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You are here: MacNN Forums > News > Mac News > Apple, Microsoft lead effort to kill rifle emoji in Unicode 9

Apple, Microsoft lead effort to kill rifle emoji in Unicode 9
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Jun 17, 2016, 04:18 PM
 
A new report claims that Apple -- a member of the Unicode consortium that approves new emoji characters -- lead an effort to remove two previously-approved symbols for Unicode 9: one representing a rifle, and the other a part of a Modern Pentathlon set, a sport that includes rifle marksmanship. Microsoft was among some other members who helped nix the additions. There has been no effort to remove the existing handgun emoji, or other items like knives or the (cartoon-style) bomb.

Unicode President Mark Davis was asked about the claims, but said only that the committee "decided not to mark [the rifle and pistol-shooting icons] as Emoji, but to add them as characters (that is, normal black & white symbols)," according to a report by Buzzfeed. Sources said that Apple lead the opposition to the rifle emoji, though it is unclear if Apple had any role in the decision to drop the much more innocuous Modern Pentathlon icon.



Because the decision was taken by the group as a whole, the two proposed emoji will not be available in Unicode 9 on any platform when it is released. Although CEO Tim Cook called for a moment of silence and addressed the mass-shooting incident in Orlando during his WWDC keynote on Monday, the company has not generally taken a position on the issue of gun violence beyond general avoidance and restrictions on certain types of realistic violence portrayal in apps on the App Store. There are, however, numerous games and apps that feature guns, shooting, and gun iconography.
     
Inkling
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Jun 17, 2016, 05:20 PM
 
Then we better not let the executives at Apple or Microsoft see this Youtube video. They'll wet their pants in fright. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttMuvmspa8o
Author of Untangling Tolkien and Chesterton on War and Peace
     
gr8tfly
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Jun 17, 2016, 05:40 PM
 
They do realize there are vast numbers of hunters and sport? No. I guess not. They have nothing to do with this kind of terrible event.

I'm sure removing *emojii* will have a great affect on reducing violence.
If only this level of effort was put into actually fighting the peoples who culturally promote terrorism.
     
DiabloConQueso
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Jun 17, 2016, 05:45 PM
 
Please enlighten me, what specific efforts can Apple put forward to actually fight the peoples who culturally promote terrorism?
     
ElectroTech
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Jun 17, 2016, 06:10 PM
 
Gun nuts don't get it and the rest of us do: It is impossible to shoot someone without using a gun. Guns kill people. Guns create insecurity and fear in a population and the US is the best example of that fear in a population.
     
PolyEx
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Jun 17, 2016, 06:18 PM
 
EltroTech. The rest of us? So the world is either nuts or people who agree with you? Take your ego down a few notches. 9/11 could not have happened without box cutters, airplanes, and a certain religion. America fears another 9/11, do you want to ban those three as well? Something tells me not, especially the last one.
     
Hillbilly Geek
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Jun 17, 2016, 10:56 PM
 
Virtue signaling. It's the default mode of SJW's Makes them feel better.
     
Hillbilly Geek
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Jun 17, 2016, 10:58 PM
 
It's a Dixie Chicks moment: please hush and make computers that work. That is your function, Apple.
Eltro: guns are tools, and they also defend you against those who misuse them. Stiff upper lip and all that.
     
Mr. Strat
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Jun 18, 2016, 10:19 AM
 
Yeah, it's always the gun's fault. Fact is, it's the fault of crazy people and followers of Islam.
     
JackWebb
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Jun 18, 2016, 04:39 PM
 
Shoot, now I'm going to have to send actual pictures of guns. I'm punny.
     
Steve Wilkinson
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Jun 19, 2016, 08:58 PM
 
Originally Posted by gr8tfly View Post
They do realize there are vast numbers of hunters and sport? No. I guess not. ... If only this level of effort was put into actually fighting the peoples who culturally promote terrorism.
No, they actually don't. Most of these people, making these decisions, have lots of money, live in the city, and are pretty isolated from any kind of reality. And, especially in the S.F. Bay area, they've got a certain worldview/political ideology that's so strong, they kind of live in an altered reality in that way too.

The problem is, you can't directly fight this terrorism either (that's the problem with the Republican party and war-monger Democrats like Hillary). It's a war of ideas, and they are too politically correct to face actual facts (that A) there really is a religion of Islam, which outside very liberal/secularized segments of it, have pretty specific beliefs on these things, and B) the USA constantly overthrowing M.E. governments for $$$-reasons just makes things all the worse).

Originally Posted by DiabloConQueso View Post
Please enlighten me, what specific efforts can Apple put forward to actually fight the peoples who culturally promote terrorism?
They could stop supporting people who's ideologies fuel it though. There's actually quite a bit that could be done if society wanted to actually face reality. And, much of Apple's political involvements do the opposite. So, in that way, they are quite implicated.

Originally Posted by ElectroTech View Post
Gun nuts don't get it and the rest of us do: It is impossible to shoot someone without using a gun. Guns kill people. Guns create insecurity and fear in a population and the US is the best example of that fear in a population.
People killed people long before guns, and if we actually could somehow get rid them, they still would. I've never seen a gun kill anyone, they usually just sit there... unless you know something I don't.

And, it isn't guns that's creating the insecurity and fear in the USA, aside from the media propaganda. Gun violence is actually down, it's 'mass shootings' that are up. And, first, you have to understand that the definition of 'mass shooting' was changed, to make the stats go up on that. But second, we're having a lot more of these crazy incidents because of societal breakdown. That's going to lead to crazy events, whether guns are involved or not. Also, don't forget that the FBI is often working to try and trigger the radicals, and sometimes these events happen when they don't (or don't want to) stop the person they've pushed and supplied.
------
Steve Wilkinson
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cgWerks | TilledSoil.org
     
reeses
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Jun 20, 2016, 08:08 AM
 
I mean...i don't know if removing a gun emoji will change everything, but sure, go ahead.
     
   
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