Twitter vows to battle the “silent pandemic” with custom emojis
The COVID-19 pandemic occupies headlines once again but there’s one grim consequence that the virus has brought upon mankind. According to the United Nations Population Fund, for every three months the COVID-19 lockdown continues, an additional 15 million women are expected to be directly affected by violence. This is the so-called “shadow pandemic” in action and now Twitter has vowed to help bring it to light.
The social network announced on its official blog that it will launch a set of custom emojis in order to raise awareness on the issue. Twitter believes that social media plays an important role in discussing women’s rights and other important social matters. According to the network, over 40 million tweets touched the subject in 2020.
In partnership with UN Women and the UN Human Rights Office, we are launching custom emojis to spread awareness on International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on November 25 and Human Rights Day on December 10. The emojis will appear when people Tweet with the hashtags #GenerationEquality, #OrangeTheWorld, #16Days, #HumanRightsDay, and other localized hashtags.
Twitter is also expanding the #ThereIsHelp notification service that the social network launched at the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis. When people search terms associated with gender-based violence on Twitter, a prompt will show information about helplines and other local resources. The service is active in 24 markets, including countries such as Australia, India, Mexico, Thailand, the UK, the US, and more.
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