New emojis from Apple, coming in the iOS 10 release, include a female weightlifter, mountain biker and private investigator, as well as a rainbow flag, among many others.
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Just past year, an anti-gun violence group even started a campaign targeting Apple to do away with the firearm emoji and it looks like it’s worked.
Apple’s iOS 10 also brings with it a new feature for QuickType, which includes emoji suggestions based on the word the user is typing.
But gun control advocates have hailed the symbolic move as a step forward. All of the new emoji are also available in a range of different skin tones.
The most controversial aspect of the emoji update for iOS 10 is changing the real-looking pistol to a water pistol instead.
This appears to be an Apple decision to change its icon – not a decision by Unicode, the body that writes the standards for computer characters, including emoji. They further discussed that the exciting update will add more gender options to existing characters, including new female athletes and professionals. In 2015, a Brooklyn teenager was arrested for posting Facebook updates with gun emojis pointing to police emojis. Unicode Consortium, the company which regulates and standardizes the emoji keyboard, nixed a proposed rifle emoji in June.
CNN Money said Tuesday that the pistol and other weapon emojis have occasionally resulted in legal trouble for users.
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“Apple is working closely with the Unicode Consortium to ensure that popular emoji characters reflect the diversity of people everywhere”, the statement concluded. “There are many more life-affirming ways to express oneself than with a gun”, she said.
