To refuse to engage with anyone who uses of instead of have?

[ExitPursuedByAKoalaBear]

That's it.

It's not people mishearing it and thinking "have" is "of", it's people misidentifying the contraction "should've" "would've" etc.

It's because firstly, this is a purely spoken form and doesn't usually exist in print or written language. Secondly, phoenetically 've and of is identical in this situation.

The contraction 've after a d sound is /?v/ (schwa, which is the lazy "uh" sound which fills in gaps between consonants and can be represented by any vowel or sometimes none, followed by v as in the original word "have".) After a vowel sound like in "I've" or "you've" it's just /v/.

Identically, the weak form of "of" is pronounced /?v/ as well. That schwa again and then the old practically unused nowadays in English form of the single f which makes a v sound.

We don't use the weak form of "of" all the time but you can hear it if you say things like "A cup of tea". Unless you enunciate every single word, which nobody does in natural speech even if you think you do, it's more like (well, in my accent at least) "Uccupuvtee" or in phonemic script /?k?p?vti:/ Hence the abbreviation "A cuppa". Try saying "Do you want a cup of tea Mum?" in a normal conversational way without thinking about it - you'll use the weak form of "of" (which sounds like "uv") or perhaps the even weaker form used in some dialects which is simply the schwa sound on its own.

English is great and really interesting but our language does not follow a simple phonetic formula, and this is the cause of most spelling errors. I do think that the teaching of phonics in schools will help with this.

Or for some people, dictated by economics and similar factors to the extent of being no choice at all.

Sure Arsenic but we tend to unconsciously adjust our mode of speech to fit in with people if we want them to accept us.

It's a way of aligning and identifying with others.

If I see 'of' rather than 'have' I think 'thicko' and I don't bother to read the post.

it's just heuristics, a quick way of weeding out the dross

I think I'm still trying to understand your stance Suzanne. Why are you so insistent there is such a tight correlation between intelligent opinion and perfect written english?

I gave up policing speeling (sic) and grammer (sic again) other than my own, realising that it made me look like an uber (sorry about the missing umlaut, don't know the ASCII code in Linux) and, well, life's too short to look like a twat all the time. I need time off from that.

Great to see that you're paying attention to my posts Arsenic but perhaps you are not familiar with the concept of heuristics?
There are almost the antithesis of tight correlations

YADNBU.
I hate repeated/uncaring misuse of there/their/they're, and to/too.
They're different words! Why do people not know/understand that?
I don't understand the argument that they're homophones, because people would never write, for example, 'I like soing' or 'Let's so some clothes' or 'A pear of tights'
It is well known and accepted that words are allowed to sound the same but be different. Why are there certain words about which it is acceptable to be ignorant? The same with apostrophes for plurals.

YANBU in that it is one of the things I hate.

On the other hand YABU because I'm sure there are things I get wrong, so I wouldn't want to be not engaged with because of it.

Then why so jolly about it?

Quenelle "It doesn't annoy me but I often notice on here people using 'too' instead of 'to' when it's at the end of a sentence, eg 'I didn't have too'."

I must admit that I do get a bit 'judgy' about anyone who can't spell a 2 letter word.

That's a typo.

I say your instead of you're all the time on here.

Because it's what my auto correct likes.

I can cope with the hatin'

Thaat's all very well Harold until you're the one that posts warning of an impending tsunami and poor Suzanne drowns due to her obstinacy. I need to make her see sense

Where will we be if all the towering intellects drown due to pedantry?

cote, I'll quote you since it was back in the thread:

This is such a target-rich environment, that I don't know where to start. Given that you seem to be claiming authority by virtue of "three degrees in English Lit" and an upcoming role teaching Oxbridge undergrad students, should I point out the irony that you are defending wrong spelling and grammar, à la 'So what, of can soon mean have'? Should I mention the English comprehension problem that must have led to your perception that I find disablism funny? Or is it intellectual dishonesty, if you understood what I said very well but pretended not to, so you could (hopefully) score a point?

I am not claiming authority there - or that wasn't the intention.

The intention I had was to point out that I'm not badly-educated, and I can still do this. I'm probably not just being lazy, and I can still do this. I made the comment in the context of the OP saying absolutely that this wasn't a proofreading issue (which it is), and in the context of multiple comments about this being an issue to do with laziness, bad education, or general ignorance.

I also made it because I know that a lot of people read these threads, see all of you lot making nasty comments, and simply feel shit. They don't all post. A lot of people on here are parents of children with dyslexia, or other learning difficulties, and you're sitting here writing their children off and sneering. So I think it is useful if someone like me uses educational privilege to say no, actually, we are not all doomed to failure. There are people out there who will give us chances.

Including, by not limited to, the writers of the Equality Act.

I suspect you know I am not being intellectual dishonest, but that I disagree with you over prescriptive and descriptive attitudes towards English spelling and grammar. I know this, because we've had this debate before. I suspect you remember it perfectly well. That's not intellectual dishonesty, nor a failure of comprehension, and I can't help feeling you're just throwing insults at me now.

When comforting a pedant I say there they're their.

When comforting a pedant I say there they're their.

From wikipedia:

"In psychology, heuristics are simple, efficient rules, learned or hard-coded by evolutionary processes, that have been proposed to explain how people make decisions, come to judgments, and solve problems typically when facing complex problems or incomplete information. Researchers test if people use those rules with various methods. These rules work well under most circumstances, but in certain cases lead to systematic errors or cognitive biases.

A cognitive bias is a pattern of deviation in judgment, whereby inferences about other people and situations may be drawn in an illogical fashion. Individuals create their own subjective social reality from their perception of the input. An individuals construction of social reality, not the objective input, may dictate their behaviour in the social world. Thus, cognitive biases may sometimes lead to perceptual distortion, inaccurate judgment, illogical interpretation, or what is broadly called irrationality."

I know that a lot of people read these threads, see all of you lot making nasty comments, and simply feel shit

Really?
My guess would be that the 'could of' brigade don't give a toss what others think about them, probably sneer at those who deride them

Yanbu, another wind up is the confusion in the use of to and too.

Sorry just realised to and too has been done.

suzanne - no, we care, believe me.

Last year I had two students on the verge of tears because someone had made them feel they were lazy and stupid for minor typos. And (sorry to bring pesky personal feelings into it - I know some of you seem to think it's unfair to mention I have them) my friends have rallied round to tell me the same approximately 93,00 times this year.

If you heard the calls to any dyslexia helpline, you'd see the same thing, and you'd see parents who are gutted because they believe you lot that their children are not going to make it.

Yes, some of these people are badly educated, but so what? You're still upsetting real people.

This comes up so often on MN. Some people, as has been pointed out, are not as well educated as others. Is it not a stealth boast to point this out by starting threads with titles like this one?

Yes, some of these people are badly educated, but so what? You're still upsetting real people.

Similarly, some people are not intellectually gifted, but so what? Intelligence isn't a moral issue.

YY, exactly.