. If we don’t intend to throw it away, we might as well open it and face the worms. T

by hrktb 5y ago

We can’t eternally keep the status quo just to avoid opening cans of worms. If we don’t intend to throw it away, we might as well open it and face the worms. This all reaction reminds me of the “new” skin tone palette of band aids: some people were happy with the change, and it seems to me the impact for everyone else who liked the standard ones was null. But there was sooooo many reactions against the very idea that more than one color was now available.

fossuser 5y ago
I think skin tone color band aids are different, people have different skin tones and the old default only blended well on people with light skin so the new ones are nice for people. With emoji people took a neutral non-racial thing and inserted race into it. In addition to the complexity of doing that well it just puts race and all the identity issues tied to it into a place it didn’t need to be. I think this generally makes things worse.
- Timpy 5y ago
  I agree that it would be a more apt comparison if the original band-aid color where neon pink, or some other non-human-skin-tone.
  - fossuser 5y ago
    Yeah - even then it’s not perfect because people in real life may have a cosmetic interest in skin tone matching bandages. It’s not about inserting race, it’s about blending the bandage so it looks nice. With emoji, it’s different - it’s explicitly about inserting race into a place it didn’t need to be. I think this type of thing is generally worse for society. It leads to people thinking about our differences more than our similarities.
- SamBam 5y ago
  > neutral non-racial thing But was it really? Serious question: Do you think that if the majority of people in the US, and particularly the majority of middle and upper classes and tech folk, were Black that they would have defaulted to a yellow color for emoji? That's not even getting into how all the "man" "woman" "child" etc emoji had stereotypical white-people hair etc.
  - fossuser 5y ago
    Make the color blue then if yellow isn’t neutral enough (like iMessage tapbacks, or Facebook thumbs up). Make the people more abstract. I’d argue the direction should be towards generality not identity specificity. I’m not dogmatic and obviously my point of view on this is a lost cause, but I generally think the universalist ideal is better and should be the goal. I do think yellow was intentionally chosen to be universal and not to be read as “white”.
  - kalleboo 5y ago
    To expand on this: The original emoji were created in Japan and had light skin tone to match Japanese users[0] (with a few exceptions of other racial stereotypes - like "person wearing turban"[1]). After they gained international popularity, their rendering was changed to yellow in an attempt to be more neutral. I'm guessing yellow was chosen to match the yellow "smiley face" which few had objected to historically [0] https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/boy/ https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/boy/ [1] https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/person-wearing-turban/ https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/person-wearing-turban/
- hrktb 5y ago
  One could argue the original band-aid was just rubber colored and non-racial in some way, but keeping ignoring it matched light color skins better was becoming a choice in itself. Emojis are the same to me, in that they were introduced with very limited scope (original ones were simple outlines, with bright pink, blue or green faces). Then expanded and got more detailed, less caricatural, and stopped fitting a single byte. IMO the can of worm got opened the moment we got detailed drawings with artistic choices that best match one category of people. We have shown we weren't limited in number, and accepted a ton of complexity to deal with flags or gender representations for instance, it would be tone-deaf to just go on saying it's too complex to also care about racial representations where they might apply. If you're arguing for getting back to simple outlines of random colors, I'm with you. But I think we're not in a stable place right now to say "we made enough diversification, let's just stop here".
  - fossuser 5y ago
    > “ If you're arguing for getting back to simple outlines of random colors, I'm with you.” Yes that is what I want. I basically agree with everything you said - I just wish we chose generality over specificity.
    - teachingassist 5y ago
      > Yes that is what I want. You have it - use the yellow emoji. If that's not good enough, then commission your own emoji font. Or, don't use emojis/don't use Unicode. And let other people communicate in the way that they want.
      - fossuser 5y ago
        I’m not talking about personal use? I do use the neutral colors, I just think inserting identity into something is a worse outcome. Generality would be better. See this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049269 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049269 Or this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049517 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049517
watwut 5y ago
> This all reaction reminds me of the “new” skin tone palette of band aids: some people were happy with the change, and it seems to me the impact for everyone else who liked the standard ones was null. But there was sooooo many reactions against the very idea that more than one color was now available. And now we have superheroes band aids, Elsa band aids, transformers band aids, teddy bear band aids.

by hrktb 5y ago

fossuser 5y ago

I think skin tone color band aids are different, people have different skin tones and the old default only blended well on people with light skin so the new ones are nice for people. With emoji people took a neutral non-racial thing and inserted race into it. In addition to the complexity of doing that well it just puts race and all the identity issues tied to it into a place it didn’t need to be. I think this generally makes things worse.

Timpy 5y ago
I agree that it would be a more apt comparison if the original band-aid color where neon pink, or some other non-human-skin-tone.
- fossuser 5y ago
  Yeah - even then it’s not perfect because people in real life may have a cosmetic interest in skin tone matching bandages. It’s not about inserting race, it’s about blending the bandage so it looks nice. With emoji, it’s different - it’s explicitly about inserting race into a place it didn’t need to be. I think this type of thing is generally worse for society. It leads to people thinking about our differences more than our similarities.
SamBam 5y ago
> neutral non-racial thing But was it really? Serious question: Do you think that if the majority of people in the US, and particularly the majority of middle and upper classes and tech folk, were Black that they would have defaulted to a yellow color for emoji? That's not even getting into how all the "man" "woman" "child" etc emoji had stereotypical white-people hair etc.
- fossuser 5y ago
  Make the color blue then if yellow isn’t neutral enough (like iMessage tapbacks, or Facebook thumbs up). Make the people more abstract. I’d argue the direction should be towards generality not identity specificity. I’m not dogmatic and obviously my point of view on this is a lost cause, but I generally think the universalist ideal is better and should be the goal. I do think yellow was intentionally chosen to be universal and not to be read as “white”.
- kalleboo 5y ago
  To expand on this: The original emoji were created in Japan and had light skin tone to match Japanese users[0] (with a few exceptions of other racial stereotypes - like "person wearing turban"[1]). After they gained international popularity, their rendering was changed to yellow in an attempt to be more neutral. I'm guessing yellow was chosen to match the yellow "smiley face" which few had objected to historically [0] https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/boy/ https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/boy/ [1] https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/person-wearing-turban/ https://emojipedia.org/apple/ios-6.0/person-wearing-turban/
hrktb 5y ago
One could argue the original band-aid was just rubber colored and non-racial in some way, but keeping ignoring it matched light color skins better was becoming a choice in itself. Emojis are the same to me, in that they were introduced with very limited scope (original ones were simple outlines, with bright pink, blue or green faces). Then expanded and got more detailed, less caricatural, and stopped fitting a single byte. IMO the can of worm got opened the moment we got detailed drawings with artistic choices that best match one category of people. We have shown we weren't limited in number, and accepted a ton of complexity to deal with flags or gender representations for instance, it would be tone-deaf to just go on saying it's too complex to also care about racial representations where they might apply. If you're arguing for getting back to simple outlines of random colors, I'm with you. But I think we're not in a stable place right now to say "we made enough diversification, let's just stop here".
- fossuser 5y ago
  > “ If you're arguing for getting back to simple outlines of random colors, I'm with you.” Yes that is what I want. I basically agree with everything you said - I just wish we chose generality over specificity.
  - teachingassist 5y ago
    > Yes that is what I want. You have it - use the yellow emoji. If that's not good enough, then commission your own emoji font. Or, don't use emojis/don't use Unicode. And let other people communicate in the way that they want.
    - fossuser 5y ago
      I’m not talking about personal use? I do use the neutral colors, I just think inserting identity into something is a worse outcome. Generality would be better. See this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049269 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049269 Or this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049517 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27049517

watwut 5y ago

> This all reaction reminds me of the “new” skin tone palette of band aids: some people were happy with the change, and it seems to me the impact for everyone else who liked the standard ones was null. But there was sooooo many reactions against the very idea that more than one color was now available. And now we have superheroes band aids, Elsa band aids, transformers band aids, teddy bear band aids.