The Times Of India Translated Sex Emojis, And Twitter Thought It Was Hilarious

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THE GOOD NEWS:

Twitter had a hilarious reaction to one newspaper’s attempt to teach its readers the meanings behind sex emojis.

The great semanticist Alfred Korzybski once postulated that “man’s achievements rest on the use of symbols.” Throughout our history, we have used sound, body language, words, hieroglyphics, art, flags, and various other symbols to share ideas and create communities with one another.

In the second millennium of the Common Era, humankind has made use of a new symbol system: emoji.

Like any other symbols, emojis can have various meanings — and not understanding their full connotations can lead to massive embarrassment.

To help its readers avoid any missteps in the world of dating, The Times of India included a cheat sheet in its March 18, 2018, print edition to teach people about sex emojis.

“Those new to digital flirting, beware — a purple brinjal [eggplant] may not mean baingan bharta [an eggplant dish] for dinner, and not everyone squirting teardrops is sad,” The Times wrote.

To the uninitiated, this could be a big help. Just like Korzybski said, improper emoji use could really hinder one’s “achievements” in the world of dating. What if someone genuinely wanted to go out for a delicious dinner and innocently texted an eggplant, not knowing it also means “Let’s go out for some penis”?

For people in the know on Twitter, the infographic was not only hilarious but contentious as well.