To judge people who use could of/should of/would of?

[sneezingwakesthebaby]

Am I being unreasonable?

I suppose I am a bit because someone could have any form of difficulty which affects their grammar.

But generally, I still form an opinion about someone and what type of person they are just based on their use of "of" instead of "have". I don't decide to do this. It just automatically happens when I read it.

Hmmm.

Yes and no. It depends. If they've heard it around them all their lives and do it without thinking logically about the fact that it makes no sens then yes. If they've had it gently pointed out to them them that they are talking nonsensical drivel, and they still continue to do it without making any effort to self-correct, then no.

YANBU especially when those guilty refuse to stop it as in the whiny 'lift in the rain' thread.

This is nothing to do with grasping aspects of written language though. Once it is pointed out to you that you have been mis-hearing 'I should have', or (as is more likely) the contraction 'I should've' and that we do not say' I of' therefore we do not say 'I should of' it makes perfect, easy sense.

So why do some people continue to do it, and insist that it doesn't really matter unless you are a 'grammar snob'?

If you spent your life calling seeing a rabbit and saying 'otter!' until someone pointed out to you that it was a rabbit, would you carry on calling it an otter and think they were just an up-themselves snob trying to make you look stupid, or would you think 'Oh! Silly me! All my life I thought that was an otter! Now I can see the difference I'll start calling it a rabbit.'

Except, Fellatio, I do think it gets people's backs up when you correct things like that so they might continue to do it because they know it annoys.

Or because they just don't care!

I don't correct anyone except my own children. but on the odd occasion I have ben corrected myself I have been very grateful and have made a mental note to get it right in future. I don't get arsey about it. But then people have not been arsey when telling me.

That could be a factor, too. And it's hard to tell, online, if someone is being arsey or not.

It's enough that someone gets a half decent education at all, manages to write letters, fill in forms and live quite comfortably with what they managed to stuff in their brains in the short time that they were at school. Little things like 'could of' mean next to nothing in the great scheme of things.

For what it's worth, I consider my spelling and grammar to be above par, yet I have no talent for anything at all. I'd rather be good at something else, believe me.

I think there is actually something a bit wrong with someone who would persist in doing something like that just to annoy someone else, knowing it's wrong, and to the detriment of how they themselves will be perceived by others. But I am someone who likes to get things right. It's really important to me to not look stupid or sloppy. (although in reality I am frequently both.) Obviously it's much less important to lots of other people. But then there are lots of things that other people do that I don't understand.

Those saying a CV would go in the bin if spelling was poor: I'm glad this didn't happen to my father, who spent 21 years in the army, became a vehicle specialist, had a CV that was so long he had to truncate it so that it might actually be read and has a poorer grasp on spelling and grammar than some. (I'm aware that sentence is too long but I don't care)

You could miss out on a great worker because you sneered at their spelling mistakes. There are doctors out there who can't spell for shit, do you think anyone gives a damn as long as they do their job well?

Boomer if you know you can't spell for shit? Get someone to write it for you or at least check it over. Why wouldn't you? A CV is your first impression.

I absolutely will bin a CV if it has poor spelling or grammar. No matter the position.

I'm glad it didn't happen to your father also, but he's very very lucky it didn't. And probably would have in today's economy especially where there's 1000 CVs for every position and you need a quick way to start eliminating.

But grammar acts as a filter in this case, doesn't it? If 100 CVs received for 1 post, useful means of impression-screening.
Doctors are not recruited by CV and being in such demand and having made it thro rigorous training/assessment already are far more likely to be forgiven any bad grammatical errors.

To be honest, if a doctor wrote "would of/should of" in any communication to me, I would be a little but would then think they obviously have a brain and a medical education so respect despite their poor grammar.

I'm not saying it doesn't grate. As a kid I'd get a bit pissy if I noticed the headteacher wrote something containing a mistake. In my head it was just as important that he or she could write properly as well as run a school.

I also see spelling mistakes in some supermarket POS posters and labels. I completely understand that it makes you do a double take, I am exactly the same. If a friend of mine showed that she couldn't spell particularly well I wouldn't mark her down for it.

I apologise for using my father as an example because I now remember that my mother - who is absolutely fantastic with spelling, grammar and construction - went over my father's CV several times.

I still believe there are people out there who aren't given a good enough chance or are passed over for promotion because their poor spelling irks the persons giving out those opportunities.

With the binning the CV thing, for me it would really depend on what position the application was for. If it was a manual skill I was looking for, and a job that required little or no written element then it would not bother me. If it was a front of house thing where first impressions to the client were everything, then clarity and accuracy of speech/grammar would be very important, even if that person's spelling was poor.

But if you know you're written English is dicey it costs nothing to ask a trusted, fully literate friend to check it over for you. Or go to the library and borrow a dictionary. To not have bothered at all is a sign of sloppiness and a lack of attention to detail.

hahah! spot the deilberate mistake! I altered the sentence but forgot to change the 'you're'

There are no books in this house, save for first aid and baby care books, but I recognise the importance of reading for improving your spelling and grammar. When I was a kid I read anything from 3-8 books a week, always maxed out my limit in the local library. I would always encourage reading absolutely anything that piques your fancy because they provide invaluable lessons for free (from the library or illegal downloads) or for the price of the book.

I've got the old fashioned Kindle with no backlight and I love it. I stuff it with books and take this tiny slim thing around with me. It's so much more convenient!

It's always important to account for accent and speed of speech as well. If I am in a rush my "could have" can easily be misconstrued for "could of" . It won't be what I said but might well sound like it.

My son who is autistic with ADHD is also a rapid speaker and sounds like he says " could of" when I know perfectly well he has said "could have" because generally his grammar is very good. He does mix up words though still and says things like "I want something betterer" or suchlike. This is despite me having read obsessively to him since his earliest days....but I guess ASD is to blame for all that.

to be honest I don't think anyone can read anything doctor writes anyway.

Doctors are not necessarily strong at English. They are almost always strong at maths though. They are left brain people, on the whole. The thing about doctors is that they are almost always from middle or upper middle class backgrounds, where good grammar and diction tends to be a default setting, drummed into them from an early age. Plus they have usually benefitted from attending a private school or a grammar school, so even if they are not naturally good spellers their standard of written English is usually be grammatically competent.

sorry for the gobbledygook typos.

Yes I wish their writing was legible, as I have very important medical notes from England to give to my Swedish doctor and I know that I'm going to have to try to translate some of the medical terms.

Your Swedish doctor will have impeccable English I bet
And certainly will not say 'could of '
And OP YANBU

You can't attribute this sort of mistake to dyslexia - dyslexic brains just don't work that way.

Yes, they do, veritate.