diff --git a/WTE/plugin.py b/WTE/plugin.py
index 5f64940..8798bd6 100644
--- a/WTE/plugin.py
+++ b/WTE/plugin.py
@@ -28,7 +28,6 @@
 
 ###
 
-from __future__ import unicode_literals
 import supybot.utils as utils
 from supybot.commands import *
 import supybot.plugins as plugins
@@ -41,6 +40,7 @@ try: # Python 3
     from urllib.parse import urlencode
 except ImportError: # Python 2
     from urllib import urlencode
+    from string import printable
 from sys import version_info
 
 try:
@@ -59,6 +59,11 @@ class WTE(callbacks.Plugin):
     def __init__(self, irc):
         self.__parent = super(WTE, self)
         self.__parent.__init__(irc)
+        if version_info[0] < 3:
+            self.log.warning("WTE: Due to Unicode handling issues, "
+                "Unicode characters will be stripped from this plugin's "
+                "input/output. For optimal results, please upgrade the "
+                "bot to Python 3.")
         self.langs = ('sw', 'sv', 'is', 'et', 'te', 'tr', 'mr', 'nl', 'sl', 
         'id', 'gu', 'hi', 'az', 'hmn', 'ko', 'da', 'bg', 'lo', 'so', 'tl', 
         'hu', 'ca', 'cy', 'bs', 'ka', 'vi', 'eu', 'ms', 'fr', 'no', 'hy', 
@@ -69,12 +74,18 @@ class WTE(callbacks.Plugin):
         'ur', 'pl', 'eo', 'yo', 'en', 'yi')
 
     def getTranslation(self, irc, sourceLang, targetLang, text):
+        args = {"client": "p", "sl":sourceLang, "tl":targetLang}
         if version_info[0] < 3:
-            text = text.encode("utf-8")
+            # Python 2's Unicode handling is just horrible. I've tried a
+            # dozen different combinations of encoding and decoding and they
+            # all fail with a stupid, useless UnicodeDecodeError. We're
+            # just going to strip all non-ASCII characters until
+            # this stupid issue gets fixed. -GLolol
+            args['q'] = filter(lambda x: x in printable, text)
+        else:
+            args['q'] = text
         url = "http://translate.google.com/translate_a/t?"+ \
-            urlencode({"client": "p",
-                "sl":sourceLang, "tl":targetLang,
-                "q":text})
+            urlencode(args)
         try:
             data = json.loads(utils.web.getUrl(url).decode("utf-8"))
         except utils.web.Error as e:
@@ -98,6 +109,14 @@ class WTE(callbacks.Plugin):
         for targetlang in ll:
             text = self.getTranslation(irc, "auto", targetlang, text)
         text = self.getTranslation(irc, "auto", outlang, text)
+        text = text.strip()
+        if not text:
+            s = ("Error encoding/decoding response. If you are using "
+                "Python 2, it is recommended to upgrade to "
+                "Python 3 to suppress these kinds of errors, as there "
+                "are some lingering issues handling Unicode on "
+                "versions of Python 2.")
+            irc.error(s, Raise=True)
         irc.reply(text)
     wte = wrap(wte, ['text'])