Thumbs down

Gen-Z has a beef with the emoji that’s known as a “thumbs-up” and that looks like, well, a thumb pointed upwards.

That generation (born between 1997 to 2012) has been stoking controversy about this innocuous symbol, sent only by seniors and boomers in the most innocent of moments, not knowing that a rebellion was fomenting in the midst of social media depths. Apparently, sending a thumbs-up emoji is seen by Gen-Z as “passive-aggressive”, and they supposedly feel attacked whenever it is used.

Now what was it we were saying about snowflakes? Or was that the millennials?

Seriously, lighten up (I now begin to question whether these words are really meant to be used together)!

The older generation don’t want to attack you when they send a thumbs-up. It’s completely the opposite. It’s an encouragement, it’s approval. Maybe the sender was just not in the mood to compose a 200-word essay at that particular moment when you needed some validation, and the convenient button to press was that icon. Admittedly, it was a tad lazy, not even bothering to type another letter to complete the word “ok”. But to take it to mean that it was an attack?

Let’s take a step back and ponder. If we think about it, the thumbs-up is used in real life to convey positive feedback, and we also see it play out that way in films and theater and commercials. When did we ever see, at least in popular culture, the thumbs-up used as an insult? We haven’t, have we?

And if this is the dawn of a new world, what is the solution now to this newly-constructed perception --wipe all those screen moments off the face of the planet? That’s cancel culture taken to the extreme.

This is why intent is so important in criminal law. When we discuss libel or defamation, we often delve into what the speaker intended to convey. If the speaker wanted to insult the recipient, then the circumstances, the audience, the inflection, the volume --all these are taken into account before a conviction. Even a swear word isn’t necessarily libelous, so long as the intent isn’t there.

I would posit it’s the same with emojis. Gen-Z cannot legislate the use of a thumbs-up, and now tell off their elders that it is inappropriate to use it in their case. When did Gen-Z get to tell the rest of the world how to interpret an emoji? When did they get to own it?

In the same vein, the most innocuous of words can actually flay like a scalpel, the dim recipient not even realizing that he’s just been eviscerated. Irony and sarcasm, the weapon of choice by the vicious (and the Brits) can have the most malicious of intents. Is the proposition by GenZ that those should be canceled as well, as their feelings are bound to be hurt?

What is more important is that we acknowledge that there are efforts to communicate, and we should analyze those efforts for their underlying purpose. When we seek to discern meanings, it is what the communicator seeks to convey that is crucial. If all the elder wanted to do was to make the recipient feel better by thumbing up, then that is how it should be taken. Surely, it’s not the communicator’s fault if the recipient takes it the Gen-Z way? And since it is not his fault, then he doesn’t have to adjust?

Perhaps, as we do with impressionable kids who may misperceive, all we have to do is patiently explain the birds and the bees, and why a thumb is not a weapon of choice. No canceling. No calling out. Maybe a few trips to the shrink to straighten all that out.

And perhaps, as with language, there is room to develop multiple meanings. Context is again important. A word can represent many meanings. So can emojis, if the kids just let them be. So there is no need for erasure. And definitely no retreat (I am definitely keeping this in my not-so-extensive emoji vocabulary).

Even if there isn’t a total ban on the use of a thumbs-up, what then is the next logical alternative were we to pander to these hurt feelings? Are boomers expected, in today’s complicated, technologically-isolating society, to check the age of the recipient before thumbing up?

In these trying dialogues among multiple generations, it might not be appropriate, but totally enjoyable, to imagine employing the middle finger. That’s pretty universal.