I have been passive aggressive without knowing......

[letsallcountsheep]

I don't use social media a lot and tend to live in my own little bubble. I had no idea that the thumbs up was passive aggressive 😬

Now I feel like I need to make a lot of apologies 😅 I just saw it as a quick I agree with what was said

I definitely agree with this. All my friends would take a thumbs up as passive aggressive. My parents on the other hand, use it regularly to mean okay.

I think in MN (before it had the Watch thread option) people would join the conversation by means of a post with just a .
Sometimes they'd say 'marking my spot'.
So, they wanted to watch the thread, but didn't want to contribute.
With some more sensitive threads many would regard that as quite rude ie. just there to watch the drama, or follow someone's distress.
Rubbernecking is very human though.

In real life I would struggle to see how a full stop could cause offence!

Communication and the usage and meanings of words have always changed over time. Why would it be different with emoji?

Thank you for the explanation @mongoliandoll Context is everything 🤣🤣

It means "ok". In actual words or in writing, "Ok" can be just what it appears to be - a comment acknowledging and agreeing with whatever has just been said - OR it can be passive aggressive/ sarcastic. Context is everything. I honestly don't understand why this is hard to get heads around.

"Ill see you in 30 minutes" - okay or thumbs up = perfectly normal interaction .
"You are an awful and toxic person and our children are probably going to need social care and therapy forever because you won't let them visit me. I don't care that you think 11pm is too late for a 6 year old to be collected, I am her dad and I have rights and you are alienating the children from me. You don't get to call the shots. I can't believe i even had sex with you, I wish I'd never had children with you. Who the F??? do you think you are. I haven't seeen the children for 6 weeks and all I want to do is have a good time with them but you're such a fucking control freak. I'm going to call social services and the police and tell your family what a total narcissist you are." .... okay or thumbs up - passive aggressive and/or sarcastic.

But who decided that? Same thing with the full stop .
Just why?
Well today I think the smiley face means you actually dont like the person you sent it to. That makes sense too doesn't it?
We didn't have this problem pre emojis 😊

This.

It's really useful if you use it as a response on the message itself (rather than adding it as a comment) it stops everyone getting loadss of notifications for messages which just say variants of fine or having to wade through lots of acknowledgement messages to get to the few messages which actually hold content.

I think it's equivalent to saying sure or okay. If the message was "can we meet at 10am instead of 10.15am?" and you said sure. It wouldn't be PA. But if someone said "I'm so excited, I'm getting married in 10 hours!" an "okay or sure" would be rude as would a thumbs up.

So when the electrician messaged to say he would arrive within half an hour I should have sent a heart to let him know I had seen the message and that time was ok? I thought that was exactly the situation to use a thumbs up.

I can't see how it's passive aggressive.

Pay no attention to the whiny little sods nowadays who get offended by emojis, punctuation marks and grammar.

Yeah, I am not about to start sending workmen heart emojis, I'm really not.

I am 100% sure me sending the guy who fitted my loft ladder a thumbs up when he said he was on his way was seen as I intended i.e. I've seen your message and confirm it's OK.

The automatic adding of a couple of xx to a text to the baby sitter (teenage son of my one my friends) made me curl up (he laughed it off and said it happens all the time).

My kids tell me that this 🙂 smilie is passive aggressive.

My kids tell me all sorts of shit. I'm taking workplace advice from my 15 yo!

I had no idea a thumbs up was pass-agg.

I use it as a response like pp said if family members are advising plans might have changed or they are going to be late. Also just checked and a client who i often contact via WhatsApp use it as an "ok" to messages.
Him : is this item ready? Me 👍 or
Me: just confirming this price is only guaranteed for this week. Him 👍
(we're both mid 40s if that makes any difference)

Years ago my teen told me red heart meant something sarcastic. I do use it in a family whatsapp group for photos I like etc, I wouldn't consider using it for work colleagues. Neither teen has ever criticised a thumbs up as a response, yet, they use it themselves.

The full stop is apparently seen as hostile and blunt (mainly in text messages) - honestly, have a Google - it's madness

It just means I’ll take the bait, I’ll get into the argument/discussion with you.

Agree with pp's that context is everything. Sometimes my SIL starts banging on about God/covid jab bots/Donald Trump (she likes him) and a thumbs up is probably a better option than what I would really like to send. Here in NI, that thumbs up would be the equivalent of 'aye, dead on mate'😆

But sometimes DS1 texts to say he's on the bus and will be home shortly and I reply with a thumbs up to let him know I saw his text.

*I'm NOT taking!

That’s exactly how I use it. Ironically that’s how other people use it to me so I guess we are all being passive aggressive to each other, only none of us know. 😁

Could someone explain what it means if you use your actual thumb as a thumbs up in real life? (Other than hitchhiking).

We need to ask Paul McCartney

It means Excellent (obviously 😉)

I use thumbs up all the time now. It's big at work, on Teams. Some people use love hearts which took me ages to get used to and even now I feel uncomfortable with.

Ah of course 😁