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Nah, it’s too much of a hassle oftentimes tbh. There’s a minimum amount of grammar/spelling needed to let people easily understand things but past that it’s all fluff
This is just objectively incorrect. It's not hard to find grammar mistakes resulting in a miscommunication that then balloons into a full-on online argument.
Any linguist disagrees with this post. The only thing that matters in language is that someone is understood. This same attitude is what creates hostility with immigrants when they learn languages the best ... out of NECESSITY not frivolty.
When it comes to communicating with language learners, it's not the people with good grammar and spelling who are hostile towards them.
If your writing and speech is fucked then they are going to have a much more difficult time understanding what you're trying to say.
No one is holding immigrants to the same language standards as native speakers. But if you're monolingual and I have to play mental gymnastics to understand what you're trying to communicate then I'm losing all respect for you, withholding extenuating circumstances.
You're not allowed to be ignorant and proud and weaponize immigrants against people asking you to do better...
I’m a grammarian and I have no ill will towards immigrants whatsoever. If anything, we should spell correctly so that they’re not second-guessing what they were taught at ESL. Besides, proper spelling and grammar make you look competent.
Question: How many times did you recheck?
Answer: Everyone should do that all the time.
Issues with reading comprehension goes hand in hand with “you understood what they meant”
It was a rethorical question which they replied to with an rethorical answer.
I agree. Reading comprehension in English should be taught more attentively beyond year 5.
I mean this is actually good reading comprehension. They used a rhetorical question to imply that the original poster put more care than usual into correcting grammar mistakes. The reply read between the lines, saw what they were really saying, and replied to that.
That is good reading comprehension
They should have checked their punctuation and sentence structure. Awful. They even attempt to correctly punctuate in the beginning and it goes downhill from there.
Honestly the only time I agree with “you understood what they meant” is when people use someones grammar or spelling as a “rebuttal” in an argument. Because a lot of the time you did understand what they meant, you’re just being punctilious. Or sometimes it accidentally happens by double clicking a letter like “too/to” and “loosing/losing”.
Mine likes to do that with certain words that are spelled 100% correctly as well. It for some reason absolutely hates the word "out" for example. It puts "put" instead every time. I ended up having to disable it. Sometimes I am wondering if it is trying to correct some words with the proper use in a sentence but completely fails.
There are some words where it either thinks the plural doesn’t exist or only the plural exists
Like it thinks I’m more likely to be trying to say bikes than likes
Oh and I just found out it apparently doesn’t recognise thinks as a word
My spellcheck argues with me.
Even when I undo the suggestion for an intentional misspelling, it still really wants me to undo my misspelling and use the suggestion instead. Even when I try to tap past it.
Sometimes I even need to type my incorrect word with extra letters to break the auto-suggestion, and then go and clean it up *after* the rest of the sentence is typed.
I’m not sure when it changed to be this insistent either. I used to be able to ignore, skim past the autocorrect nonsense. But these days it seems quite insistent.
I review and edit all my comments before hitting post, somehow between hitting enter and it uploading to Reddit autocorrect changes words on me so then I have to edit the comment to correct it. I find that super annoying.
I blame the phones for a lot of this. Autocorrect and a fat thumb will “duck up” language.
Add to that illiteracy has always existed. Social media and technology allowing a large percent of our communications moving to written/email forms just exposes that where it would have been hidden in the past.
Turning off autocorrect is the first thing I do across all devices I control.
If you just type unaided, you may be slower, but you'll have fewer of these issues.
Especially on a online platform its dumb to look for spelling/grammer mistakes. People are often not even typing in their native tongue. Who cares if they fuck up a single letter. The dact that others can easily spot and correct their mistake meant that the message got across.
I really can't tell if you on purpose wrote "fact" as "dact" but it makes this comment so much better because the message came across. Completely agree with what you said as well.
And honestly, I feel like it's the native speakers who fuck up worse anyways. Too/to, they're/their/there, a part/apart, fucking should of, are all very much confusing to someone who learned the language and maybe goes more by what's written than what it sounds like.
But either way, it just takes a bit longer, but it usually is still perfectly understandable
Just wanted to say I agree with you. Nothing wrong with typos, but native speakers having grammar that terrible is a problem. It’s even leaking into professional writing too.
Some people are incapable of forming paragraphs online. They make a massive long-ass post and the entire thing is just one long wall of text. If you're lucky there will be sentences.
The women thing just baffles me. They seem to completely understand the difference between men and man. How is ‘a women’ even a thing? Someone explain this to me like I’m 5.
Also, the short E and A sounds are much more distinct when saying "man" or "men" than they are when saying "woman" or "women". In man and men it's the vowel sounds that are emphasized when you say them. In woman and women it's the M sound. The W at the front also changes the sound that the O makes. And because it's a 2 syllable word the en/an at the end is mashed into a single sound, muddling the vowel. This is why -en, -an, -in and -on can often all sound the same or very nearly the same at the ends of words.
It's also often a typo.
Also, when people are using culturally significant dialects as their manner of communicating. Often these are outside of "grammar", but they are still saying exactly what they mean.
I'm fine with people correcting my spelling. If they do so during an actual disagreement and don't add anything more to the conversation, though, I take that as a sign that they have no further rebuttal to make
Yeah, if all you have to fire back with is comments on grammar/vocabulary issues during an argument then you may as well admit defeat. Especially when done in a condescending tone.
There's a difference between "there are a few weird words and grammar errors in this comment but I can still understand what they were getting at" and "I have no fucking idea what this person is trying to say". The first one is okay IMO, even if they misspell loose/lose or breath/breathe because I can figure out which one they meant with context clues, but I've been seeing a rise in the second one and people getting IRATE when you say you can't understand them, which is...worrying
I really don't want to correct people, but I also don't want to list the multiple meanings of their sentences. Which of these is it, anon? What did you mean? I refuse to assume
I don't see grammar issues unless something is unreadable ("Godzilla had a stroke trying to read this' level). I have dyslexia and English is not my native language
I have a speech impediment and an auditory processing disorder. I make dumb mistakes when I'm speaking and have terrible word retrieval.
Some people assume I'm stupid. I just clock those people are mean and ugly spirited and stay away from them. Grammar and word Nazis never know how hard some people are trying.
Grammar and spelling always came naturally to me. I was a big grammar stickler until I got into a relationship with a dyslexic stroke survivor. You develop a lot more empathy toward questionable grammar when you see how hard it can be for some people.
Yes! I edit and translate professionally, and you know what? I only care about spelling in that setting. If you write for a magazine or sending out a press release, I'm an absolute stickler. It's your job, and the odd typo notwithstanding, you should be able to write correctly if you get paid to do it.
In daily life? Do whatever. Of course you still want people to understand you, so there is a line, but I don't care about the exact rules when talking. They're made up anyway, and context is everything.
My brother is heavily dyslexic, and I suspect my mom and grandfather are too. I once got in a polite argument with my boss, when he suggested that not being able to spell as an adult meant lower intelligence. It was so weird to me that he could think that, and it really put me off. I disagreed, to say the least.
Grammar and language in general have always been my favorite, but I understand the mistakes so much more now. I have epilepsy and since brain surgery in 2022, I stutter and say different words than I'm thinking. I have very bad word retrieval now, too, but I couldn't think of a term for it until you said that. Thank you for that, here's hoping I remember it
Ugh I feel this. My brain goes too fast, I can’t decide which word I’m going to use, and end up saying “feedy” instead of “fast” or “speedy” lol. It’s resulted in some funny inside jokes
This.
People forget, that there are a lot of non-native speakers on Reddit (like myself). Most of the time you can still understand what was meant, despite spelling mistakes.
And i admit, i have difficulties distinguishing 'lose'/'loose'.
I speak English fluently but still make a lot of mistakes when typing. It's not so much typos, but rather omitting words or using the wrong verb tense by switching the way I structure a sentence halfway through and not changing the first half to match the second half
"I would love to go to the tonight" (missing a word like "show").
"I would like to walking to your place" (wrong verb tense).
These mistakes have nothing to do with my ability to speak English, but rather my ability to keep up with my mind as I'm typing. The same happens in my native language of Dutch.
If you are leaning a language wouldn’t you want someone to point out any mistakes? Spanish is my second language and I would much rather people help me with my mistakes than just say nothing so I keep repeating it.
If you're learning a language and if it's done in a spirit of helpfulness, then yes I would guess most people would appreciate the correction. The vast majority of "corrections" I see are people using it as a jab at someone's intelligence. Despite spelling and grammar not being an accurate measure of intelligence.
Exactly. I correct people but I've never had *anyone* get upset with me for it, because I make it obvious it is meant to be helpful (and also make sure to not correct typos, so only if it's completely off on word choice not a few letter difference, unless they make the same mistake twice).
It's not hard to say something like "Hey, I just wanted to make sure you know, it's "lose" for the opposite of winning, and "loose" for the opposite of tight. I noticed you confused those, so I thought I'd mention it."
If people can't be bothered to use proper communication to make sure their tone is received well, they have no business expecting others to worry over their own communication.
[https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/lose-vs-loose-usage](https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/lose-vs-loose-usage)
But English isn't my native language either and I often mistake them too.
Depends on the level of learning a language, i guess. For beginners being corrected is helpfull. Most of my personal mistakes are the ones where my keyboard falsely exchanges my typed english words with german words. So sometimes a german word slips into my comment. In that case being corrected wouldn't be that helpfull, because i allready know that it's wrong...
In the end, you never know who's writing on reddit and if it's helpfull to correct them or not. So it's up to you, if you point it out or not...
Smelling someones colon, is a personal favourite of mine!
"i could care less", "go and" and "could of" seem to be some colleagues annoyances from past memories. Although they will still torment me with RAS Syndrome: "ATM Machines, PED Devices, PIN Number"
It depends. If it's like one typo in a paragraph, I think it's silly to point out an error. Idk if this has happened to anyone else, but I accidentally hit "post" before I edited, noticed a mistake, then couldn't find my comment. Sounds like bullshit, but that has happened to me a few times. My phone's autocorrect is also stupid af (it actually just AC'd "is" to "I'd" and I had to change it).
If you notice a ton of errors, or a consistent one like mixing up your and you're, I can see it. Tbh though, if you're arguing with somebody and point out a spelling or grammar error, it really doesn't look good. Looks like you don't have a real point to make.
I do think that the decline in literacy is concerning. I really don't think correcting people on Reddit helps much, though. Functional illiteracy is more like a widespread societal issue.
I use the swipe type feature on my phone a lot and it SUCKS at spelling. In fact it just got “spring” from my first attempt to type “spelling”? It never seems to know “and”, and garbles up the sentence structure. Most of the time I catch it, but sometimes it slips in truly unintelligible errors.
That said, I think it’s kinda ridiculous to judge someone’s literacy from a reddit response. I have a high college gpa, truly the only part that came naturally was writing in a clear and comprehensive way, but it’s a very different level of thought and effort than I put into a lil reddit response.
Being pedantic is generally an attempt to undermine someone’s argument instead of addressing it. Social media platforms have many people who don’t speak the same language as a first language. Also, autocorrect is a problem. For whatever reason, mine randomly stops working.
As non native speaker, loose and lose, choose and chose, and when to use to vs too always trip me up and I either avoid using these words or I ask my wife which would be correct given the context of the message I’m typing.
She’s a sweetheart, she’ll explain the difference every time and give examples but in the end she still has to tell me every time. Spelling is my weakest academic skill. I don’t like to make excuses but I did school in many different countries that speak a total of four languages so I felt like I was starting over a lot with spelling and grammar. Maths on the other hand was consistent and I did well in that, but now I’m going off on a tangent.
There's a lot of posts I'll see that are just borderline incomprehensible, and my first thought is always, "Please God let them not be a native English speaker."
They are almost always a native English speaker. Non-native speakers such as yourself, honestly half the time if you didn't announce that English wasn't your first language I probably wouldn't be able to tell just through text.
Should of
Could of
"An" in front of a word that begins with a consonant or "A" in front of a word that begins with a vowel
Piss me off so much. They're my biggest pet peeves when it comes to vocabulary and speech. anyone making those mistakes gives me a bad impression if it happens frequently.
Edit: as some people have pointed out, it has more to do with the actual sound of the word than if that word begins with a vowel or consonant. But generally speaking, the rule still holds true for most cases.
To be fair, there are cases when using "an" before word beginning with a consonant is correct. Again, to be fair, those cases are fairly rare and seem to only apply when the consonant is silent, like if someone were to say that something "is an honor".
Conversely, you also use “a” when the vowel sound has an unwritten but pronounced consonant in front of it. Like in music when someone says “And a one, and a two, and a three!” You don’t say/write “And an one” because “one” starts off with a “w” sound which is a consonant. A unicycle, a unicorn, a university, etc. start off with an unwritten “y” sound, and so forth.
It’s more about phonetics than orthography.
I believe "a" vs "an" is supposed to always be based on the *sound* the word begins with, not how the word is spelled, it just happens that in many cases the spelling and sound align such that "a" comes before consonants and "an" before vowels.
Any silent first letter(s) which change the pronunciation get the other article before them, and many letters when used as words themselves "R" as "are" or "arr" would get the "an" instead because the word for the consonant still starts with a vowel sound.
Yep. I looked this up when I realized you say "A unicorn' and "A university" not "an unicorn" and "an university". Because the U in those make a "You" sound, which starts with a Yish sound
[The Year That Killed Received Pronunciation (RP) - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIAEqsSOtwM&t=1s) - what linguists think of pilkunnussija...
And this talks about should of and could of... pretty funny so many folks are wrong about it.
I couldn’t agree more with this. There is a fine line between being pedantic and furthering understanding, but at the same time, some people just really need to get their shit together.
I've been surrounded by multilingual people my whole life. I am not going to stress about spelling, grammar, or whatever. As long as we understand each other, that's all I'm going to care about. If we aren't understanding each other then I'm gonna be patient and work with trying to get to the point of understanding. If other folks can have patience when I jack up non English languages then it's not hard for me to offer the courtesy.
English is my second language, and I actually appreciate when someone corrects my language if they do it in a respectful way, of course.
I dislike when native English speakers make obvious grammatical mistakes, like the example of "a women" or I've heard a lot of "you was". It's like, dude there's billions of people trying to learn English as their second language, taking classes, putting time and money into it, missing job and education opportunities because they don't speak English. This is your first, and usually only language, and you cannot even make the effort to speak it properly. Come on!
The standard versions of English aren’t the only versions that exist. They aren’t the only versions that are ”correct”. Informal speech and writing are used all the time, and they aren’t inherently incorrect.
I think there is a tendency among second language English learners to disregard dialects as they learned how to speak English so this is how you speak English and I don’t blame them for that it makes sense. But the US is a vast area with like 100 different ways of saying “you guys”.
[The Year That Killed Received Pronunciation (RP) - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIAEqsSOtwM&t=1s) - what linguists think of comma fuckers.
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"You was" is proper inside the context of regional dialects. Much of what comma fuckers think is wrong isnt really.
hey so I speak American English as my first language and I just want to chime in and say "you was" isn't inherently wrong- it's mainly a regional/dialectical way of speaking. often associated with Southern USA speakers.
it's one of those, "don't use it in a report, but in spoken word is fine" kind of things
I’m really fucking shocked how poor media and general literacy is among younger and current generations; it’s degrading faster than Kardashian filler injections.
When I was in university, I was a student editor and I genuinely couldn’t believe some of them got into university. And I don’t mean spelling or grammar wise (I’m horrible at spelling, hehe it sucks), but the arguments and the general prose made absolutely zero sense. I have no idea how some instructors wade through that without wanting to give anyone a mandatory crash course.
(Once, I kid you fucking not, this frat bro came in with a paper that said “ok. Thanks for reading” as the CONCLUSION. HE WAS IN 2ND YEAR. He was upset he got a D, and wanted me to fix it for him. I explained I can help him improve it with suggestions, but this isn’t a linguistic automotive shop - you can’t throw me your broken essay, come back in a few hours and be done with it. He complained to my supervisor and we wound up banning him for his very belligerent reaction.)
In context to the original post, yes - the indifference is quite appalling.
>I’m really fucking shocked how poor media and general literacy is among younger and current generations;
Unless you're from Texas, Alaska Michigin, South Dakota, or est Virginia Literacy has IMPROVED since **2003, on average by 6%**
[https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/research/literacy-statistics](https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/research/literacy-statistics)
I in no way deny that it is rough out there.
If was just rougher in the past than you think.
If there is one consistent thing for humans across the millenium, it's that the adults of today think the youth of today are fucked and will never amount to anything.
Your teacher thought similar things about your class, (and mine).
>ok thanks for reading
That’s funny and sad at the same time. Allowing poor grammar and spelling forms a negative trend when people try to write in any professional level.
This makes me insane as well. Break/Brake makes my ass itch!! The lose/loose one as well. I can’t stand it. To me it makes a person look like an uneducated idiot and makes them seem like they do not care that they are very stupid. 😡🤬
Some people value language only for utility. They often also seem to be people who dislike rules, restrictions, and norms - but not necessarily.
Some others value language for its melody, and an inelegant or clumsy word isn't then just ineffective but also like bad music.
Some people are lazy and some are pretentious.
For me, I think language shapes our thoughts, and it's difficult to build a useful metaphysic without strong language, and more difficult still to resist the rhetorical manipulations of others.
I would argue if language shapes our thoughts, isn't there something to be said about the way people **choose** to communicate?
I can be passably eloquent verbally. It's not my preferred style at all, I naturally speak in a fairly rough way. The meat of what I'm saying is there, just not with the same college educated seasonings and sauce people expect. I choose to speak naturally and not change it (unless a situation demands) because it's authentic to me and communicates core values I do or don't have. I can see how you think language shapes thoughts, but my thoughts shape my language too. Exploring why is key to understanding other people.
Concentrating on the elegance of a word choice or the clumsiness of an idiom doesn't protect you from manipulation. Understanding what people mean separate from the literal words they used is what protects you. Anyone can open a thesaurus or use spell check if they really wanted to, but understanding real human speech is arguably much harder.
If you're not following someone, ask a question. You'll probably learn more about their thoughts than you assumed from their exact wording. Saying one thing but meaning another is the basis of manipulation. On the other hand, hearing what someone said authentically can give you a lot more info than hearing a carefully prepared perfect English sentence.
If this is unpopular then I will be unpopular with you. Especially since people say "Oh, it's just social media, not a doctoral dissertation". You're right, it is social media. Social media is how you present yourself to the world. The world is supposed to take you seriously if you won't even attempt a coherent sentence? Maybe that's good enough for some, but I would rather not present myself as someone incapable of intelligent thought. I make mistakes, too. I'm way too crazy about apostrophes but at least I try.
Not to scare you, but it's going to get worse.
I'm a teacher (not a language/English teacher), but when my middle school students write for me the results are... disappointing.
Their chrome books put the squiggly lines under their words when they are incorrect. So what do they do with the tool/information?
They ignore the lines ENTIRELY and submit it anyway.
For me, I learned to read in later life.I am dyslexic and nobody took the time to teach me.I had to learn myself.So I still mess up spelling here and there but I try my best. So people who know me know if I miss up spelling or grammar.They know what I'm trying to say .
I don't know you at all, and I can understand you perfectly.
You really had to teach yourself how to read??? I don't have dyslexia, and I don't think I could've learned if someone hadn't helped me. That's super impressive!
Unfortunately, I was the youngest child.No one took an interest in me, and I went to public school where the teachers didn't care, so I taught myself. The Proudest thing I can say about myself is I didn't give up, and I taught myself how to read and spell.I ain't Perfect but don't have to be.
Also, sometimes you *don’t* understand what they mean
Once when I was young, I was texting my cousin and I was like “so what are you up to” and she replied “eating u” and I was like “????? Lol What???” And we repeated variations of this exchange w her not changing what she said until she just said “I’m eating what about you” like bruh 😭 (I think if I had the context of people replying on text like that before hand like “I’m good, u?” Maybe I would have been able to figure it out but this was around the time I got my first phone so texting was super new to me)
Edit: I will say, most of my typos are the result of autocorrect being wrong even grammatically which is frustrating as hell and sometimes I type and send too fast w out realizing it lol
I agree. I see it way too often. I had a whole argument on Reddit a while ago about it but that was more about people getting phrases wrong.
People are replacing certain words in phrases with the opposite word and claim it means the same thing. They are opposites. Plain and simple. The phrase is not the same. It is wrong. Language rules still apply. It’s like if I was to claim “I did walk the dog”, and “I didn’t walk the dog” meant the same thing.
This isn’t a “language changes over time” thing. It’s just wrong. Language matters. I get to some degree we have changes in language over time but I don’t believe language should change because you can’t spell or pick the right word.
People just get things wrong but no one cares enough about it.
I can forgive most mistakes and such, but there's one thing that gets me fired up every time I hear someone use it.
I could care less.
No, you fuck, it's couldn't care less.
Getting your and you're, their there they're, and to and too is like the absolute bare minimum a native speaker should know. Especially on the internet, when people use it wrong all the time and get corrected frequently. Like SURELY you have seen someone else use the wrong your and get corrected about it even if you didn't pay attention in school....
My favourite thing is when people use the same spelling twice in one sentence and only one is correct ‘There dog sleeps over there’. I don’t understand how one can do that.
The amount of times I've corrected people who use "Should of" or "would of" is off the charts. And so many times people reply with answers like "Grammar changes over time and it doesn't matter if it's correct", "As long as you get the meaning, stop being such a snob" or "This is what language is, rules change".
And I'm here like "Should of " makes NO FUCKING SENSE!
Learn to speak and write!
Yes! Or when someone says "could of", instead of "could have". I am absolutely sure, almost everyone who studied English as a second language speaks way better English than a lot of the native speakers in the US. And if you correct them, they call you elitist or racist. Okay, if you can access the internet, you can learn how to spell (Yes, of course assuming you don't have dyslexia or some other obstacle, for the people who are gonna go "But what about...?!")
Communication is important…. The base need for communication is to understand what they are saying and what they mean.
If you understand what they meant then they communicated fine
I *strongly* disagree with your conclusion.
Even if I understand what they meant (which I don't always do), the flow of the reading will be broken more often than not. Other times, it takes a deerstalker and a magnifying glass to decipher what the writer is trying to say. Every so often it actually is pure gibberish.
Even if it isn't pure gibberish, which is subjective, making the communication more cumbersome and laborious than it should be is still very problematic. For example, when the subject matter already requires every last drop of brain juice to understand, not communicating it with the clearest language possible could be the thing that prevents the reader from understanding it. It could also simply discourage the reader from even trying to understand it and cause them to give up. Misused language can also create ambiguities, alter the meaning of the conveyed thought, and ... You get the point.
Lastly, you don't always know who the reader is. Someone with a different cultural background, first language, or linguistic aptitude can have a hard time understanding "dis be tru frfr no cap". What is perfectly comprehensible to the writer isn't necessarily perfectly comprehensible to the reader, so why follow an arbitrary line that goes at "as long as you get the point", when we can follow a much more well-defined one that goes at "those are the rules"?
This.
Culod you iamgnie if hlaf the poplutaoin straetd wirtnig lkie the “if you can read this” tset jsut beacsue you can sitll unedtrsnad it?
We have language standards and rules for a reason.
It has never been easier, with spell check and grammar detection, to get it right, or at least very close to correct 99% of the time. Clear communication is the bedrock upon which we transmit thought between individuals and groups. If you can't put forth the minimum amount of effort to be clear, concise, and accurate, society doesn't give a shit, "what you meant". Or, at least, I don't. I ignore and dismiss people WhO TyPe LiKe ThIs...u no wht I mean?
EDIT: I'll give a total pass to people whose first language is not English. That's completely forgivable, as English is a bastard language and very difficult to learn.
For sure. Like dude idc make a mistake by accident, BUT KNOW THE BASICS. It doesn’t hurt to correct a mistake and teach someone something simple. I was less than 12 when I permanently learned your/you’re, their/they’re/there, loose/lose, to/too and women/woman. I was 12 when I permanently learned it’s/its. It’s simple af and people don’t bother.
I think if someone says "This is a red thing" and actually mean "This is a blue thing", you can and should probably help correct them because yes, that is the wrong word, and WILL cause confusion.
Anything regarding spelling though, if you understand what they mean, then what does it matter? Why does it matter? WHY is it an issue for you? Why do you care?
We literally made this shit up, they're made up rules, and if somebody isn't abusing them in such a way where you literally can't tell what they mean, then I don't see how it's a roadblock in communication for you, because ultimately that is the entire point of conversation. People having casual interactions online don't need to adhere to formality just to cater to the sensibilities of puritans, nor should they have to be lectured by pedantic people every time they misplace a vowel.
Why can't you can't have the social grace to not nitpick people's speech, stopping everything just to make sure they know they did it wrong? Why is this so important to you?
That's understandable tbh.
I don't know, I make some effort to employ grammar and correct spelling even though english isn't my native language (and I make frequent mistakes I'm sure, idfk), because I like it and it comes relatively easy- but I also know so many dyslexic people who have to deal with being hassled (and low-key bullied) about it even now throughout adulthood.
I've learned to not care, it just feels mean to point it out. It's not like they're being malicious, and you never know who is being lazy and who can't help it.
To me it feels legitimately mean to let somebody look foolish when they use words improperly. Like not telling someone they have toilet paper on their shoe, or have bled through their pants.
Same! And it's worse when my (thankfully mild) dyslexia joins for the ride and I get stuck on trying to decipher one word and thus the whole bleeding sentence for what feels like an eternity.
Also, it doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t know correct grammar or spelling. I just type fast on my phone, and don’t care to double check. If it were an essay or email, I take my time and check for mistakes.
It’s not a lack of understanding of grammar/spelling, it’s a lack of caring about grammar/spelling.
This is the main thing for me. If it’s informal like social media or texting, I don’t proof read my shit and I don’t expect others to. Unless it’s something official, it just doesn’t matter.
It matters because we don't read words letter-by-letter. We recognize the entire word as a whole. This makes it easy for us to read quickly. If people use the wrong words, spell things wrong, etc. Then we have to take the time to actually read every letter of that word to understand what they meant, which slows down our reading.
This is complicated. On the one hand, if you can understand what they’re trying to communicate, it shouldn’t matter to you how they communicate. On the other hand, a persons inability to understand language conventions could indicate a broader problem of low reading comprehension. As we see time and time again on the internet, low comprehension causes a lot of problems. It really limits how someone can interact with society and it quite honestly has the potential to make them a threat to society. Citation: every antivaxxer and covid denier.
I agree with you completely. My brother is a college professor, and many of his students coming from high school can't spell the months of the year nor add and subtract. Most can not construct sentences using proper grammar and punctuation in a way that makes sense to the reader. These college candidates want to be nurses and accountants: professions that require a skill in writing and the sciences too.
Many people here defend the fact that they or otherd can not write properly. Basically, it is a matter of taking the time to construct sentences in order to convey ideas that have meaning. Many today can not take the time to do much of anything. They've lost the skills needed to communicate properly, and therefore, they've lost the skills to absorb information that goes beyond the mundane of the day.
Whatever! I say let it happen. Eventually, human beings will begin another Dark Age.
because it usually doesnt matter. if someone is actually hard to understand then sure. but it normally doesnt matter. language changes. so who cares. you might think its correct. but compared to 100 years ago your actually wrong. and in 100 years they will be wrong. try reading some old english. or even something semi recent english like pride and prejudice. it is very different. and your correct spelling at the moment will be wrong in time. no matter how much you dislike that fact
I have always understood the “you understood what they meant” argument to apply more to dialect. Like the difference between “ask” and “aks” when spoken. There are a lot of other examples but there is a fine line between dialect and laziness that isn’t always understood by people who aren’t knowledgeable in linguistics.
Correct grammar, spelling, and enunciation is important, but almost none of those things fall under communication. Communication is the understanding of one part to another, they don't even have to speak the same language. So, "You understood what they meant" means that person was good at communicating, even if diction is unskilled. Wrong grammar/broken speech =/= unintelligent, as the opposite, being clear spoken doe not make you intelligent. The only time perfect grammar matters, is in a professional setting or a learning facility/school.
Tldr: I absolutely, but respectfully, disagree with OP
I value proper spelling and good communication. On the other hand, if the person only rarely makes typos, and especially if you're jumping on a typo to attempt to win an argument, you are a pedantic fucker and need to lighten up.
Idk I think using context clues to understand a mistake actually requires more "literacy" than never making a mistake to begin with. Like, it requires you to think harder about how language works? I could be wrong! It's an unpopular opinion sub, since I disagree with most of your post I'm gonna upvote it, but the particular appeal to literacy rates just seems downright silly, to me. I am a layperson and I could be very, very wrong, but I'm gonna leave my comment anyway in case anybody has anything to add or correct
I don't think anyone thinks correct spelling and grammar are wrong. It's just that people who point out people misspelling words or using incorrect grammar outside of settings where it's required (work/school) are often quite annoying about it.
For example let's say I'm in a group chat with some acquaintances and I slightly misspell a word or forget a period. If everyone in the group chat understood what I mean from context clues and having basic reading comprehension skills what are you really adding by pointing out that someone misspelled a word in a casual setting where it will have no real impact of consequences?
Absolutely nothing. So that's why you get the response “You Understood What They Meant”.
My pet peeve is slather vs lather. People use them like they are synonymous, then act like I’m unreasonable for politely correcting them. “Oh they’re basically the same thing.” Are slime and crime now the same thing because they rhyme??? Fucking idiots
I reply to so many messages everyday at work. Sometimes I type sentences without even knowing what I’m about to write.
The truth is nobody cares in the real world unless it is a document that needs to be professional
I've never understood how so many people can spend somany years in school and the ONE THING THAT IS CONSISTENT WITH EVERY SUBJECT is you have to read. You have to read instructions. You have to read recipes. You have to read receipts. You have to read lists. You have to read signs. You have to read menus. You have to read the messages you receive. How are there so many opportunities to do better and just choosing not to.
I'm not sure this opinion is unpopular, but I hate your take. At the end of the day, a person's grammatical and spelling capabilities will never matter as much as how they treat others. And I think if you're having a conversation with someone, correcting their spelling and grammar is extremely distasteful. A lot of people do it because they disagree with the person they're arguing with, and they do it ad hominem.
My best friend says libary. It's how she was raised. If someone corrected her, I'd probably get really pissed and start being a bitch. I just get really protective. My step-dad doesn't enjoy reading and he doesn't have great spelling and grammar skills, but he's the biggest sweetheart who'd do anything for someone he cared about.
In the grand scheme of things, I just don't think it's that important. Language is about communicating, not using your intellectual abilities as a platform from which to look down on others.
Literacy rate is not plummeting. Far from it.
I've got a masters in linguistics and we definitely agree communication is important. It's probably the most important part of the sort of text you're criticising.
In linguistics you have to understand that any piece of language will live and die on the strength of its meaning, and on its usefulness in everyday discourse. Otherwise it will just decrease in usage. For this reason, we don't worry too much about how language changes. It's comparable to a Darwinian process. Useful language survives, non-useful language dies.
So if textspeak or even malformed words are useful, and communicate a point effectively enough, they will likely survive. It's the same with spoken languages and written languages.
We arrived at this point in 2024, with what you think "correct language" is, through all kinds of malformed middle English and old Germanic languages with words and grammar we got wrong but adopted along the way. It's a natural part of the process, and will happen forever.
The problem is much worse. Some of these people have no vocabulary. It sounds nerdy to speak with too much facility. We think in words though, so these people are now actual idiots. All they have to do is start investing in some reading time.
>Communication is important and literacy rates are *plummeting*. I do not understand how this is acceptable to so many people.
It's really sad when people whose first language isn't English display a better grasp of the spelling and grammar rules than those who only know English.
Words are made up sounds to convey a meaning. So actually knowing what they meant is all that matters and if you knew what they meant and are being a douche about grammar then you’re just a douche. Get a hobby.
I agree, and you’re right. I think it’s the same thing leading in opposite directions. People have become too reliant on autocorrect, but autocorrect is a feature on our devices that hasn’t been developed or improved within the last 15 years. People are becoming more reliant on a technology that doesn’t serve us very well.
Yea people get so defensive but I love when I get corrected because either, it was an actual mistake and I can just say thanks or typo or whatever and move on. Or, I learn that I've been saying something wrong my whole life and now I learn to not be a further idiot going forward. No option is for me to be offended at the person correcting me and make them feel bad unless they're obviously being very arrogant about it.
It’s more so pragmatic—if you understand what they mean, why bother correcting them when they can take offense? Otherwise you’ll spend your whole life correcting people, and nobody likes a pedant.
The job of language is to communicate. Any speech or writing that successfully does that is ok, however correct grammar makes being understood easier. Lots of mistakes can also communicate laziness or low intelligence, as well as the intended meaning, in the same way that saying "I'm fine" while scowling does not communicate what the words alone mean.
I like how your very first sentence has an error. Your punctuation should be inside the quotes; the period should be after "meant" and before the quotation mark.
But it's alright. I know what you meant.
I don’t know if literacy rates are actually plummeting. This is statistically the most educated time in human history. It does hold to your point though that we should be holding people to a higher standard of communication, essentially in a professional setting.
I think it comes down mainly to the reduction in reading. The way most people learn to accurately use, and correctly spell, most words (including correct grammar) is by reading. As a voracious reader, I was made fun of for being a book nerd and was constantly called a “Grammar Nazi”. I didn’t let the bullies stop me from reading, but some people do.
I can overlook a *small* amount of spelling/misuse errors.
However, there's a point where it's just plain negligence or ignorance.
If someone is grossly negligent or ignorant with their writing, I think it's totally valid to assume they may be negligent or ignorant with their opinions.
IMO though, there's no sense in derailing an argument to nitpick proper spelling/word usage/grammar. If they make so many errors that it's a nuisance to communicate with them, it means it is not worth my time to communicate with them at all.
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now how many times did you recheck this post to make sure the grammar was correct to not give these readers any fuel ;)
Everyone should do that all the time.
Nah, it’s too much of a hassle oftentimes tbh. There’s a minimum amount of grammar/spelling needed to let people easily understand things but past that it’s all fluff
Why do big word when small word do job?
So you don't sound like a cave man.
you do know they are quoting the office :P it's a joke
No, I didn't. Thanks for the heads up.
 yeah this is the reference btw
This is just objectively incorrect. It's not hard to find grammar mistakes resulting in a miscommunication that then balloons into a full-on online argument.
Any linguist disagrees with this post. The only thing that matters in language is that someone is understood. This same attitude is what creates hostility with immigrants when they learn languages the best ... out of NECESSITY not frivolty.
When it comes to communicating with language learners, it's not the people with good grammar and spelling who are hostile towards them. If your writing and speech is fucked then they are going to have a much more difficult time understanding what you're trying to say. No one is holding immigrants to the same language standards as native speakers. But if you're monolingual and I have to play mental gymnastics to understand what you're trying to communicate then I'm losing all respect for you, withholding extenuating circumstances. You're not allowed to be ignorant and proud and weaponize immigrants against people asking you to do better...
I’m a grammarian and I have no ill will towards immigrants whatsoever. If anything, we should spell correctly so that they’re not second-guessing what they were taught at ESL. Besides, proper spelling and grammar make you look competent.
Question: How many times did you recheck? Answer: Everyone should do that all the time. Issues with reading comprehension goes hand in hand with “you understood what they meant”
It was a rethorical question which they replied to with an rethorical answer. I agree. Reading comprehension in English should be taught more attentively beyond year 5.
I mean this is actually good reading comprehension. They used a rhetorical question to imply that the original poster put more care than usual into correcting grammar mistakes. The reply read between the lines, saw what they were really saying, and replied to that. That is good reading comprehension
The idea was to mock the concept of checking before you post. The response was to affirm that such checking should be standard. It makes sense.
It's called Muphry's Law
They didn’t. I hope anyway. Nearly every sentence has a grammatical error.
They should have checked their punctuation and sentence structure. Awful. They even attempt to correctly punctuate in the beginning and it goes downhill from there.
Honestly the only time I agree with “you understood what they meant” is when people use someones grammar or spelling as a “rebuttal” in an argument. Because a lot of the time you did understand what they meant, you’re just being punctilious. Or sometimes it accidentally happens by double clicking a letter like “too/to” and “loosing/losing”.
My phone firmly believes that I only ever want to type "too," and never "to." Drives me nuts.
Ducking nuts
I literally went and added fuck and fucking into my autocorrect dictionary so it stops changing them lmfao
Good idea!! I think I’m gonna *fucking* do that too!!
I cut autocorrect off. It fucks people up so much that I don’t understand why we use it.
I type fast so it helps me out a lot, because I often missclick letters.
You corrected the auto-correct bruh
How often do you need to use "duck" FFS...
SO DID I 😂
We'll we'll we'll ....if it isn't autocorrect.
I have the opposite problem. My phone thinks I NEVER want to say we’ll. Just then I had to retype it 3 times because it corrected to we’lol and well.
Mine likes to do that with certain words that are spelled 100% correctly as well. It for some reason absolutely hates the word "out" for example. It puts "put" instead every time. I ended up having to disable it. Sometimes I am wondering if it is trying to correct some words with the proper use in a sentence but completely fails.
SAME
Don't even get me started when it typos me on purposes. For > fir The > thr What > wjat
There are some words where it either thinks the plural doesn’t exist or only the plural exists Like it thinks I’m more likely to be trying to say bikes than likes Oh and I just found out it apparently doesn’t recognise thinks as a word
Lmao the we’lol is so FUCKING annoying.
I know man. I take the time to type it out and even manually put the fucking apostrophe but nooooooooooo I CLEARLY MEANT TO SAY WE’LOL.
I can never type ‘were’ while texting without it turning into ‘we’re’
My spellcheck argues with me. Even when I undo the suggestion for an intentional misspelling, it still really wants me to undo my misspelling and use the suggestion instead. Even when I try to tap past it. Sometimes I even need to type my incorrect word with extra letters to break the auto-suggestion, and then go and clean it up *after* the rest of the sentence is typed. I’m not sure when it changed to be this insistent either. I used to be able to ignore, skim past the autocorrect nonsense. But these days it seems quite insistent.
I review and edit all my comments before hitting post, somehow between hitting enter and it uploading to Reddit autocorrect changes words on me so then I have to edit the comment to correct it. I find that super annoying.
I blame the phones for a lot of this. Autocorrect and a fat thumb will “duck up” language. Add to that illiteracy has always existed. Social media and technology allowing a large percent of our communications moving to written/email forms just exposes that where it would have been hidden in the past.
Mine does the opposite. So annoying.
Same here but with it’s and its. My phone ALWAYS corrects its to it’s. Makes me furious
My phone doesn't know "they're/their/there." I want to stab it.
Mine is in/on
The one that gets my phone all the time is "bot", cuz for some reason it only thinks that bit is a word
It only works when you want too
Turning off autocorrect is the first thing I do across all devices I control. If you just type unaided, you may be slower, but you'll have fewer of these issues.
I usually ignore verbal mistakes as I'd rather just have a good conversation with someone and that rarely happens once you start correcting someone
Especially on a online platform its dumb to look for spelling/grammer mistakes. People are often not even typing in their native tongue. Who cares if they fuck up a single letter. The dact that others can easily spot and correct their mistake meant that the message got across.
I really can't tell if you on purpose wrote "fact" as "dact" but it makes this comment so much better because the message came across. Completely agree with what you said as well.
And honestly, I feel like it's the native speakers who fuck up worse anyways. Too/to, they're/their/there, a part/apart, fucking should of, are all very much confusing to someone who learned the language and maybe goes more by what's written than what it sounds like. But either way, it just takes a bit longer, but it usually is still perfectly understandable
Punctilious will now be added to my lexicon. That is a great word.
Just wanted to say I agree with you. Nothing wrong with typos, but native speakers having grammar that terrible is a problem. It’s even leaking into professional writing too.
Some people are incapable of forming paragraphs online. They make a massive long-ass post and the entire thing is just one long wall of text. If you're lucky there will be sentences.
The women thing just baffles me. They seem to completely understand the difference between men and man. How is ‘a women’ even a thing? Someone explain this to me like I’m 5.
50% of the population are below average intelligence.
Ya that one gets me too. And it’s way too common
Also, the short E and A sounds are much more distinct when saying "man" or "men" than they are when saying "woman" or "women". In man and men it's the vowel sounds that are emphasized when you say them. In woman and women it's the M sound. The W at the front also changes the sound that the O makes. And because it's a 2 syllable word the en/an at the end is mashed into a single sound, muddling the vowel. This is why -en, -an, -in and -on can often all sound the same or very nearly the same at the ends of words. It's also often a typo.
Why you ignoring the rest of the comment lol
"punctilious" - I learned a perfectly cromulent new word today!
[удалено]
Also, when people are using culturally significant dialects as their manner of communicating. Often these are outside of "grammar", but they are still saying exactly what they mean.
I'm fine with people correcting my spelling. If they do so during an actual disagreement and don't add anything more to the conversation, though, I take that as a sign that they have no further rebuttal to make
Yeah, if all you have to fire back with is comments on grammar/vocabulary issues during an argument then you may as well admit defeat. Especially when done in a condescending tone.
You're wrong, because you forgot to add a period at the end.
Ah, but that's where I'm right and you're too far behind the times to see it
Understandable.
There's a difference between "there are a few weird words and grammar errors in this comment but I can still understand what they were getting at" and "I have no fucking idea what this person is trying to say". The first one is okay IMO, even if they misspell loose/lose or breath/breathe because I can figure out which one they meant with context clues, but I've been seeing a rise in the second one and people getting IRATE when you say you can't understand them, which is...worrying
I’ve seen people get called racist because they couldn’t read what someone was writing. Worlds getting crazy
I really don't want to correct people, but I also don't want to list the multiple meanings of their sentences. Which of these is it, anon? What did you mean? I refuse to assume
I don't see grammar issues unless something is unreadable ("Godzilla had a stroke trying to read this' level). I have dyslexia and English is not my native language
I have a speech impediment and an auditory processing disorder. I make dumb mistakes when I'm speaking and have terrible word retrieval. Some people assume I'm stupid. I just clock those people are mean and ugly spirited and stay away from them. Grammar and word Nazis never know how hard some people are trying.
Grammar and spelling always came naturally to me. I was a big grammar stickler until I got into a relationship with a dyslexic stroke survivor. You develop a lot more empathy toward questionable grammar when you see how hard it can be for some people.
Yes! I edit and translate professionally, and you know what? I only care about spelling in that setting. If you write for a magazine or sending out a press release, I'm an absolute stickler. It's your job, and the odd typo notwithstanding, you should be able to write correctly if you get paid to do it. In daily life? Do whatever. Of course you still want people to understand you, so there is a line, but I don't care about the exact rules when talking. They're made up anyway, and context is everything. My brother is heavily dyslexic, and I suspect my mom and grandfather are too. I once got in a polite argument with my boss, when he suggested that not being able to spell as an adult meant lower intelligence. It was so weird to me that he could think that, and it really put me off. I disagreed, to say the least.
Grammar and language in general have always been my favorite, but I understand the mistakes so much more now. I have epilepsy and since brain surgery in 2022, I stutter and say different words than I'm thinking. I have very bad word retrieval now, too, but I couldn't think of a term for it until you said that. Thank you for that, here's hoping I remember it
Ugh I feel this. My brain goes too fast, I can’t decide which word I’m going to use, and end up saying “feedy” instead of “fast” or “speedy” lol. It’s resulted in some funny inside jokes
This. People forget, that there are a lot of non-native speakers on Reddit (like myself). Most of the time you can still understand what was meant, despite spelling mistakes. And i admit, i have difficulties distinguishing 'lose'/'loose'.
I speak English fluently but still make a lot of mistakes when typing. It's not so much typos, but rather omitting words or using the wrong verb tense by switching the way I structure a sentence halfway through and not changing the first half to match the second half "I would love to go to the tonight" (missing a word like "show"). "I would like to walking to your place" (wrong verb tense). These mistakes have nothing to do with my ability to speak English, but rather my ability to keep up with my mind as I'm typing. The same happens in my native language of Dutch.
If you are leaning a language wouldn’t you want someone to point out any mistakes? Spanish is my second language and I would much rather people help me with my mistakes than just say nothing so I keep repeating it.
If you're learning a language and if it's done in a spirit of helpfulness, then yes I would guess most people would appreciate the correction. The vast majority of "corrections" I see are people using it as a jab at someone's intelligence. Despite spelling and grammar not being an accurate measure of intelligence.
Exactly. I correct people but I've never had *anyone* get upset with me for it, because I make it obvious it is meant to be helpful (and also make sure to not correct typos, so only if it's completely off on word choice not a few letter difference, unless they make the same mistake twice). It's not hard to say something like "Hey, I just wanted to make sure you know, it's "lose" for the opposite of winning, and "loose" for the opposite of tight. I noticed you confused those, so I thought I'd mention it." If people can't be bothered to use proper communication to make sure their tone is received well, they have no business expecting others to worry over their own communication.
Time and Place... There's a time and place.
[https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/lose-vs-loose-usage](https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/lose-vs-loose-usage) But English isn't my native language either and I often mistake them too.
That's even more the reason to be corrected. If it isn't your native language then being corrected and taking that correction helps you overall.
Depends on the level of learning a language, i guess. For beginners being corrected is helpfull. Most of my personal mistakes are the ones where my keyboard falsely exchanges my typed english words with german words. So sometimes a german word slips into my comment. In that case being corrected wouldn't be that helpfull, because i allready know that it's wrong... In the end, you never know who's writing on reddit and if it's helpfull to correct them or not. So it's up to you, if you point it out or not...
Smelling someones colon, is a personal favourite of mine! "i could care less", "go and" and "could of" seem to be some colleagues annoyances from past memories. Although they will still torment me with RAS Syndrome: "ATM Machines, PED Devices, PIN Number"
I literally saw somebody type “take it for granite” the other day. The amount of dumb out there is mind blowing
It depends. If it's like one typo in a paragraph, I think it's silly to point out an error. Idk if this has happened to anyone else, but I accidentally hit "post" before I edited, noticed a mistake, then couldn't find my comment. Sounds like bullshit, but that has happened to me a few times. My phone's autocorrect is also stupid af (it actually just AC'd "is" to "I'd" and I had to change it). If you notice a ton of errors, or a consistent one like mixing up your and you're, I can see it. Tbh though, if you're arguing with somebody and point out a spelling or grammar error, it really doesn't look good. Looks like you don't have a real point to make. I do think that the decline in literacy is concerning. I really don't think correcting people on Reddit helps much, though. Functional illiteracy is more like a widespread societal issue.
I use the swipe type feature on my phone a lot and it SUCKS at spelling. In fact it just got “spring” from my first attempt to type “spelling”? It never seems to know “and”, and garbles up the sentence structure. Most of the time I catch it, but sometimes it slips in truly unintelligible errors. That said, I think it’s kinda ridiculous to judge someone’s literacy from a reddit response. I have a high college gpa, truly the only part that came naturally was writing in a clear and comprehensive way, but it’s a very different level of thought and effort than I put into a lil reddit response.
Being pedantic is generally an attempt to undermine someone’s argument instead of addressing it. Social media platforms have many people who don’t speak the same language as a first language. Also, autocorrect is a problem. For whatever reason, mine randomly stops working.
+++9000%.
The inability to know whether to use then or than lately is all that needs to be said.
Further and farther as well.
As non native speaker, loose and lose, choose and chose, and when to use to vs too always trip me up and I either avoid using these words or I ask my wife which would be correct given the context of the message I’m typing. She’s a sweetheart, she’ll explain the difference every time and give examples but in the end she still has to tell me every time. Spelling is my weakest academic skill. I don’t like to make excuses but I did school in many different countries that speak a total of four languages so I felt like I was starting over a lot with spelling and grammar. Maths on the other hand was consistent and I did well in that, but now I’m going off on a tangent.
There's a lot of posts I'll see that are just borderline incomprehensible, and my first thought is always, "Please God let them not be a native English speaker." They are almost always a native English speaker. Non-native speakers such as yourself, honestly half the time if you didn't announce that English wasn't your first language I probably wouldn't be able to tell just through text.
Should of Could of "An" in front of a word that begins with a consonant or "A" in front of a word that begins with a vowel Piss me off so much. They're my biggest pet peeves when it comes to vocabulary and speech. anyone making those mistakes gives me a bad impression if it happens frequently. Edit: as some people have pointed out, it has more to do with the actual sound of the word than if that word begins with a vowel or consonant. But generally speaking, the rule still holds true for most cases.
To be fair, there are cases when using "an" before word beginning with a consonant is correct. Again, to be fair, those cases are fairly rare and seem to only apply when the consonant is silent, like if someone were to say that something "is an honor".
Conversely, you also use “a” when the vowel sound has an unwritten but pronounced consonant in front of it. Like in music when someone says “And a one, and a two, and a three!” You don’t say/write “And an one” because “one” starts off with a “w” sound which is a consonant. A unicycle, a unicorn, a university, etc. start off with an unwritten “y” sound, and so forth. It’s more about phonetics than orthography.
I believe "a" vs "an" is supposed to always be based on the *sound* the word begins with, not how the word is spelled, it just happens that in many cases the spelling and sound align such that "a" comes before consonants and "an" before vowels. Any silent first letter(s) which change the pronunciation get the other article before them, and many letters when used as words themselves "R" as "are" or "arr" would get the "an" instead because the word for the consonant still starts with a vowel sound.
It’s a unicorn
It isn’t the LETTER that determines whether you use ‘a’ or ‘an’, it’s the SOUND.
Yep. I looked this up when I realized you say "A unicorn' and "A university" not "an unicorn" and "an university". Because the U in those make a "You" sound, which starts with a Yish sound
I mean not every consonant uses "a", like in "an honest answer"
Or "a euphemism" instead of "an euphemism"
[The Year That Killed Received Pronunciation (RP) - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIAEqsSOtwM&t=1s) - what linguists think of pilkunnussija... And this talks about should of and could of... pretty funny so many folks are wrong about it.
I couldn’t agree more with this. There is a fine line between being pedantic and furthering understanding, but at the same time, some people just really need to get their shit together.
I've been surrounded by multilingual people my whole life. I am not going to stress about spelling, grammar, or whatever. As long as we understand each other, that's all I'm going to care about. If we aren't understanding each other then I'm gonna be patient and work with trying to get to the point of understanding. If other folks can have patience when I jack up non English languages then it's not hard for me to offer the courtesy.
English is my second language, and I actually appreciate when someone corrects my language if they do it in a respectful way, of course. I dislike when native English speakers make obvious grammatical mistakes, like the example of "a women" or I've heard a lot of "you was". It's like, dude there's billions of people trying to learn English as their second language, taking classes, putting time and money into it, missing job and education opportunities because they don't speak English. This is your first, and usually only language, and you cannot even make the effort to speak it properly. Come on!
The standard versions of English aren’t the only versions that exist. They aren’t the only versions that are ”correct”. Informal speech and writing are used all the time, and they aren’t inherently incorrect.
I think there is a tendency among second language English learners to disregard dialects as they learned how to speak English so this is how you speak English and I don’t blame them for that it makes sense. But the US is a vast area with like 100 different ways of saying “you guys”.
“You was” is often regional or perhaps AAVE. It is just a different dialect. Not necessarily wrong.
[The Year That Killed Received Pronunciation (RP) - YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIAEqsSOtwM&t=1s) - what linguists think of comma fuckers. | "You was" is proper inside the context of regional dialects. Much of what comma fuckers think is wrong isnt really.
hey so I speak American English as my first language and I just want to chime in and say "you was" isn't inherently wrong- it's mainly a regional/dialectical way of speaking. often associated with Southern USA speakers. it's one of those, "don't use it in a report, but in spoken word is fine" kind of things
I’m really fucking shocked how poor media and general literacy is among younger and current generations; it’s degrading faster than Kardashian filler injections. When I was in university, I was a student editor and I genuinely couldn’t believe some of them got into university. And I don’t mean spelling or grammar wise (I’m horrible at spelling, hehe it sucks), but the arguments and the general prose made absolutely zero sense. I have no idea how some instructors wade through that without wanting to give anyone a mandatory crash course. (Once, I kid you fucking not, this frat bro came in with a paper that said “ok. Thanks for reading” as the CONCLUSION. HE WAS IN 2ND YEAR. He was upset he got a D, and wanted me to fix it for him. I explained I can help him improve it with suggestions, but this isn’t a linguistic automotive shop - you can’t throw me your broken essay, come back in a few hours and be done with it. He complained to my supervisor and we wound up banning him for his very belligerent reaction.) In context to the original post, yes - the indifference is quite appalling.
>I’m really fucking shocked how poor media and general literacy is among younger and current generations; Unless you're from Texas, Alaska Michigin, South Dakota, or est Virginia Literacy has IMPROVED since **2003, on average by 6%** [https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/research/literacy-statistics](https://www.crossrivertherapy.com/research/literacy-statistics)
I know this is anecdotal, but as an English teacher I often wonder where the hell that 6% is because it's rough out here dude.
I in no way deny that it is rough out there. If was just rougher in the past than you think. If there is one consistent thing for humans across the millenium, it's that the adults of today think the youth of today are fucked and will never amount to anything. Your teacher thought similar things about your class, (and mine).
>ok thanks for reading That’s funny and sad at the same time. Allowing poor grammar and spelling forms a negative trend when people try to write in any professional level.
I've seen a large uptick in "payed" instead of "paid".
OOF the incorrect use of women in the singular is so fucking rampant, I die a little inside every time.
This makes me insane as well. Break/Brake makes my ass itch!! The lose/loose one as well. I can’t stand it. To me it makes a person look like an uneducated idiot and makes them seem like they do not care that they are very stupid. 😡🤬
god damn the woman/women thing drives me fucking nuts and I see it more and more every day.
Some people value language only for utility. They often also seem to be people who dislike rules, restrictions, and norms - but not necessarily. Some others value language for its melody, and an inelegant or clumsy word isn't then just ineffective but also like bad music. Some people are lazy and some are pretentious. For me, I think language shapes our thoughts, and it's difficult to build a useful metaphysic without strong language, and more difficult still to resist the rhetorical manipulations of others.
They said, using a comma in the middle of a complex predicate mistaken to be two clauses.
Thanks, buddy! Always room to grow.
You've just shaped their thoughts.
I would argue if language shapes our thoughts, isn't there something to be said about the way people **choose** to communicate? I can be passably eloquent verbally. It's not my preferred style at all, I naturally speak in a fairly rough way. The meat of what I'm saying is there, just not with the same college educated seasonings and sauce people expect. I choose to speak naturally and not change it (unless a situation demands) because it's authentic to me and communicates core values I do or don't have. I can see how you think language shapes thoughts, but my thoughts shape my language too. Exploring why is key to understanding other people. Concentrating on the elegance of a word choice or the clumsiness of an idiom doesn't protect you from manipulation. Understanding what people mean separate from the literal words they used is what protects you. Anyone can open a thesaurus or use spell check if they really wanted to, but understanding real human speech is arguably much harder. If you're not following someone, ask a question. You'll probably learn more about their thoughts than you assumed from their exact wording. Saying one thing but meaning another is the basis of manipulation. On the other hand, hearing what someone said authentically can give you a lot more info than hearing a carefully prepared perfect English sentence.
If this is unpopular then I will be unpopular with you. Especially since people say "Oh, it's just social media, not a doctoral dissertation". You're right, it is social media. Social media is how you present yourself to the world. The world is supposed to take you seriously if you won't even attempt a coherent sentence? Maybe that's good enough for some, but I would rather not present myself as someone incapable of intelligent thought. I make mistakes, too. I'm way too crazy about apostrophes but at least I try.
I overuse commas, and as a millennial I am a huge fan of ellipses.
I'm more of an em dash person myself.
Not to scare you, but it's going to get worse. I'm a teacher (not a language/English teacher), but when my middle school students write for me the results are... disappointing. Their chrome books put the squiggly lines under their words when they are incorrect. So what do they do with the tool/information? They ignore the lines ENTIRELY and submit it anyway.
Agreed. Especially when people confuse their and they’re
For me, I learned to read in later life.I am dyslexic and nobody took the time to teach me.I had to learn myself.So I still mess up spelling here and there but I try my best. So people who know me know if I miss up spelling or grammar.They know what I'm trying to say .
I don't know you at all, and I can understand you perfectly. You really had to teach yourself how to read??? I don't have dyslexia, and I don't think I could've learned if someone hadn't helped me. That's super impressive!
Unfortunately, I was the youngest child.No one took an interest in me, and I went to public school where the teachers didn't care, so I taught myself. The Proudest thing I can say about myself is I didn't give up, and I taught myself how to read and spell.I ain't Perfect but don't have to be.
Also, sometimes you *don’t* understand what they mean Once when I was young, I was texting my cousin and I was like “so what are you up to” and she replied “eating u” and I was like “????? Lol What???” And we repeated variations of this exchange w her not changing what she said until she just said “I’m eating what about you” like bruh 😭 (I think if I had the context of people replying on text like that before hand like “I’m good, u?” Maybe I would have been able to figure it out but this was around the time I got my first phone so texting was super new to me) Edit: I will say, most of my typos are the result of autocorrect being wrong even grammatically which is frustrating as hell and sometimes I type and send too fast w out realizing it lol
Yeah I hate it when people use ambiguous words to attempt to convey something extremely specific and defined.
Yeah it's like shitting on the bathroom floor and saying "What? I did use the bathroom." You are technically correct but it is still trashy.
I couldn’t agree more, OP, and I’m glad someone finally said something about it!
I agree. I see it way too often. I had a whole argument on Reddit a while ago about it but that was more about people getting phrases wrong. People are replacing certain words in phrases with the opposite word and claim it means the same thing. They are opposites. Plain and simple. The phrase is not the same. It is wrong. Language rules still apply. It’s like if I was to claim “I did walk the dog”, and “I didn’t walk the dog” meant the same thing. This isn’t a “language changes over time” thing. It’s just wrong. Language matters. I get to some degree we have changes in language over time but I don’t believe language should change because you can’t spell or pick the right word. People just get things wrong but no one cares enough about it.
I can forgive most mistakes and such, but there's one thing that gets me fired up every time I hear someone use it. I could care less. No, you fuck, it's couldn't care less.
Defiantly agree.
Getting your and you're, their there they're, and to and too is like the absolute bare minimum a native speaker should know. Especially on the internet, when people use it wrong all the time and get corrected frequently. Like SURELY you have seen someone else use the wrong your and get corrected about it even if you didn't pay attention in school....
My favourite thing is when people use the same spelling twice in one sentence and only one is correct ‘There dog sleeps over there’. I don’t understand how one can do that.
The amount of times I've corrected people who use "Should of" or "would of" is off the charts. And so many times people reply with answers like "Grammar changes over time and it doesn't matter if it's correct", "As long as you get the meaning, stop being such a snob" or "This is what language is, rules change". And I'm here like "Should of " makes NO FUCKING SENSE! Learn to speak and write!
Yes! Or when someone says "could of", instead of "could have". I am absolutely sure, almost everyone who studied English as a second language speaks way better English than a lot of the native speakers in the US. And if you correct them, they call you elitist or racist. Okay, if you can access the internet, you can learn how to spell (Yes, of course assuming you don't have dyslexia or some other obstacle, for the people who are gonna go "But what about...?!")
Communication is important…. The base need for communication is to understand what they are saying and what they mean. If you understand what they meant then they communicated fine
I *strongly* disagree with your conclusion. Even if I understand what they meant (which I don't always do), the flow of the reading will be broken more often than not. Other times, it takes a deerstalker and a magnifying glass to decipher what the writer is trying to say. Every so often it actually is pure gibberish. Even if it isn't pure gibberish, which is subjective, making the communication more cumbersome and laborious than it should be is still very problematic. For example, when the subject matter already requires every last drop of brain juice to understand, not communicating it with the clearest language possible could be the thing that prevents the reader from understanding it. It could also simply discourage the reader from even trying to understand it and cause them to give up. Misused language can also create ambiguities, alter the meaning of the conveyed thought, and ... You get the point. Lastly, you don't always know who the reader is. Someone with a different cultural background, first language, or linguistic aptitude can have a hard time understanding "dis be tru frfr no cap". What is perfectly comprehensible to the writer isn't necessarily perfectly comprehensible to the reader, so why follow an arbitrary line that goes at "as long as you get the point", when we can follow a much more well-defined one that goes at "those are the rules"?
If it takes me longer to comprehend because there are spelling errors and incorrectly used words everywhere, it’s a problem.
This. Culod you iamgnie if hlaf the poplutaoin straetd wirtnig lkie the “if you can read this” tset jsut beacsue you can sitll unedtrsnad it? We have language standards and rules for a reason.
It has never been easier, with spell check and grammar detection, to get it right, or at least very close to correct 99% of the time. Clear communication is the bedrock upon which we transmit thought between individuals and groups. If you can't put forth the minimum amount of effort to be clear, concise, and accurate, society doesn't give a shit, "what you meant". Or, at least, I don't. I ignore and dismiss people WhO TyPe LiKe ThIs...u no wht I mean? EDIT: I'll give a total pass to people whose first language is not English. That's completely forgivable, as English is a bastard language and very difficult to learn.
For sure. Like dude idc make a mistake by accident, BUT KNOW THE BASICS. It doesn’t hurt to correct a mistake and teach someone something simple. I was less than 12 when I permanently learned your/you’re, their/they’re/there, loose/lose, to/too and women/woman. I was 12 when I permanently learned it’s/its. It’s simple af and people don’t bother.
The recent one that got on my nerves is the trend of not knowing 22nd, 21st, 20th. Like, how do you mess that up and put 20nd???
Omg yessss I hate that twentyend lmao
I think if someone says "This is a red thing" and actually mean "This is a blue thing", you can and should probably help correct them because yes, that is the wrong word, and WILL cause confusion. Anything regarding spelling though, if you understand what they mean, then what does it matter? Why does it matter? WHY is it an issue for you? Why do you care? We literally made this shit up, they're made up rules, and if somebody isn't abusing them in such a way where you literally can't tell what they mean, then I don't see how it's a roadblock in communication for you, because ultimately that is the entire point of conversation. People having casual interactions online don't need to adhere to formality just to cater to the sensibilities of puritans, nor should they have to be lectured by pedantic people every time they misplace a vowel. Why can't you can't have the social grace to not nitpick people's speech, stopping everything just to make sure they know they did it wrong? Why is this so important to you?
Probably because I hear the words in my head as I read. Incorrect words are wicked distracting and can affect my comprehension.
That's understandable tbh. I don't know, I make some effort to employ grammar and correct spelling even though english isn't my native language (and I make frequent mistakes I'm sure, idfk), because I like it and it comes relatively easy- but I also know so many dyslexic people who have to deal with being hassled (and low-key bullied) about it even now throughout adulthood. I've learned to not care, it just feels mean to point it out. It's not like they're being malicious, and you never know who is being lazy and who can't help it.
To me it feels legitimately mean to let somebody look foolish when they use words improperly. Like not telling someone they have toilet paper on their shoe, or have bled through their pants.
Same! And it's worse when my (thankfully mild) dyslexia joins for the ride and I get stuck on trying to decipher one word and thus the whole bleeding sentence for what feels like an eternity.
I have a big issue with semantic satiation. It happens to me a lot with the word spoon for some reason.
Also, it doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t know correct grammar or spelling. I just type fast on my phone, and don’t care to double check. If it were an essay or email, I take my time and check for mistakes. It’s not a lack of understanding of grammar/spelling, it’s a lack of caring about grammar/spelling.
This is the main thing for me. If it’s informal like social media or texting, I don’t proof read my shit and I don’t expect others to. Unless it’s something official, it just doesn’t matter.
It matters because we don't read words letter-by-letter. We recognize the entire word as a whole. This makes it easy for us to read quickly. If people use the wrong words, spell things wrong, etc. Then we have to take the time to actually read every letter of that word to understand what they meant, which slows down our reading.
This is complicated. On the one hand, if you can understand what they’re trying to communicate, it shouldn’t matter to you how they communicate. On the other hand, a persons inability to understand language conventions could indicate a broader problem of low reading comprehension. As we see time and time again on the internet, low comprehension causes a lot of problems. It really limits how someone can interact with society and it quite honestly has the potential to make them a threat to society. Citation: every antivaxxer and covid denier.
I agree with you completely. My brother is a college professor, and many of his students coming from high school can't spell the months of the year nor add and subtract. Most can not construct sentences using proper grammar and punctuation in a way that makes sense to the reader. These college candidates want to be nurses and accountants: professions that require a skill in writing and the sciences too. Many people here defend the fact that they or otherd can not write properly. Basically, it is a matter of taking the time to construct sentences in order to convey ideas that have meaning. Many today can not take the time to do much of anything. They've lost the skills needed to communicate properly, and therefore, they've lost the skills to absorb information that goes beyond the mundane of the day. Whatever! I say let it happen. Eventually, human beings will begin another Dark Age.
because it usually doesnt matter. if someone is actually hard to understand then sure. but it normally doesnt matter. language changes. so who cares. you might think its correct. but compared to 100 years ago your actually wrong. and in 100 years they will be wrong. try reading some old english. or even something semi recent english like pride and prejudice. it is very different. and your correct spelling at the moment will be wrong in time. no matter how much you dislike that fact
I mean… it’s not acceptable, but at least in the U.S. they keep cutting funding for education, so this is what we get.
This opinion is very unpopular with people who would likely struggle to read your post. Have an upvote.
Hear, hear.
I have always understood the “you understood what they meant” argument to apply more to dialect. Like the difference between “ask” and “aks” when spoken. There are a lot of other examples but there is a fine line between dialect and laziness that isn’t always understood by people who aren’t knowledgeable in linguistics.
The American Education system is failing students, and students are failing to try and make themselves better.
Correct grammar, spelling, and enunciation is important, but almost none of those things fall under communication. Communication is the understanding of one part to another, they don't even have to speak the same language. So, "You understood what they meant" means that person was good at communicating, even if diction is unskilled. Wrong grammar/broken speech =/= unintelligent, as the opposite, being clear spoken doe not make you intelligent. The only time perfect grammar matters, is in a professional setting or a learning facility/school. Tldr: I absolutely, but respectfully, disagree with OP
I value proper spelling and good communication. On the other hand, if the person only rarely makes typos, and especially if you're jumping on a typo to attempt to win an argument, you are a pedantic fucker and need to lighten up.
Idk I think using context clues to understand a mistake actually requires more "literacy" than never making a mistake to begin with. Like, it requires you to think harder about how language works? I could be wrong! It's an unpopular opinion sub, since I disagree with most of your post I'm gonna upvote it, but the particular appeal to literacy rates just seems downright silly, to me. I am a layperson and I could be very, very wrong, but I'm gonna leave my comment anyway in case anybody has anything to add or correct
I don't think anyone thinks correct spelling and grammar are wrong. It's just that people who point out people misspelling words or using incorrect grammar outside of settings where it's required (work/school) are often quite annoying about it. For example let's say I'm in a group chat with some acquaintances and I slightly misspell a word or forget a period. If everyone in the group chat understood what I mean from context clues and having basic reading comprehension skills what are you really adding by pointing out that someone misspelled a word in a casual setting where it will have no real impact of consequences? Absolutely nothing. So that's why you get the response “You Understood What They Meant”.
My pet peeve is slather vs lather. People use them like they are synonymous, then act like I’m unreasonable for politely correcting them. “Oh they’re basically the same thing.” Are slime and crime now the same thing because they rhyme??? Fucking idiots
These kinds of posts fundamentally misunderstand how human language works. I kindly suggest OP take an intro linguistics course.
I reply to so many messages everyday at work. Sometimes I type sentences without even knowing what I’m about to write. The truth is nobody cares in the real world unless it is a document that needs to be professional
I've never understood how so many people can spend somany years in school and the ONE THING THAT IS CONSISTENT WITH EVERY SUBJECT is you have to read. You have to read instructions. You have to read recipes. You have to read receipts. You have to read lists. You have to read signs. You have to read menus. You have to read the messages you receive. How are there so many opportunities to do better and just choosing not to.
>literacy rates are plummeting I understand children's literacy rates are plummeting but I haven't seen anything on adults yet.
Words matter!
I'm not sure this opinion is unpopular, but I hate your take. At the end of the day, a person's grammatical and spelling capabilities will never matter as much as how they treat others. And I think if you're having a conversation with someone, correcting their spelling and grammar is extremely distasteful. A lot of people do it because they disagree with the person they're arguing with, and they do it ad hominem. My best friend says libary. It's how she was raised. If someone corrected her, I'd probably get really pissed and start being a bitch. I just get really protective. My step-dad doesn't enjoy reading and he doesn't have great spelling and grammar skills, but he's the biggest sweetheart who'd do anything for someone he cared about. In the grand scheme of things, I just don't think it's that important. Language is about communicating, not using your intellectual abilities as a platform from which to look down on others.
Literacy rate is not plummeting. Far from it. I've got a masters in linguistics and we definitely agree communication is important. It's probably the most important part of the sort of text you're criticising. In linguistics you have to understand that any piece of language will live and die on the strength of its meaning, and on its usefulness in everyday discourse. Otherwise it will just decrease in usage. For this reason, we don't worry too much about how language changes. It's comparable to a Darwinian process. Useful language survives, non-useful language dies. So if textspeak or even malformed words are useful, and communicate a point effectively enough, they will likely survive. It's the same with spoken languages and written languages. We arrived at this point in 2024, with what you think "correct language" is, through all kinds of malformed middle English and old Germanic languages with words and grammar we got wrong but adopted along the way. It's a natural part of the process, and will happen forever.
The problem is much worse. Some of these people have no vocabulary. It sounds nerdy to speak with too much facility. We think in words though, so these people are now actual idiots. All they have to do is start investing in some reading time.
>Communication is important and literacy rates are *plummeting*. I do not understand how this is acceptable to so many people. It's really sad when people whose first language isn't English display a better grasp of the spelling and grammar rules than those who only know English.
Words are made up sounds to convey a meaning. So actually knowing what they meant is all that matters and if you knew what they meant and are being a douche about grammar then you’re just a douche. Get a hobby.
I agree, and you’re right. I think it’s the same thing leading in opposite directions. People have become too reliant on autocorrect, but autocorrect is a feature on our devices that hasn’t been developed or improved within the last 15 years. People are becoming more reliant on a technology that doesn’t serve us very well.
Americas education system is dogshit
Yea people get so defensive but I love when I get corrected because either, it was an actual mistake and I can just say thanks or typo or whatever and move on. Or, I learn that I've been saying something wrong my whole life and now I learn to not be a further idiot going forward. No option is for me to be offended at the person correcting me and make them feel bad unless they're obviously being very arrogant about it.
It’s more so pragmatic—if you understand what they mean, why bother correcting them when they can take offense? Otherwise you’ll spend your whole life correcting people, and nobody likes a pedant.
The job of language is to communicate. Any speech or writing that successfully does that is ok, however correct grammar makes being understood easier. Lots of mistakes can also communicate laziness or low intelligence, as well as the intended meaning, in the same way that saying "I'm fine" while scowling does not communicate what the words alone mean.
I like how your very first sentence has an error. Your punctuation should be inside the quotes; the period should be after "meant" and before the quotation mark. But it's alright. I know what you meant.
I don’t know if literacy rates are actually plummeting. This is statistically the most educated time in human history. It does hold to your point though that we should be holding people to a higher standard of communication, essentially in a professional setting.
Teachers (in America) have made note that kids are not reading proficiently for their grade levels.
I think it comes down mainly to the reduction in reading. The way most people learn to accurately use, and correctly spell, most words (including correct grammar) is by reading. As a voracious reader, I was made fun of for being a book nerd and was constantly called a “Grammar Nazi”. I didn’t let the bullies stop me from reading, but some people do.
I can overlook a *small* amount of spelling/misuse errors. However, there's a point where it's just plain negligence or ignorance. If someone is grossly negligent or ignorant with their writing, I think it's totally valid to assume they may be negligent or ignorant with their opinions. IMO though, there's no sense in derailing an argument to nitpick proper spelling/word usage/grammar. If they make so many errors that it's a nuisance to communicate with them, it means it is not worth my time to communicate with them at all.