Much like first dibs on lifeboats, emoticons are a thing for women and children. Text already speaks for itself; that’s the entire point of it.
There are only four acceptable emotions for adult men to exhibit in their day-to-day life; the comprehensive list includes stoic, content, angry, and asleep. We instinctively repress, appropriately pushing feelings deep into our subconscious where they can’t embarrass us. It’s in our nature as adult men to suppress. So, frankly, it baffles me to see “adult men” punctuating their sentiments with garbled partial-faces broadcasting their mindsets.
As an adult man with no experience in emoticon-ing, I consulted the Internet for information. Subsequently I was overwhelmed, nearly vomiting with rage at the vast quantity and variety of emoticons used by so-called adult men in contemporary society. So, similar to weekly lists of the top ten most wanted criminals, this is not complete list of offenders but rather just the most egregious.
: / No one needs this. Your audience can figure out from your emo song-lyric-laden statuses and the cliché existential crisis you’re projecting that you’re feeling uneasy.
😉 Winking in real life seems to be a quirk common only among people who are liars, Santa Claus, or sexual predators. There’s absolutely no good reason to utilize this already-undesirable quality into your Internet persona.
🙂 An unnecessary addition to anything. If there’s one thing adult men know it’s that nobody in this world, with the potential exception of their non-Internet using mother, seriously cares if you’re happy.
O_o Given, some people have wonky, apathetically lazy eyes, but, really, your inability to seem trustworthy or look at people straight is not something you typically want to publicize.
😮 What even is this, excited, yawning, surprised, aching to gargle a mouthful of dicks?
: P Put that fucking tongue back in your fucking mouth. You’re an adult; you’re not being playful and silly. No, now you’re just being lightheartedly creepy.
🙁 These always trivialize the sentiment they follow; truly, they’re just a way to underplay the seriousness of a proclamation like “Gramps died” or “I relapsed back into alcoholism.”
^_^ Why would an adult man need to post something that has a specifically incorporates an Asian child’s face in it? Wait, oh, Jesus, okay, probably time to contact Amber Alert. Time is a factor.
:’( Crying for men is to be done exclusively in secret or in secret showers not posted in social media or in a easily forward-able email for the goddamn free world to witness and silently judge.
=) Curb your goddamn enthusiasm, you’re an adult man not an excitable child hopped up on Chuck E. Cheese pizza and Fruit By the Foot. If you find yourself this excessively excited, do the sensible thing and get off social media, go outside, and recklessly fire a gun off into the air until you’re content.
Listen, I don’t care how much easy poon you think your “cute” emoticon use is getting you; real adult men have a little thing called integrity.