Feels like just replacing one set of things you're supposed to memorize with another. Instead of learning how neurotypical people talk and memorizing that, I have to go to tone indicators dot net and flash card those until I learn them. I've never gotten it either.

I’ve only ever seen /s or perhaps it’s the only one I’ve ever acknowledged the existence of. Lmao re: /hj and /pos, literally no other way to interpret them

nah, honestly I agree, like - ostensibly they're there to help autistic folks specifically read into things, but I've seen more autistic folks go on about how useless they are than anyone else

probably because it's at the end of the day just a different arcane system to make up for the lack of nonverbal cues in text, except this one doesn't make intuitive sense to anyone as opposed to doing so for at least some people

someone made a video literally complaining about this topic. right down to "wtf does HJ EVEN MEAN"

had a whole reply typed out about /hj and /pos and then i finally saw the tags lmao

i still think “assume giving you a handjob as i say this” is a more useful tone indicator than “honest joke”

tone indicators (derogatory)

it's like "what if emoji were impenetrable"

i think /s was genuinely useful exclusively when it was the only one anyone used, long before the others were made, because its easy to remember when its the Only Thing. i find the others to be kind of just performative garbage that don't improve the conversation at all. like, big agree with jan misali's video - /pos reads as 'piece of shit' to me because thats an existing abbreviation, '/hj' is a meaningless interjection, and all of the other ones are laughably niche

the funniest thing is when you ask what they are and someone links https://toneindicators.carrd.co/#masterlist this fucking masterpiece. which includes such beauties as SEXUAL INTENT, THREAT, and CLICKBAIT. i fully consider it to be a troll/bait piece and it seems widely accepted as the 'canon' list... pulled completely out of thin air.

the jan misali video on this is really good

I spent my entire socialization window being taken seriously when I thought I was obviously joking and being laughed at when I was sincere. as a direct result of this training regimen I am now exactly 50% joking at all times and when a forum I was on implemented a rule that tone indicators were required on all posts, I just tagged everything I said as sarcastic until I got banned. life is short

tone indicators and hyper-granular trigger lists in big discords are honestly more alienating to me than most things allistic people come up with. it's like. ah cool here's Even More ways for me to unwittingly fail the vibe check

I am that way only really with /s; because I always assume when people do it; they mean serious. It wouldn't be so bad if they were all standardized instead of many of them meaning two exact opposite things

Yeah, one of the more basic accessibility guidelines for writing is to always spell out abbreviations and acronyms the first time you use them in a piece - back when I learned that, I switched my very occasional use of "/s" to "/sarcasm."

I'd never even heard of /hj or /pos before! And now I will forever remember them wrong as handjob and piece of shit, haha.

Instead of using an ambiguous single letter character code, if I really need a tone indicator I put an entire adjective in parenthesis