Currently, the 🙏 emoji's polysemy has won out, and on Emojipedia, all three meanings are listed. While Emojipedia defines it as the "Folded Hands" emoji, different users have argued over whether the icon is meant to be construed as a sign of thanks, prayer or, simply, two hands giving each other a high-five. One of the oldest examples of users trying to parse the specific meaning of an emoji is 🙏. Unlike written language, however, the pictorial qualities of emojis have always conferred upon it an additional layer of semantic ambiguity. The fact that one symbol is capable of such elasticity is perhaps unsurprising considering that emojis are a form of language and the meanings of a language shift all the time depending on its contexts and users. In a study done by data scientist Hamdan Azhar, the ✊ emoji is one of the most commonly-used emojis in tweets with protest-related hashtags such as #NoBanNoWall and #WomensMarch, along with emojis such as ❤️️ and 🇺🇸. His protestors, on the other hand, have frequently marshaled the raised fist, or at least its emoji form, in demonstrations against the president. The president himself is fond of pumping his fists - even on occasions when it's wildly inappropriate.
Once widely connected with the civil rights movement and the Black Panther party, the raised fist symbol has seen its more recent iterations been utilized by both Trump supporters and anti-Trump demonstrators. Before the OK hand sign, there was the raised fist, a gesture that has come to signify both "everything and nothing," as BuzzFeed's Niela Orr has described, since it's been continuously adopted and repurposed by different camps, from Black Power supporters to white supremacists. It's worth first noting that the OK hand sign isn't the only symbol that has conflicting political connotations. Should certain emojis, like 👌, therefore, now be avoided to ward off any possible association with groups such as the alt-right, or should we still insist on using them to prevent these symbols from being entirely subsumed by hate groups? Before The OK Hand Sign, There Was The Raised Fist While emojis have never existed in a political vacuum, as more hand gestures are becoming increasingly politicized, so are the usage of their emojis. Underlying Emojipedia's declaration is a sense of urgency and unease regarding the appropriation of a once relatively harmless sign.
Although the OK hand sign hasn't been taken over by alt-right groups to the degree of, say, Pepe, its growing association with white supremacists has prompted Emojipedia, one of the leading online resources on emojis, to recently publish an article declaring that the symbol and its emoji counterpart are not white power symbols. While the OK hand sign began to have associations with Trump supporters as early as 2015, its perception as a hate symbol has grown over the past two years to the extent that when Zina Bash, a clerk of Brett Kavanaugh's, appeared to make an OK sign with her hands during the judge's confirmation hearing last month, interpretations that Bash was making a white power gesture went viral on the internet.Īccording to Brad Kim, head of Know Your Meme, the hand sign now has multiple connotations in addition to its original meaning of "OK." There are those that employ it as a dog-whistle for alt-right affiliations and there are those that use it primarily for its shock value and to troll liberals. My discomfort with 👌 had nothing to do with the emoji itself, and more to do with how a once innocuous hand sign is now being spread by white supremacists as a symbol of white power. So when 👌 popped up as a suggested emoji when I was texting a friend last week, I was surprised and frankly, a little startled. I've never been much of a 👌 user, both in real life and in emoji.
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