Content Warnings (CWs) Acronym Reference

Fediverse servers all have their own rules, guidelines, and community standards for how content warnings are used. The tech.lgbt Content Warning Policies can be found at https://info.tech.lgbt/about/#content-warnings-and-sensitive-media

Please note that the below list is not exhaustive, and is updated based on real-world usage, not on enforced standards. While there are no standards for content warning acronyms and abbreviations, these are some of the most commonly used content warnings.

Most Commonly Used

• ec – eye contact, usually an image of someone or something looking directly at the camera
• exp – experience
• ment – mention
• mh – mental health
• nsfw – not safe for work
• oh – overheard
  • often used tongue-in-cheek, literally meaning “I overheard this”, but often used as “I saw this said in a conversation, and now im posting it out-of-context, as it is funny/interesting/bemusing”
• ph – physical healh
• pol – politics
  • uspol/ilpol/ukpos/eupol etcetera – politics, but region specific, the first two letters are an indicator (uspol – united states politics, eupol – european politics, and so forth)
• rp - roleplay
• sfw – safe for work
• veg – usually vegan, sometimes vegetarian
• what – commonly used for “hotdogs are tacos” type of statements; posts that seem silly that are meant for messing with people
• ??? – confusing or nonsensical

Overtly Negative

• sa – sexual assault
• csa – child sexual abuse
• sh – self harm
• sui – suicide

Social Media Sharing

• lb - last boost
• qt – quote toot/tweet
• rt – re(toot/tweet)
• qn – quote note
• rn – renote
• qp – quote post
• rp – repost
• cw – content warning
• cn – content note
• alt – alt-text, which are media descriptions for the visually or aurally impaired

Modifiers

• pos (or +) – positive
• neg (or -) – negative
• ~ (sometimes ?) – unsure if it’s positive or negative, or somewhere in-between

Tone Indicators

Tone indicators are meant to convey how the author wants their emotion or feeling of their statement to be read.

• /j (or just j) – joking
• /lh (or just lh) – lighthearted
• /ly (or just ly) – lyrics
• /s (or just s) – sarcasm
• /srs (or just srs) – serious
• /sx, /x (or just sx or x) – sexual

For more information on tone indicators, here are further and more detailed references:

• https://tonetags.carrd.co/
• https://toneindicators.carrd.co/

This page was most recently updated on 8 August 2023