In a disturbing sign of the times, a Stapleton youth football team celebrated their championship victory by holding up one finger and yelling, “we’re hashtag one!” The symbol that used to be most commonly referred to as “the number sign” or “the pound sign” has now been gobbled up by the twitterverse to the degree of which it has affected our children.
The kids played great, “said coach James of the Houston Texans little league team. “I just wish they understood how you are supposed to celebrate. Makes me kind of sad. We did have a talk after the game, and hopefully, it doesn’t happen again.” But the damage has already been done.
League Owner Don Retzlauf was disappointed in the celebration as well. “We want kids to talk a little trash, and do a little celebration,” said Retzlauf. “But, the word hashtag is a pretty lame way to celebrate. I don’t know what is going on with today’s youth, but we certainly need to correct it.”
Twitter founder Jack Dorsey released the following statement. “It was never our intention to confuse kids as to what a hashtag is and what being number one means. We deeply regret any confusion this has caused, and plan to support youth organizations in any way possible to make sure this is corrected.” Later the following tweet was sent through Dorsey’s personal twitter account. “Don’t confuse number and hashtag. They are the same but different. #numberandhashtagsaredifferent.”
League owner Retzlauf is encouraging parents to talk with their kids. “I think just letting them know the differences between the two would be great,” said Retzlauf. “The hard thing is that kids watch ESPN all the time, and all they are seeing is hashtags from twitter accounts, and very few people yelling, ‘we’re number one.’” ]]>