People Can't Find Apple's New Redhead Emoji On iOS 11.1 & They're Pissed

Redheads are about to kinda, maybe, sorta, finally get the respect they deserve. The recessive hair group is one of the only hair groups not to be represented in emoji form — which is basically a negligent slap in the face to gingers everywhere. Fear not, though, my copper-headed friends, because if you're wondering where the redhead emoji is, you might get your answer very, very soon.

Redheads have been fighting for the ability to virtually express themselves for a long, long time. Meanwhile, an iOS 11.1 update featuring tons of new emojis was released on Nov. 3, and not a single ginger could be found. There was, however, a zombie, a person in lotus position, a coconut, and a wizard — all of which seemed to be a whole lot less pressing than our current ginger situation.

Needless to say, redheads were pissed. They took to Twitter in droves to complain about their lack of representation, and the whole virtual protest was kind of an amazing display of solidarity. Thankfully, Apple heard their cries, and, according Unicode, plans to release a redhead emoji in 2018 — along with a whole slew of other very cool emojis (finally we're getting some curly haired people in there).

In the meantime, redheads stood strong in protest together.

Redheads have been waging a long, hard-fought emoji battle together.

Over in Scotland, there was actually a petition with more than 20,000 signatures advocating for that coveted redhead emoji. It read,

Despite the recent racial and sexual 'diversification' of Apple's emoji to be released in the next iOS 8.3 update, there's still an important group of people missing from the emoji family of 300 new symbols.

Redheads. In all their glorious gingerness, they've been missed out. Again. If you say you're going to diversify, why not add a few red-haired emoji in the mix? Natural redheads may be rare at less than 2% of the world's population, but that is 138,000,000 iPhones waiting to happen.

When asked why they were signing the petition, here were some of the responses:

Gingers matter.

I have Hope.

Equality

im have read hair and i feel discriminated

I have red hair! #RedHeadsLivesMatterToo

I'm a strong independent ginger.

They can rest assured that they're finally going to get their emoji in 2018.

“In the past, most emoji candidates have gone on to become actual emojis,” Jeremy Burge, a member of the Unicode Emoji Subcommittee told The Huffington Post in August. “Given the high frequency of request for redhead emojis, I hope that these will make the final cut! Afro or curly hair is also a popular request.”

You can see a sampling of possible ginger emojis below:

Are there other big emoji changes in the works?

According to Unicode's site, you may soon be able to express yourself as a superhero and supervillain. There's also — brace yourself — an infinity symbol, updated skin-tone modifiers, new hair styles, a question-mark face, a frowning face with question mark eyes, a grinning face with the letters "OK" as eyes and... a "sad pile of poo" (because, duh).

There will also be grey-haired women and men emojis (shout-out for that!), along with bald men and women, legs, bagels, sponges, toilet paper, and soap. The last three are honestly game-changers when it comes to figuring out who is buying what in your roommate group text.

It'll be interesting to see if any of these newbies manage to usurp Apple's #1 emoji right now: the "face with tears of joy" — a true classic.

In case you were wondering, the rest of the top 10 most frequent used emojis are, they are the red heart, crying face, heart eyes face, face blowing a kiss, rolling eyes face, skull, blushing smiling face, incredibly sad face, and the confused face.

Based on all of the redhead protests, it's very possible that those cute ginger emojis could climb the charts should they — hopefully! — get released. C'mon, Apple, do the right thing here. The world needs redheads more than they need a sad poop emoji.

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