To be a bit paranoid about my spelling and grammar on MN?

[Hotmad]

Seen quite a few threads here about poor spelling and grammar that every time I write something now I make sure I spell correctly, don't use text speak and proof read it before posting!
Apart from spelling and grammar what other human errors and behaviours annoy you most?

[Bogeyface]

What annoys me most is people pointing out spelling and grammar mistakes when they are clearly not the most important thing. For example, I have seen AIBU that are quite serious, and you will always get "YABU for not knowing how to spell....".

[ISeeYouShiverWithAntici]

I agree bogey. I itch all over when confronted with spelling errors or poor grammar (I had to stop going into a cafe because their menu board offered panini's and it made me want to chew my foot off) but my god, you'd have to be a special shade of shit to actually pull someone up on it.

Posters who do that go on my wanker list.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

To be honest, I find MN much, much less wankerish about it than a lot of places. It does seem to be widely accepted that it's a bit crap to pull someone up on SPAG when you disagree with them, unless it's relevant. Whereas on CiF on the Guardian it seems to be considered the soul of wit.

The human behaviour that annoys me the most is idiots who make assumptions about you because of spelling. Eg., the kind of people who say 'why didn't you spellcheck that' rather than 'did you spellcheck that?' or 'why couldn't you be bothered to check' rather than 'excuse me, you have a mistake'.

If you mean non-spelling-related irritations, people who don't understand road signs but continue to drive/cycle. Yes, I am that dull.

[MsVestibule]

I'm a grammar and spelling pedant but, as long as a post is legible and understandable, I wouldn't dream of pointing any errors out. Text speak irritates beyond all reason; it makes the writer look incredibly thick but I'd just ignore their posts, not pull them up on it.

IRL, things that irritate me are people who drive too quickly or too slowly, don't indicate, forget to switch their indicator off and hog the middle lane. People who are obsessive about being punctual/early mum to the detriment of others me.

In short, anybody who doesn't behave and think exactly the way I do .

[TheGruffalo2]

Yes and I'm an Oxbridge English graduate and primary school teacher. We all make mistakes, especially when posting informally and are tired, but I live in dread of the "teachers are crap because of spelling and grammar mistakes" brigade!

[squoosh]

A lack of paragraphs is the thing that really bugs me. I can't be bothered reading a wall of text, it makes me eyes feel muddled, but I wouldn't say so the person who wrote it!

[IdRatherPlayHereWithAllTheMadM]

My spelling and grammer are appalling and if anyone is upset by it, they are more than welcome to take it up with the school where I spent the first 6/7 years of my precious life, being educated in precisely diggly squat.

[frogslegs35]

Yabu :) Take absolutely no notice.
I can spell and form sentences perfectly well but I seldom check what I've wrote before submitting.
It's just MN not an application for mensa or Oxford.
Don't let it worry you.

[frogslegs35]

Or should that be 'what I have written' :) Both are past tense but should it be active or passive? :)

Shoot me now.

[northlight]

No, YANBU and I understand your apprehension.

Would there be any mileage in a Common Mistakes to Avoid page (with a better name) where people who want to can check for errors. I rely on various tips I've picked up over the years. For example you can remember the spelling of practice (verb) and practise (noun) by thinking about advise and advice where the pronunciation is different. A good mnemonic ,
to spell diarrhoea is DI And Ronald Reagan Have Oranges Every Afternoon.

Is there a mnemonic for mnemonic?

Personally, I would like to see a reduction of loose for lose and draw for drawer.

[LadyBeagleEyes]

People that pull posters up on spelling and grammar are twats.
I don't read threads that are all text speak though, but only because it just doesn't come naturally to me and it takes too long to decipher it. But I'm really old.
And I also get muddle eyed with long texts with no paragraphs so I don't read them.
I don't pull anyone up on them though, that's just so rude.

[NewtRipley]

I love discussing spelling and grammar, and certain errors get my goat, but I do agree that it's really rude to point these errors out.

frogslegs

It's written

The one I still get confused about is practice/practise


OP

Behaviours that anger me are poor or aggressive driving.
Oh, and misogyny

[SelectAUserName]

I am one of nature's spelling pedants so I do notice errors but I don't comment on them out of politeness, unless they're unintentionally humerous typos or, increasingly, autocorrects. For example on another board I used to frequent, someone once typed "the worat had happened" instead of "worst", which ended up as a whole spin-off thread in which it was determined that worats were South American creatures similar to polecats but easier to tame and available in a multitude of colours. We all had a pet worat by the end of that thread.

I know my grammar isn't always 100% correct, but I am from the generation which wasn't taught it at school, and I think it's less vital on an informal social network site than it would be in a professional setting.

I do think, however, that it doesn't hurt to at least try to use paragraphs and punctuation. I see it as a courtesy to the people who you are, presumably, hoping will read your [generic you/your] post. If you want people to invest time in reading what you've written and answering you, the least you can do is invest a little time yourself making it legible for them. TBF MN is generally one of the better sites for readability.

[BadgersRetreat]

I take no notice of the pedants. My spelling and grammar are fine, I just can't type

[frogslegs35]

Newt

[Anonymai]

Yabu. As long as you don't use text speak (like some annoying people I've noticed "r" doing) you'll be fiiiiiine.

[TheVictorian]

When your having a debate with a person and they say one thing about a subject and you offer a counter view but instead of the person sticking with the original point of the debate, they then go off and try and add a new point to the debate as if to make their point or to win their point even though its a different point from the start of the debate.

[ZeroSomeGameThingy]

northlight Were you deliberately practising to deceive?

I would be a pedant if my declining ability to spell left me any time. On the whole I accept that here everyone is typing on a tiny screen while doing other things. So mistakes shouldn't inhibit anyone from posting or reading.

In RL I am generally irritable and intolerant....

[Innogen]

My spelling is appalling on mn, mostly because I'm not using a keyboard. Can't type on a screen for shit, and it just can't be arsed to sort the syntax out most the time. Autocorrect fucks me over lots too.

[MrsMook]

I'm struggling with accuarcy since starting to use smart phones and tablets. I find going back to edit very cumbersome, and the auto correct changes its mind about words as I'm about to use it. I'm often feeding a baby while I'm on here so if he fidgets, it's very eady to press the wrong thing. I found a Blackberry style keypad much easier. I've had to make at lesst 10 corrections already on this post.

Just spotted eady rather than easy. Its too much faff to sort it now by trying to get the cursor in the right place.

[northlight]

Zoo Gah, no just posting while tired. For clarity practice and advice are nouns, practise and advise are verbs. Sorry, sorry sorry. As I said I depend on tips like this so just awful to get it wrong.

[meditrina]

Pedants' Corner and now Cunning Linguists are lovely topics populated by users who have a fascination for language, who discuss it in detail (including occasionally 'it's all gone to the dogs') but who also are really helpful to people with queries .

This is not the same as unsolicited, or even hostile, criticism on a thread.

[IsitwrongtofancyHarryStyles]

I am genuinely dismayed - as in I actually wince - at the amount of posters who mistake 'your' and 'you're' and 'have' and 'of'.

This has definitely become more widespread and frequent - at least a few times on each thread - on Mumsnet.

I'm not going to say it's because the type of poster has changed because I don't think it has.

I think it's due to typing on phones and tablets and our communication standards and expectations have changed.

Even if posters know they should be writing 'you're', it's accepted to write 'your' because it's easier/quicker on a handheld device.

It's still wrong though!

[ZeroSomeGameThingy]

My particular irritant is who's and whose. I am so fond of my annoyance that I started an astonishingly beautiful thread yesterday to spread the word....

The evidence suggests that I am the only person in the world who cares....

[IsitwrongtofancyHarryStyles]

Ooh ooh I care, Zero!

but your and you're is worse