diff --git a/rtv/content.py b/rtv/content.py
index acf4d5d..a8e925a 100644
--- a/rtv/content.py
+++ b/rtv/content.py
@@ -8,18 +8,17 @@ import requests
 
 from .errors import SubmissionURLError, SubredditNameError
 
-FORCE_ASCII = True
+UNICODE = False
 
 def clean(string):
 
-    encoding = 'ascii' if FORCE_ASCII else 'utf-8'
+    encoding = 'utf-8' if UNICODE else 'ascii'
 
     if six.PY2:
         out = string.encode(encoding, 'replace')
     else:
         out = string.encode().decode(encoding, 'replace')
     
-    out = out.replace('\\', '')
     return out
 
 def split_text(big_text, width):
diff --git a/rtv/main.py b/rtv/main.py
index a48e87b..f85b44f 100644
--- a/rtv/main.py
+++ b/rtv/main.py
@@ -45,8 +45,8 @@ def main():
         formatter_class=argparse.RawDescriptionHelpFormatter)
     parser.add_argument('-s', dest='subreddit', help='subreddit name')
     parser.add_argument('-l', dest='link', help='full link to a submission')
-    parser.add_argument('--force-ascii', dest='force_ascii',
-        help='disable unicode', action='store_true')
+    parser.add_argument('--unicode', help='enable unicode (beta)',
+            action='store_true')
 
     group = parser.add_argument_group(
         'authentication (optional)',
@@ -64,7 +64,7 @@ def main():
         if getattr(args, key) is None:
             setattr(args, key, val)
 
-    content.FORCE_ASCII = args.force_ascii
+    content.UNICODE = args.unicode
 
     if args.subreddit is None:
         args.subreddit = 'front'