Communism ❤☭❤ or Soviet Union 🇸🇺 Flag emoji

[Crissov]

Soviet Union Flag

It would be straightforward to encode the Flag of the Soviet Union as an emoji, because it did have the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code element SU which is indeterminately reserved and still used as a ccTLD, although the ISO 3166-3 alpha-4 code SUHH has also been defined of course. CLDR has been around before the USSR dissolved in the early 1990s, so it previously also supported SU, but it is now listed as a deprecated code element. As such, support for it is not mandated in the flag emojis section of UTR#51 which describes how to use Unicode Region Indicator Symbol (RIS) letters U+1F1E6–FF.

• The valid region sequences are specified by Unicode region subtags as defined in [CLDR], with idStatus="regular", "deprecated", or the "macroregion". […]
• Deprecated region sequences should not be generated, but may be supported for backward compatibility.

<id type="region" idStatus="deprecated">
  <!--  12 items  -->
  AN BU CS DD FX NT QU SU TP YD YU ZR
</id>

Code	Region	Replacement(s)	ISO 3166-3
🇦🇳	Netherlands Antilles	🇧🇶 🇨🇼 🇸🇽	ANHH
🇧🇺	Burma = Myanmar	🇲🇲	BUMM
🇨🇸	Czechoslovakia	🇨🇿 🇸🇰	CSXX ↙️
🇨🇸	Serbia and Montenegro	🇲🇪 🇷🇸	CSHH
🇩🇩	German Democratic Republic	🇩🇪	DDDE
🇫🇽	Metropolitan France	🇫🇷	FXFR
🇳🇹	Neutral Zone	🇮🇶 🇸🇦	NTHH
🇸🇺	Soviet Union	🇷🇺 🇦🇲 🇦🇿 🇧🇾 🇪🇪 🇬🇪 🇰🇿 🇰🇬 🇱🇻 🇱🇹 🇲🇩 🇹🇯 🇹🇲 🇺🇦 🇺🇿	SUHH
🇹🇵	East Timor = Timor-Leste	🇹🇱	TPTL
🇾🇩	Democratic (South) Yemen	🇾🇪	YDYE
🇾🇺	Yugoslavia	🇲🇪 🇷🇸 🇧🇦 🇭🇷 🇸🇮 🇲🇰 🇽🇰	YUCS
🇿🇷	Zaire = Congo	🇨🇩	ZRCD

SU is one of the currently 12 codes exceptionally reserved in ISO 3166. CLDR directly includes 6 of them as regular (see #291). EU and UN are covered by macroregion and UK is an alias of GB. EZ does not refer to a real region, but a concept (basically Euro zone). FX is just FR without overseas dependencies. That leaves SU as an exception. It was reserved on behalf of a request of the Foundation for Internet Development (FID), the other requests came either from the countries themselves, from ISO or from one of Universal Postal Union (UPU), International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and World Customs Organization (WCO).

Communism Red Flag

Since the red flag with hammer and sickle symbol has also been used as the international flag of the Communist movement, 🇸🇺 would be sufficient to encode this as an emoji. (A simple red flag is at least a s common, though, and other yellow symbols like a star also occur.) Nevertheless, the character ☭ U+262D Hammer and Sickle has also been available in Unicode for quite some time now, but not as an emoji. Hence, there could instead be a ZWJ sequence for the flag as established by the Rainbow Flag emoji: 🏳‍☭️ U+1F3F3[-FE0F]-200D-262D[-FE0F] or 🏴‍☭️ U+1F3F4-200D-262D[-FE0F]. Even more simple, the emoji variant of that codepoint, once registered, could be rendered as a flag: ☭️ U+262D-FE0F (VS-16). Alternatively, the sequence could use a Red Heart (or two): ❤☭️ or ❤‍☭️‍❤ U+2764[-FE0F]-200D-262D[-FE0F][-2764[-FE0F]]. Samsung already treats the symbol as an emoji.

[Crissov]

Mockups

Emojitwo:

[simison]

Just noting here that by adding Soviet flag you would probably get follow up requests to add Nazi Germany (1935—1945) flag:

via Wikipedia

While ☭️ is often considered a symbol of communism (and thus used e.g. by LPRP in Laos), Soviet Union flag represents a country which in many Eastern European countries is considered as a dictatorship and occupier. Just like Nazi Germany is considered so in Western Europe.

So I'm trying to make a neutral comment here, just noting that:

• Country flag and symbol of communism are two separate (albeit very related) things (re: "Samsung already treats the symbol as an emoji." or "the red flag with hammer and sickle symbol has also been used as the international flag of the Communist movement")
• Emotionally there is no big difference between Nazi flag and Soviet union flag to many, so be prepared.

❤️ ☮️

[Crissov]

I might have been oversimplifying the relationship between the SU flag and the Hammer and Sickle symbol. The use cases nowadays at the emoji scale would still be quite similar in a way that most people that are requesting one or the other would be satisfied with either one. Some of them are probably not asking for an emoji for communism/socialism to represent themselves, by the way. Anyway, Emojitwo, which is a project I maintain, kinda supports both of them.

The swastika flag is a different issue, especially technically. While the existing Unicode swastika characters could (but never will) be emojified, there is no separate ISO 3166-1 code element for the German state of the 1930s and 1940s, because the ISO standard and its companion UN specification were released years after WW2. There was DD for the GDR (i.e. East Germany), however, alongside DE for FRG (West Germany), which is still used for reunified Germany.

Many countries have had minor or major changes to their flag throughout the ages. Some of them, Mauritania for instance, changed something after country flag emoji had become widely available.

[chicago420]

As simison brings Wikipedia, there's quite a difference from a humanities point of view, as well.

Someone using the communist flag will probably joke about communist folklore, such as the communist manifesto, Kronstadt, and so on. Even communists themselves agree about Stalin being a dictator, and this is not the purpose for which the hammer and sickle flag will be used. As such, feminists can joke about castration but I never heard of a feminist castrating a man. (So far, a rape victim setting her rapist on fire, a beaten wife murdering her husband, and a reality show star stabbing her boyfriend are the only examples of female violence I can think of.)

Someone using the Nazi flag straight wants to murder people. The swastika is a sacred symbol in Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism and has no reason to be turned into a nazi emoji; the use of the swastika in the Nazi flag is the appropriation of the complex relations between various regional cultures and Asian religious sects by Adolf Hitler.

Code is obviously political: if I'm creating an internal frontend for a company, then my relationship with this company will become, because of this code, political. I'll become responsible for their success. If we're creating a Nazi flag, then we're responsible for people being murdered or people being harassed online until they kill themselves – hence being murdered, ultimately. If not by decency towards the industrial murder of clustered humans clutching their peers after breathing the gas chambers' Zyklon B, implying that the Nazi ideology doesn't exist anymore is either irresponsible or criminal – because people will die.

[grimcap]

Why we have a Pirete flag? 🏴‍☠️

[Crissov]

@grimcap Vendors are free to implement custom ZWJ sequences and that is what Twitter did with the Pirate Flag. Unlike Microsoft's custom Ninja Cat emoji sequences, the Pirate Flag was deemed worthy of general support and thus (like the Rainbow Flag before) became RGI: recommended for general interchange.

[ChameleonTartu]

@Crissov Any progress with this emoji? I really want to have either communism or a better USSR flag emoji. It would be so cool!

[SelfMadeSystem]

me rn: bruh how does this even exist XD

I searched "ussr flag emoji" and found this github page and I didn't even know it existed. Cool

[OCTAGRAM]

* Emotionally there is no big difference between Nazi flag and Soviet union flag to many, so be prepared.

Emotionally there is no big difference between so called Nazi flag and so called LGBT flags, and we can't be more prepared since we're already in. We launch Skype for work needs, and it's there, in direct reach. Maybe our government should consider banning Skype, and we'll get a good excuse for not using it.

Unicode space is a different matter, since it's about describing things. Phenomena don't appear or disappear with words describing them. So, from this point of view, I cannot be against historic flags in Unicode. Like, for instance, if a baby born in some country, this is a forever fact. And Soviet Union delivered pretty much more than just babies. Moon and Antarctica laws are gift from SU. Long-term financial contracts are active, nominated in Soviet Rubles, and so called Central Bank of Russian Federation provides an exchange course.

[Crissov]

• 🔴☭️🔴
• 🟥☭️🟥

[Crissov]

Openmoji has a red flag and a deep-red flag as U+1F3F3+FE0F+200D+1F7E5 🏳️‍🟥 and U+2691+FE0F+200D+1F7E5 ⚑️‍🟥, respectively.

[kovalensky]

Closed? :( This would be awesome, seriously, implement communism symbol, you see that there's a demand for this.

[mb6ockatf]

needs to be implemented, imo

[BennettFourr]

Any updates?

[utajum]

It's a weak argument, to be honest, I'm willing to bet that most Unicode flags have committed a genocide or two, and are offensive to someone.

[klimenk0aa]

моя бабуля порадовалась бы

[klimenk0aa]

If the USSR bothers you, at least add the Chinese Communist Party flag.

[mykolq]

But SU wasn't involve to any genocide. It's really some bullshit. Genocide is for Belgium (Congo), France (any Africa place), Germany (do you need examples?..), USA (Indians), Ukraine (Donbas), Japan (China) etc. So, author better take out shit from his head before say something like that.

Good examples of democratic genocides

[alysdexia]

But SU wasn't involve to any genocide. It's really some bullshit. Genocide is for Belgium (Congo), France (any Africa place), Germany (do you need examples?..), USA (Indians), Ukraine (Donbas), Japan (China) etc. So, author better take out shit from his head before say something like that.

learn diction; Americans had nothing to do with Indians.

[BennettFourr]

But SU wasn't involve to any genocide. It's really some bullshit. Genocide is for Belgium (Congo), France (any Africa place), Germany (do you need examples?..), USA (Indians), Ukraine (Donbas), Japan (China) etc. So, author better take out shit from his head before say something like that.

learn diction; Americans had nothing to do with Indians.

Here is a great video I ran across a few years ago explaining how you're wrong.

https://youtu.be/kh88fVP2FWQ?t=3m56s