A troll, a pregnant man, and a low battery make the list of proposed new emoji

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  This is the full slate of proposed new emoji for Unicode 14.0 [credit: Emojipedia ]

Today is World Emoji Day, a thing I never knew existed until two years ago when Ford publicized that it was trying to get a pickup truck added to the official set. Truth be told, I forgot all about World Emoji Day almost immediately, but I was reminded again this week when I saw the list of potential new additions being considered by the Unicode Consortium for inclusion into Unicode 14.

Some of these potential emoji would be useful for talking about the climate emergency—I’m thinking of the melting face and also the coral here. I’m sure we can all use a troll in our lives, too, while the saluting face will replace the trusty o7. And the low battery is bound to be popular. There are some new hands, gesturing, pointing, shaking, and even making love hearts to boot.

A couple of additions might upset some reactionaries on the Internet, however. Specifically, the pregnant man and his gender neutral equivalent, the pregnant person, have been proposed as inclusive additions since pregnancy is possible for some transgender and non-binary people. The world may also soon receive a gender neutral person with a crown option to go with the emoji man and woman wearing crowns.