Okay Hand Gesture- Racist Hand Signs

Note: For reasons explained below, particular caution must be used when evaluating this symbol.

The “okay” hand gesture—in which the thumb and index finger touch while the other fingers of the hand are held outstretched—is an obvious and ancient gesture that has arisen in many cultures over the years with different meanings. Today, in a usage that dates to at least as early as 17th century Great Britain, it most commonly signals understanding, consent, approval or well-being. Since the early 1800s, the gesture increasingly became associated with the word “okay” and its abbreviation “ok.”

In 2017, the “okay” hand gesture acquired a new and different significance thanks to a hoax by members of the website 4chan to falsely promote the gesture as a hate symbol, claiming that the gesture represented the letters “wp,” for “white power.” The “okay” gesture hoax was merely the latest in a series of similar 4chan hoaxes using various innocuous symbols; in each case, the hoaxers hoped that the media and liberals would overreact by condemning a common image as white supremacist.

In the case of the “okay” gesture, the hoax was so successful the symbol became a popular trolling tactic on the part of right-leaning individuals, who would often post photos to social media of themselves posing while making the “okay” gesture.

Ironically, some white supremacists themselves soon also participated in such trolling tactics, lending an actual credence to those who labeled the trolling gesture as racist in nature. By 2019, at least some white supremacists seem to have abandoned the ironic or satiric intent behind the original trolling campaign and used the symbol as a sincere expression of white supremacy, such as when Australian white supremacist Brenton Tarrant flashed the symbol during a March 2019 courtroom appearance soon after his arrest for allegedly murdering 50 people in a shooting spree at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand.

The overwhelming usage of the “okay” hand gesture today is still its traditional purpose as a gesture signifying assent or approval. As a result, someone who uses the symbol cannot be assumed to be using the symbol in either a trolling or, especially, white supremacist context unless other contextual evidence exists to support the contention. Since 2017, many people have been falsely accused of being racist or white supremacist for using the “okay” gesture in its traditional and innocuous sense.

Other, similar-seeming hand gestures have also been mistakenly assumed to have white supremacist connotations as a result of the “okay” hoax. One of these is the so-called “Circle Game,” in which people attempt to trick each other into looking at an okay-like hand gesture made somewhere below the waist. Another is the hand sign of the Three Percenter movement, a wing of the anti-government extremist militia movement. Three Percenters, who are right-wing extremists but are not typically white supremacists, often make a hand gesture to symbolize their movement that uses the outstretched middle, ring, and pinky fingers to represent a Roman numeral “3.” This gesture, from certain angles, can often resemble an “okay” hand gesture and has been misinterpreted by some as a white supremacist symbol.

Because of the traditional meaning of the “okay” hand gesture, as well as other usages unrelated to white supremacy, particular care must be taken not to jump to conclusions about the intent behind someone who has used the gesture.

I have to disagree with you there, equaviator, but only to a degree.

One of the mistakes we have made on our side is to discount the use of symbolism and icons as a tool.

To a degree, I understand perfectly how and why conservatives like us dismiss it: we simply believe in being straightforward, saying what we mean, and meaning what we say. To us, there is much about symbolism that seems, well...wasteful and frivolous to us.

But it is clear to me we don't feel that way about all symbols. At a gut level, I think we do understand the power of symbolism. Look at how many of us view the symbolism of the American flag.

Leftists view it as Michelle and Barack Obama do with their "All this for a flag" deriding of a flag covered casket. They view the American flag as a symbol of oppression and greed.

We view that symbolism quite differently. We view it as the POWs in the Hanoi Hilton did, willing to risk their lives to sew together a flag and covertly say the Pledge of Allegiance (another powerful symbol) in front of it in their grimy prison cells. They understood the symbolism behind that flag sewn together from pieces of ripped cloth. And when the owner of the flag was discovered and beaten to within an inch of his life by his captors and his flag taken away, he began immediately to make another one even though his eyes were nearly swollen shut by the beating.

Those guys valued that flag because of its symbolism. Me, when I see an American flag, I think of my father being buried under it in Arlington. I think of myself about a US Navy ship at sea, looking up and seeing it flying far above the flight deck. I see it in the shoulder patch of every Marine lined up outside a house in Fallujah waiting to break the door down to clear out the house. I think of how beautiful that flag must have been to people liberated from the Nazis.

That is the way you and I see the symbolism of the flag. So I think we DO understand it.

But I think where we conservatives fall short is in understanding how powerful a tool symbolism is to influence and yes...manipulate people who don't even think about symbols but whose main part in all this is simply to be influenced unconsciously by them. Symbolism is VERY important, and very powerful, too. You might appreciate this excellent short video "The Power and Danger of Iconography" (8 minutes)

The Left understands the power of symbols on the "proletariat" (to use their term) and exploits it at every chance they get to contribute in the achievement of their Leftist goals, and successfully, too.

I find this infuriating in their control (through the Leftist Media) of both symbols and language. They appropriate both of them and twist them to their own ends (much as they do with things like the "OK" hand sign. The word "gay". The symbol of the rainbow. Their control of what the current correct nomenclature is to describe people racially, sexually, culturally, etc.

They change this nomenclature on a seemingly daily basis, and they do it deliberately. We don't pay as much attention to this, and as a result, are constantly being accused and called out for using insensitive or politically incorrect terms, simply because that isn't as important to us as it is to them, so we don't follow the changes in terminology, what is accepted, what is prohibited.

And that is no accident on the part of the Left. The Homosexual Movement is rife with examples which I related above, and being a wholly leftist construct, it isn't surprising.

On a humorous note, one of my favorite examples of the power of symbolism and the unintentional use (or mis-use) of them is this:

I am relating it from memory so I might not remember it perfectly, but I do believe this was also featured in the excellent movie "Churchill" where he came out of a building after a contentious meeting, and was being abused by his opponents and the press, and as he climbed into the car, flashed this sign. Seemed innocent enough, the victory sign.

When his secretary came into work, people were huddled around newspapers, grinning and snickering. When she asked what was going on, they showed her the picture on the front fold which showed Churchill giving the backwards victory sign to the gaggle of reporters. She gasped in astonishment.

When she saw him, somehow the subject came up where Churchill wanted to know what everyone was tittering about (he hadn't seen the paper) and when she showed him, he was puzzled. He thought he had just given the victory sign. In his upper social circle, apparently knowledge of that hand gesture was not as widespread, talked about, or used as it was in her lower social circle.

When he asked why people thought it was funny and why they were talking about it, his young, very pretty, prim, proper, and now furiously blushing secretary had to explain to him that it meant something about "sticking it up your backside".

As I recall reading the account Churchill, looked at her in puzzlement, but as it sunk in, he grinned broadly and had a good laugh, thinking the affair was a wonderful thing!

That's a man who fought...and I would use his same gesture towards the media today!

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