What we’ve learned from Facebook’s reaction emoji

Don’t know what to make of Facebook’s new reaction buttons? Try this handy user’s guide

I’m not sure if Facebook exactly ruined the word “like” for me, but at the very least, it spilled something on it that won’t come out no matter how hard I scrub. A “like” has become something to collect and horde, like currency or Star Wars figurines. However, as precious as they are to have, we dole them out with the thoughtless obligation of a Soviet functionary. We have to like that baby picture. We have to like that artfully arranged photograph of your dinner.

We have to like that sassy shot of you with a new haircut.

Facebook, seeing that we were cornered and frequently found ourselves obliged to “like” horrible events in a person’s life, when in fact, all we wanted was to show them a little support, trotted out five new reactions — love, wow, haha, sad and angry — late last month. So now, we have a total of six options in which to express the vast and complex spectrum of human emotion.

Presumably, this expansion was meant to give some more nuance to the emotional lives of Facebook’s 1.6 billion users, but it just made me feel like a chimp who some scientist was trying to teach to communicate, “Look, Little Cornelius just pressed the ‘ angry’ button when I took away his licorice!”

No matter, a couple weeks in, I’ve had an opportunity to adapt to my new language, I would like to offer this guide for its usage:

LOVE

The love emoji should be used exclusively for things pertaining to cats. Cats are mystical and unpredictable, deserving of our unreserved love and fascination. When you see a video of a cat knocking stuff off of a counter like a badass, you will Love that video. A Like is insufficient, insulting even. Similarly, if somebody has posted a video of a cat with laser eyes or battling with a light sabre, you will Love that video, too. A cat getting into a box or a bag? Love.

WOW

The Wow emoji has many applications. If somebody posts a photo- graph of themselves all dressed up for a big event or is in any way exposing deep cleavage, the Wow emoji is the appropriate response. To merely Love or Like such a post is to leave things open to interpretation, and only an awestruck Wow will be sufficient to meet the needs of the poster. You may also use Wow when somebody expresses the difficult chain of events they experienced while taking public transit in to work, stories of extraordinary resilience ( survived the weekend without cellphone), or saw a celebrity, ghost, UFO, et cetera.

HAHA

The Haha emoji was not really designed to be used. Typically, the only people who use it are parents attempting to communicate that they’re “cool” to their child ( for instance, a parent might use the Haha emoji if their college- aged daughter posted a clip from Broad City), or grandparent, in which case the emoji is used liberally and without context, often referred to as a tweet. However, it is appropriate to use this emoji whenever a man posts a shirtless selfie taken in front of a mirror, especially if said man has a barbed wire tattoo around his bicep.

SAD

The Sad emoji should only be used when truly dire, intimate news has been announced. You do not use this emoji if somebody is upset that Uber Eats was out of the daily special. You do not indulge this person. You do not. You do not use this emoji if a person is complaining about somebody posting a spoiler before they had a chance to finish Making a Murderer. They are slow and it’s their own fault that they can’t keep up with the world! The Sad emoji is only to be used to express sincere sympathy for something objectively sad, and is forbidden in any other circumstance

ANGRY

The Angry emjoi was created to deal with bureaucracy in all its forms. Whenever a lineup or cable provider is involved in a post, you are allowed to use the Angry emoji. This also applies to any traffic event that impedes your progress or if somebody posts about having their licorice stolen.

LIKE

The Like emoji should be used exactly as you have been using it, as nobody uses or cares about any of the other emoji.