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Fuck emojis. I have enough trouble interpreting the facial expressions of the real-time humans who I am conversing with, whose immediate emotional response to

Fuck emojis. I have enough trouble interpreting the facial expressions of the real-time humans who I am conversing with, whose immediate emotional response to what I or they are saying is meaningful and important to me and which inform my own social behavior. Now you want to shrink that whole set of social cues down to a handful of pixels, with loads of cultural and meta-cultural interpretation built in, and also give respondents as much time as they want to choose some tragically and perhaps intentionally vague icon to reply with that I’m then supposed to make sense of? No. Already had that with words, thanks. Fuck emojis. Red cheeks with wide eyes and an “o” mouth means one thing, while virtually the same thing but with a purple forehead instead of the red cheeks means something entirely different? Congratulations, you’ve reified my middle school experience into a goddamned tamagotchi and I hate it. I’m not going to discuss the eggplant. Or the star or the bus or the shoe, or the juice box or the helicopter or the five (presumably) alcoholic drinks I’ve just scrolled through. Or how they only show up as suggestions while texting after you have already typed the word they symbolize and how that adds nothing to the conversation except a visual stumbling block, or how these things have NOTHING to do with emotions anymore. (Eggplant is the outlier here; even I know it’s never really used as an eggplant. And I’m angry that it can also be classified within the set of emojis that are encompassed by my first and final statement.) Fuck emojis.

silvester23 5y ago
The word Emoji makes it sound to an English speaker like it should have something to do with emotions (like emoticon does), but that is pure coincidence: it just means 'picture character' in Japanese (see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoji https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoji)
- filoeleven 5y ago
  Thanks, I did not know that.
- jhgb 5y ago
  Of course it's Japanese trying to push thousands of ideograms onto nations perfectly happy with just dozens of phonetic letters. Yeah, nope. F that.
  - scrollaway 5y ago
    Please have an even more xenophobic, imperialistic take on this. Go right ahead. Seriously, you maybe might want to consider the western world has been forcing american/latin standards on cultures which need far more than those to communicate, considering them second class citizens and killing some of the more peculiar / original languages because they're "not worth supporting". (= Not enough eyeballs for the ads you'd be printing) Now you have the cojones to complain about Japanese communication features seeping into the west? Fucking PLEASE.
    - throwaway210222 5y ago
      Are you arguing that it should be the national policy of a Western government, say Norway to pass laws to enforce its companies to honour every language/script on earth? If not, can you - precisely - explain what changes you would like to see in (say) Switzerland and swiss products with respect to the San/Khoi of Botswana?
      - scrollaway 5y ago
        The only change I'm currently advocating for is the one that involves GP not writing their repulsive comment.
    - jhgb 5y ago
      "Xenophobic"? "Imperialistic"? What has "xenophobia" or "imperialism" have to do with historically observed practicality of types of scripts? > you maybe might want to consider the western world has been forcing american/latin standards on cultures which need far more than those to communicate No, I might not. For starters I'm neither American nor Latin (whatever that you imagine to be). And second, historically, almost every civilization that had a realistic option to do so got rid of ideograms and logograms, because of their sheer impracticality, especially after the invention of movable type. Hieroglyphs went from ideograms and logograms to phonograms (see this very text). Cuneiform went from ideograms and logograms to phonograms (see Ugaritic). Some civilizations like Japanese found themselves in a cul-de-sac because of how a former adoption of a logographic script changed their language (for example with onyomi in case of Japanese) but that doesn't mean that they didn't realize the advantages of phonetic writing and haven't at least tried (onnade in the Heian period, romaji in the Meiji period). I learned to read when I was three or four years old. In retrospect, there is no way in hell that I would have preferred growing up in a place where you become fully literate (and able to read the kinds of technical texts that I was reading by the age of ten) in your very late adolescence. So for obvious reasons I do not prefer having to re-learn reading ten times as many symbols as I need to just to be able to read some small amount of texts of ephemeral value, or having to find out how to write hundreds of symbols on my QWERTY keyboard that hasn't hampered my communication in any way so far. > killing some of the more peculiar / original languages because they're "not worth supporting" If you believe this to be a "western" phenomenon, then I have bad news for you -- it's universal. Sad but true.
- xdennis 5y ago
  While it is a coincidence that e+moji sounds like emotion, that is their purpose: to communicate emotions. And it is the origin of emoticons which preceded them.
SapporoChris 5y ago
I have a similar opinion. I see emoji use, especially excessive emoji use as a indication of someone who cannot adequately express themselves using normal speech. If you are seriously worried about interpretation of your comments then it is worth learning to write clearly and unambiguously. Adding an ill defined emoji is not a solution.
theandrewbailey 5y ago
I don't like emoji, and I view every single one I come across as a festering zit on whatever idea someone is attempting to poorly express. Your dislike is on another level. Comment favorited.

silvester23 5y ago

The word Emoji makes it sound to an English speaker like it should have something to do with emotions (like emoticon does), but that is pure coincidence: it just means 'picture character' in Japanese (see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoji https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoji)

filoeleven 5y ago
Thanks, I did not know that.
jhgb 5y ago
Of course it's Japanese trying to push thousands of ideograms onto nations perfectly happy with just dozens of phonetic letters. Yeah, nope. F that.
- scrollaway 5y ago
  Please have an even more xenophobic, imperialistic take on this. Go right ahead. Seriously, you maybe might want to consider the western world has been forcing american/latin standards on cultures which need far more than those to communicate, considering them second class citizens and killing some of the more peculiar / original languages because they're "not worth supporting". (= Not enough eyeballs for the ads you'd be printing) Now you have the cojones to complain about Japanese communication features seeping into the west? Fucking PLEASE.
  - throwaway210222 5y ago
    Are you arguing that it should be the national policy of a Western government, say Norway to pass laws to enforce its companies to honour every language/script on earth? If not, can you - precisely - explain what changes you would like to see in (say) Switzerland and swiss products with respect to the San/Khoi of Botswana?
    - scrollaway 5y ago
      The only change I'm currently advocating for is the one that involves GP not writing their repulsive comment.
  - jhgb 5y ago
    "Xenophobic"? "Imperialistic"? What has "xenophobia" or "imperialism" have to do with historically observed practicality of types of scripts? > you maybe might want to consider the western world has been forcing american/latin standards on cultures which need far more than those to communicate No, I might not. For starters I'm neither American nor Latin (whatever that you imagine to be). And second, historically, almost every civilization that had a realistic option to do so got rid of ideograms and logograms, because of their sheer impracticality, especially after the invention of movable type. Hieroglyphs went from ideograms and logograms to phonograms (see this very text). Cuneiform went from ideograms and logograms to phonograms (see Ugaritic). Some civilizations like Japanese found themselves in a cul-de-sac because of how a former adoption of a logographic script changed their language (for example with onyomi in case of Japanese) but that doesn't mean that they didn't realize the advantages of phonetic writing and haven't at least tried (onnade in the Heian period, romaji in the Meiji period). I learned to read when I was three or four years old. In retrospect, there is no way in hell that I would have preferred growing up in a place where you become fully literate (and able to read the kinds of technical texts that I was reading by the age of ten) in your very late adolescence. So for obvious reasons I do not prefer having to re-learn reading ten times as many symbols as I need to just to be able to read some small amount of texts of ephemeral value, or having to find out how to write hundreds of symbols on my QWERTY keyboard that hasn't hampered my communication in any way so far. > killing some of the more peculiar / original languages because they're "not worth supporting" If you believe this to be a "western" phenomenon, then I have bad news for you -- it's universal. Sad but true.
xdennis 5y ago
While it is a coincidence that e+moji sounds like emotion, that is their purpose: to communicate emotions. And it is the origin of emoticons which preceded them.

SapporoChris 5y ago

I have a similar opinion. I see emoji use, especially excessive emoji use as a indication of someone who cannot adequately express themselves using normal speech. If you are seriously worried about interpretation of your comments then it is worth learning to write clearly and unambiguously. Adding an ill defined emoji is not a solution.

theandrewbailey 5y ago

I don't like emoji, and I view every single one I come across as a festering zit on whatever idea someone is attempting to poorly express. Your dislike is on another level. Comment favorited.