Sorry millennials, the laugh-cry emoji isn’t cool anymore – Gen Z says so

If you’re experiencing the joy of something so funny you’re crying, what emoji would you use to convey that?

Well, I’m afraid to say that you can no longer use the crying-laughing emoji.

Well, you strictly can – it’s still possible – it’s just not cool, according to very cool Gen Z-ers.

You should now put a skull to display your reaction to hilarity. The days ahead will not stand for laughter that makes you cry – that is not enough!

It must literally kill you. Be so funny that is numbers your days on this Earth.

This emoji was the most used emoticon for years on end. It was well-loved, well used, a regular friend within our message exchanges.

But then TikTok – the app of the very trendy – came along, and the cheery-but-weepy face got kicked off its pedestal.

Now, to be down with the kids, you can’t use it anymore. It’s all about the skull now.

There are some people – those largely not within Gen Z, which includes those born between 1997 and 2012 – who are dissatisfied with this change.

Those who are struggling most with this seismic shift in our technological communication are millennials, those born between 1981 and 1996.

No one likes change, but is it worth it to seem cool?

Reader, I won’t tell you my age, but I am indeed a Gen Z-er. Am I a cool one? No. But amongst many things, I can tell you that a crying laughing emoji just does not possess the same joie de vivre that it used to.

It’s unlikely the emoji will ever cease to exist, and it may come back around to being cool in the future. But for now, the use of it may lead you to lose any and all street cred.