‘We need y’all to fix this’: Woman says ‘all redheads have beef with Apple.’ Then she explains why
A woman recently ignited a trend that’s taken TikTok by storm. In her post, Deiara (@scorpiostellyla1meramera) declared that all redheads are Black people. The TikTok went mega-viral. As of May 19, the controversial take has been watched 67.7 million times. There are thousands of posts riffing on the idea that redheads are Black. Both sides are tickled by the mutual outpouring of acceptance and affection.
The camaraderie has inspired a member of the ginger community to ask for help righting what many view as a wrong: The lack of redhead emoji on iPhones.
“Listen, I don’t know who started this whole trend of ‘gingers are Black’ but I am so here for it,” Sophie (@sophietoday) says in her post. “I absolutely love it. In the spirit of our shared camaraderie, we need your guys’s help, OK?”
“Every single redhead has beef with Apple,” she continues. “Because in emojis where you can choose hair and skin combinations, there’s no redhead. You cannot choose orange hair.”
Redheads flocked to the comments to vent about the lack of ginger representation on Apple products.
“When I use [shrugging emoji] or anything else, I have to be blonde,” one lamented.
Sophie didn’t immediately respond to a TikTok comment. Her account doesn’t accept messages without permission.
The emoji rainbow coalition is missing red
Sophie’s right. Standard iPhones only come with a handful of basic redheaded emojis.
In fact, the first redhead emoji didn’t launch until 2018. Seven years later, the 1-2% of the world’s population who have red hair still have limited emoji options on iPhones.
“Like all the little profession ones, like firefighter, doctor, scientist, fairy, princess, whatever, there’s no red hair,” Sophie says. “You can pick every other combination of skin and hair.”
She concedes that there’s a “token redhead emoji”—a person, man, or woman with red hair. This isn’t enough in her view.
“How am I supposed to know that I can achieve things if I don’t see people who look like me doing it first? How am I supposed to know that I can grow up to be a princess or a fairy or whatever?” she continues, half-jokingly.
Apple didn’t immediately respond to an emailed inquiry sent Monday.
Sophie isn’t the only one to notice the lack of carrot top emoji in iPhones. Two months ago, a Redditor made a call to action to flood Apple’s feedback page with requests for redheaded emoji.
“We make up a small but mighty percentage of the population, and we deserve full emoji representation. Let’s make some noise!” LilRhino007 wrote in the Redhair subreddit.
One Redditor replied that they made their own ginger emojis on Piscart.
@sophietoday HEAR ME OUT every redhead has beef with apple ????♀️#redisthenewblack #gingersareblack #redhead #ginger ♬ original sound – Sophie
Now Sophie’s calling on the Black community to lend their voices to the semi-serious cause.
“I think we need to partner up on this and get Apple to change this because it’s an issue. I use like the little yellow one and it’s so boring,” she says.
“…We’ll chat about it more at the cookout. We’ll talk then.”
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