Every time somebody sends me a thumb I take it as “whatever you say you fucking dumbass” and it pisses me off.
And ya, I’m aware that that the replies are going to be thumbs, let’s see em ya jerks!!!
It really depends on the age of the sender.
30s and younger: Fairly dismissive response. Not outright insulting but pretty rude.
40s and older: genuinely meant as an earnest acknowledgement of your message.
It’s a pretty simple “acknowledged” to me. It’s a “I’ve not just seen your message, I’ve read it, and I have no further comments”.
I don’t think I’ve ever interpreted it as rude.
Nah, and to be honest it threw me off to hear some people interpet it that way. It’s always meant “acknowledged” or “I agree, no notes” to me.
If I wanted to be rude I’d do this instead: 👍🙄
I give a 👍 on a reaction message all the time cause I’m too lazy to respond to it using words
Why waste word when 👍 do trick?
Reacting with “I agree” instead of 👍 in the reaction field can completely disrupt a conversation.
This is literally my “message received” emote.
If people thought it was rude, I’d be fired by now.
👍
Be careful that people don’t think you’re contractually agreeing to something with the emoji: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/06/canada-judge-thumbs-up-emoji-sign-contract
There are workgroups at my job that use it as acknowledgement and for voting consensus as we are allowed to attend meetings camera and mic off.
Maybe you’re just that good at your job.
Are you old?
I see that as an old people response.
Why tho? I am not old and this is fairly standard in my work place, some forums I use, messages with friends etc. Maybe it’s a culture thing but definitely not an old people thing imo. Its the easiest way to send an acknowledgment or agreement with a message without spamming the group chat and it makes it easier to count if you interpret it as votes.
Edit: I am talking about reacting to the messages directly, I don’t reply to someone with just a thumbs up emoji when I can just say Ok in most context.
👍
in response to plans?
chill.
in response to something like a political opinion?
highly sarcastic.
👍
It depends on what it’s in response to.
Dinner at 6 at Greasy Spoon? 👍Entirely reasonable.
Should we do the project in COBOL? 👍Entirely unreasonable, but not rude.
My cat just died. 👍Rude.
This is absolutely spot on. Well done.
This is the best answer. Also, even in some serious case the thumbs up is interpreted as “noted, all good”. It does not mean positive action, just saying “noted”.
I guess I just picture a chat as a textual representation of a conversation and if I said to you, want to get dinner at 6, and you replied 👍 in real life, I would cancel the dinner lmao
I see where you’re coming from now. In most English-speaking cultures, it is not conventional to use hand gestures as a substitute for spoken words in a conversation. Breaking social conventions for no apparent reason is at least potentially rude.
You’re translating those conventions directly to chat. Chat is not spoken word, and it is conventional to use emojis, at least the really unambiguous ones, instead of typed words in chat some of the time. People do not usually do this with any rude or insulting intent.
I appreciate the level headed reply in the sea of insanity I have started with this thread.
Honestly, I don’t interpret it as something malicious ever either, like I don’t think everyone is actually telling me to fuck myself, it just reads that way to me.
You saying you’d straight up cancel a dinner because someone gave you a thumbs up instead of a verbal response genuinely blew my mind lmao. Ngl fam, that’s a bit extreme. I give people the thumbs up all the time, and imagining someone becoming so upset at me for doing it that they’d cancel our dinner together is insane to me. I couldn’t be friends with such a person without feelings like so was constantly walking on eggshells.
👍
It was an exageration my guy, as with all my reactions to the 👍 in this thread. It does not make me truly angry, I’m being a bit silly because it’s fun.
Maybe try not habitually exaggerating? People who don’t know you are just gonna take you at your word.
So I wasn’t sure if you were an asshole, but based on this comment, I’m am not certain you are.
I say this because it’s fun for me and I’ve been taught to speak at my audience’s level.
I do not think the majority of people would agree that chat is a textual representation of a conversation. It’s its own thing and this is evident by slang, leetcode, emoticons, emoji, and euphemisms (🍆💦). How people talk over text is completely different than how they speak in real life, especially when they’re typing fast.
You and I are very different then. If I tell someone that dinner is at 6 and they give me a thumbs up, I would interpret that as “I acknowledge that I heard you and have no objections. It is not worth taking my attention off of whatever I am doing.”
If you are mid drinking or chewing and somebody asks you a question, a thumbs up is perfectly acceptable as a yes. Otherwise its a bit odd, but not offensive. Its like a +1 affirmation
You’re weird.
Yes, and weird is fun
It’s probably one of the auto responses on their side when the text alert pops up. Maybe they were driving or I. The middle of something and it was just easier for them to respond this way.
It’s pretty clear the issue here is you. Specifically, your reaction. The solution to than can only come from you. The world will not bend to you and the world is not responsible for making you feel certain things, that’s all you.
no definitely not. but that’s probably because i don’t associate with people who think im a piece of shit
GenX here. Shit, I do thumbs up frequently to confer agreement.
And I will indeed give you a middle finger emoji to say, “you fucking dumbass.”Millennial here, I use the shit emoji
Boomer here, what’s an emoji?
No. Your reading of it is unusual, in most contexts. It almost always means “agreement, and I have nothing of substance to add”.
It can be rude if the thing you’ve said should warrant a substantial response. Like if you wrote “my brother just died in a car wreck”, a thumbs up (or probably any emoji) would be an inappropriate response. Heavier stuff warrants whole words.
But if it’s like “Can you get cat food at the store? The kind we always get” then a thumbs up is an acceptable shorthand for "yes, I understand and commit to this request "
The chat built into my hospital’s charting software has the ‘thumbs up’ react so you can quickly and easily show that you’ve read it. So for me it just means ‘heard’, ‘roger’, etc.
In a professional setting, it’s been a normalised acknowledgement, but socially I try to avoid it. Depending on the generation it can be taken the wrong way.
If it’s coming from my older coworkers, I know it’s meant well. They approve of whatever was discussed and are too busy to type out more, or its unnecessary.
If it’s coming from my gen z boyfriend, I have pissed him off.
Depends on who’s saying it and to what, and in what manner (message reaction, its own separate text).
“Hey who wants pizza tonight?” in the group text.
Bunch of👍reactions mixed in with some 🍕 and 🕺
That’s normal and people agreeing with you.
“Hey could you pick up some toilet paper on the way home?”
👍 reaction.
That’s a neutral kind of acknowledgement.
“Hey man, that was pretty fucked what you said back at the party. I think the others want to talk to you about it.”
“👍”
That’s rude and dismissive, and not just an acknowledgement text.
Aka context matters, like all forms of english communication.
First of all - I’m shocked that anyone would use a thumb up like in your last example. That’s obviously extremely rude and disrespectful.
Second of all - I’m shocked that some people can’t see the difference of the usage of the thumb up and believe that it’s always rude, regardless of context.
It’s a little bit of a generational/cultural gap, I think! Like how
Ok.andOk...are fully normal to boomers, but anyone millennial and younger are going to read that as being short, or as an ominous trailing off compared to the neutral, no-caps-no-punctuationkkorok.I think children up through the younger end of millennials are just more likely to give neutral-to-lightly-positive acknowledgement in other ways, like 🫡or ✅ or 🥰 or 💯. 👍 is reserved by some for lower enthusiasm or even a restrained, mild annoyance.
That was pretty fucking funny
