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I saw this on the news yesterday. It was a video snipped from USA where democrats and republicans were arguing. One of the republicans did the following hand symbol

enter image description here

Does it have a special meaning? I think it looks like the letter W but I don't quite understand why he should make that letter.

Adam
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  • http://www.businessinsider.com/order-a-beer-like-a-german-2014-3?IR=T – MorganFR Nov 10 '16 at 16:39
  • @MorganFR so he is saying "3" in the american / english way? Must be a interesting discussion then.. – Adam Nov 10 '16 at 17:22
  • He's either counting 3 or four depending on if his pinky is raised – G-Cam Nov 10 '16 at 17:33
  • Can you link to the video itself, so we can watch him make the gesture? – Esoteric Screen Name Nov 10 '16 at 18:38
  • If it's "4" then the context may be that "Trump is president for the next 4 years". But that's just speculation. – John Feltz Nov 10 '16 at 20:08
  • @JohnFeltz your right. He is using his pinky - he probably means 4 years! thx – Adam Nov 10 '16 at 20:13
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    @EsotericScreenName its from https://www.zdf.de/nachrichten/heute-journal/hjo-gesamt-110.html at 12:09 – Adam Nov 10 '16 at 20:14
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    I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it is asking for an interpretation of a hand gesture, and is not about the English language. – choster Nov 10 '16 at 20:22
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    @choster body language is a part of the English language. I was asking what this hand symbol means and MorganFR comment was sufficent to explain this. I agree with you that body language is not the major topic of this page, but I think its within this scope of English language so I do not see a reason to close the question. – Adam Nov 10 '16 at 21:00

2 Answers2

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It's the hand sign for the number four:

enter image description here

It's not clear from the video what the relevance is, though. A popular chant in support of a President is "four more years", though that doesn't make a lot of sense in the context of Donald Trump's recent election.

Esoteric Screen Name
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It's not a common hand symbol in the U.S. It may have special meaning to a particular group of people, like a gang sign (only in this case the "gang" is a group of Republican voters).

White supremacist groups have been known to use various signs to identify each other and express their views. However, this is not one of those on this list.

It's possible it isn't a hand sign at all, just a meaningless gesture. If it is an actual hand sign, then I expect it's unknown to the average American.

Andrew
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  • It could be a disguised way of 'giving the finger' (the middle finger). A colleague and I sometimes lightheartedly gestured with three fingers together. – Sydney Nov 10 '16 at 19:42
  • @Sydney "read between the lines"? :) – Andrew Nov 10 '16 at 19:49