> Like using stars to represent favorites, typography to emphasisze/deemphasize things, the color red for warnings/errors, the color green for go/submit/ready,

Screw the dyslexic and colourblind, I guess.

> using descriptive naming in buttons and having self-documenting labels.

Screw the non(-native)-English speaking in this case.

And even in the case that you're a native speaker, this is really hard to do well. You should try. Most fail.

I agree you should do these things, and many of your other suggestions (within reason) if only to give your users a better chance at understanding your software, but they cannot replace a solid grounding in the real world. We should have both.

What's clearer? [Call] or [(telephone receiver emoji) Call]?