X website reverts water pistol emoji to realistic gun
Users on Twitter/X have found that after six years, choosing the pistol emoji now shows an image of a gun instead of a water pistol.
Choosing the "Pistol" emoji on Twitter/X now again gets you a gun instead of a water pistol
The existence of any particular emoji is down to the Unicode Consortium and its annual decisions, rather than specific firms such as Apple, Google, or Twitter. Each company does its own graphic design representation, and today, X has demonstrated that by going against the industry's recognized standards.
According to Emojipedia, Twitter/X has updated its emoji design for the word "pistol," and made it into an image of a firearm.
The pistol appears to have become an official emoji around 2010, and Emojipedia has a chart showing its design from 2013 onwards. Originally, every firm showed the emoji as a firearm, except Microsoft, which designed it as a Buck Rogers-style ray gun.
In 2016, however, Apple changed it from a firearm to a water pistol. It was not the only firearm-related emoji change it did then, either.
By 2018, Google, Microsoft, Samsung, Facebook, and Twitter had all agreed with Apple. Each pistol emoji was different, but each one was an image of a water pistol.
Twitter has not announced the change, and due to how emoji appearance is controlled by each platform, the old water pistol emoji still appears on the iOS Twitter app. But adding it through a browser gets the new gun design.
How the pistol emoji has changed over the years (Source: Emojipedia)
Reportedly, the new design began rolling out in a Twitter/X update on July 18, 2024. In July 2023, the company revamped emojis, including the "Pleading Face" one, but this appears to be the first intentional revision back to a previous design idea.
Separately, the Unicode Consortium has been considering proposals for new emoji. If passed, they will typically be added to Apple devices within a few months.
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
Txitter may be "an irrelevance" to Xbit and others, but it is still used by millions.
X needs to remember they have a responsibility to the global userbase, not just Americans. Frequent exposure to anything can desensitize a person, and that can lead to a rewiring of the brain. Guns are a problem in the US. That's a fact, and the problem is growing globally until we, humans, stand against it. Unfortunately, too many can't see past their artificial "rights". Guns for food-hunting is not a problem. Guns for clay-pigeon shooting is not a problem. Guns as the first line of defence in everyday life is a major problem. If you really step back, you can see it's a self-fulling prophecy. Gun "rights" has created a need for guns for protection, and on it goes. It needs to stop.
Unfortunately, messaging can be harmful. Messages can create fear. If someone can easily send a picture of a real gun to someone else, it's an avenue of potential threat and harm. X is a conduit between two such people, and by reverting, they are letting their American 2nd-A mentality blind them to the larger harm that can be done with their platform. Sending an image of a water pistol does not have the same impact to a scared recipient as receiving a picture of a real gun. X is in control of this.
Up until 2018 for some vendors, the wrong image was being used. You are correct. The water pistol was correct, and X's new image is technically correct for a pistol.
I've now deactivated my X profile. I can no longer give any of my time to Elon and his personal agenda.
I was simply calling out the straw man argument being made by another commenter. By acting like it was a fear of just the image they were intentionally misrepresenting the view they were opposed to in order to more easily dismiss it. Acting like it is simply a fear of a picture is painfully reductive and emblematic of someone that has less than optimal critical thought skills.
True thinkers will no doubt enjoy this:
https://www.amazon.com/Politically-Correct-Bedtime-Stories-Modern/dp/002542730X/
A friend gave me a copy in 1994. Yes, even back then, we had the "PC" madness. It was as laughable back then as it is today.
I can't help but muse when I see defenders of Political Correctness not recognizing that their own objectives actually seek to "rewire the brain." It seeks to change language for what they deem is "the greater good."
The definition of the English word "pistol" pertains to a real gun, not a squirt gun. Only those with extremely delicate sensibilities hop aboard the PC bandwagon to redefine what a "pistol" is. If it is a toy, you can say "Water Pistol," but the word "water" in that word pair really establishes what the thing is all about.
It doesn't matter if you like or dislike firearms. It doesn't matter if guns are good or bad. It's a matter of language and word meanings. "Pistol" doesn't mean a kiddy squirt gun, even if squirt guns are often made in the shape of a pistol. If I want an emoji for "squirt gun" those should be the two words which define it.
Imagine people who dislike Lions because they often kill others animals seeking to replace a Lion emoji with something more fluffy, kind and totally disconnected to the actual animal! That sort of lunacy is what using a squirt gun emoji is when someone is searching for a pistol firearm emoji.
I think there are times when people may want one emoji or the other. But my freedom to choose shouldn't be limited by the PC police. Give me both choices.
It's an emoji of a firearm. Something that's been around for hundreds of years and has been in popular culture since visual entertainment became part of our lives.
As a kid I would play soldiers, pick up a stick and 'kill' my friends using it as a 'machine gun'. Far healthier than sitting in front of a screen holding a joystick. Later I was given a plastic toy machine gun that 'fired' plastic discs (although fired is stretching the term - it was more 'float/glide'). I was a kid and that's what kids do.
A emoji of a gun really shouldn't be of concern and if some folks could be negatively influenced by seeing a 'cartoon' representation of a real gun, then it's society that has a problem.
Perhaps the real question is why we even need a gun emoji in the first place.
Oh wait, they already do.
SPAM® is also used by millions. It's still considered gastronomically irrelevant. And repellant.
*Applies to both lines.
Would a noose emoji add or detract from conversations?