Pedants

[Frenchw1fe]

Do some people really browse Mumsnet with the purpose of commenting on the use of English language and add nothing of any use to the original topic.
I have read many threads where the OP is extremely put off by some of the ‘superior ‘ attitudes of those who may be academically intelligent but emotionally stilted if their first thought is to criticise language skills rather than offer advice on the problem.

Surely everyone in need of advice should feel able to post on mumsnet without worrying about a few grammar mistakes.
Please feel free to criticise any mistakes in my post at least you’ll be leaving some other poor person alone.

While I think spelling and grammar are important, I am able to ignore the odd typo or grammatical error on an online forum. It's not like it's a job application or anything.

As well as that, some errors get through because there's no editing function!

As long as a post is generally correct, and reads well, I think people here can get picky for no other reason but to show off their sense of superiority.

As long as I can understand what is written I don't care. People don't post on here to have it marked like an English GCSE paper.

I am one of the pedants (ex-teacher, work in publishing). I don’t see why people can’t just learn to write, the rules are not that hard!

It’s a forum. It’s casual.

I'm a lecturer and also work in pblishing. In fact one of my jobs is to proofread You wouldn;t know it from my posts on here which are frequently sub-literate. I really enjoy this being a casual forum where I can relax the perfectionism of the working world and just type quickly and inaccurately and press 'Post' without having to triple check every line. It's liberating.

For what it's worth, when we discussed this on Pedants' Corner, the consensus was that it is out of order to comment on others' spelling and grammar on a chat forum like this.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/pedants_corner/3235416-Being-a-stickler-for-good-English-doesnt-mean-you-should-comment-on-others-grammar-and-spelling-uninvited

What does 'I am one of the pendants' actually mean?

Is there a club? Do you take an exam?

Why are you phrasing it like it's a official job or club? Surely anyone can just rock up to pendants corner and post?

@TheSandman the you can appreciate, assuming people displaying shitry behaviour should automatically put down to 'being on the spectrum'. Its quite clear most people who do, dont do it to be factual. They do because it makes them feel superior. It's really that simple.

Surely anyone can just rock up to pendants corner and post?

Yes, Pedants' Corner is open to all, and has the mixture you find everywhere else on MN of posters criticising each other as well as genuinely helpful discussion on points of grammar, punctuation etc.

Yes, you can just rock up to pedants' corner and post.

I do quite often and will happily join in the moans about things such as could of/would of.

However, I wouldn't dream of saying anything about someone's grammar, or spelling on any other board.

Pedants' corner is the place to go if you want to moan about such things. On any other board commenting on another posters SAG is unnecessary, nasty and frequently sounds like bullying.

*Commenting on another poster's SAG would just be mean, I meant SPAG, of course.

And yes, I'm aware I missed out an apostrophe on the word poster's before one of the SPAG police feels the need to comment on it.

@anotherlongdrive

@TheSandman the you can appreciate, assuming people displaying shitry behaviour should automatically put down to 'being on the spectrum'. Its quite clear most people who do, dont do it to be factual. They do because it makes them feel superior. It's really that simple.

I was offering the poster a method of mentally coming to terms with what she/he perceived as shitty behaviour that would fit neatly with her /his view that she/he should be allowed to spell 'badly' because she /he has (or claims to have) dyslexia.

In no way should shitty behaviour be put down automatically to autism any more than bad spelling is automatically down to dyslexia.

There are also pigshit ignorant stupid people out there, and downright pigshit ignorant rude people too.

How we tell one from another on a text only forum is hard.

Simplest thing to do is ignore the fuckers.

I was offering the poster a method of mentally coming to terms with what she/he perceived as shitty behaviour that would fit neatly with her /his view that she/he should be allowed to spell 'badly' because she /he has (or claims to have) dyslexia.

The poster was me. What do you mean claims to be dyslexic?

I wont right of shitty behaviour as 'maybe on spectrum', no.

Some posters who say they work in publishing or as editors are making errors, right here, in their own posts.

This again?

I can make something out when it says loose instead of lose or of instead of have etc but I wish posters would use paragraphs.

People get offended and on their high horse when this is mentioned ( not the poster without the paragraphs ) but other people.

It’s not a slur or a dig at anyone’s spag. Just a simple request to make reading very long posts easier.

I'll be the first to admit that poor spelling and grammar does get to me but I don't tend to mention it. People don't do it on purpose, they're obviously writing what they think is correct or have made a mistake perhaps. Plus, you never know whether they have genuine learning difficulties.
There's one particular independent store local to me who is always advertising on Facebook and every time I read their ads I'm cringing. I do find it unprofessional for a company but think that's a bit different? What do you think?

Some people weren't blessed with a great education like others, some are foreign. You are a bit of a dick if you go round correcting everyone.

Some people don't mind and would like to better themselves, others couldn't give a stuff, and some object to criticism.
If you want to try your luck, go ahead and see which one you find

Love people that are like ‘well I’m a teacher I can’t help it’ or ‘I’m an ex teacher’, like teaching is the absolute height of academia and you simply can’t help yourselves 😂

[grin]@Footiefan2019

Footiefan2019
The thing is they will be able to help it. Choosing to ignore a thread and become the SPAG police is a personal decision.

No part of teacher training says "and remember, thou must go forth and correct SPAG on Mumsnet and dazzle the world with your apostrophes".

Yes, I'm also a teacher.

I find it funny people are using the term SpaG when they often seem to hate abbreviations and acronyms.

I do find it unprofessional for a company but think that's a bit different?

Yes, I agree it is different. Like a job interview, if you are writing for a company's social media, you are selling yourself, and so it's worth putting in the effort to check and polish what you write for the world to read. In that case, errors imply (maybe unfairly) that you don't have attention to detail, or don't care too much about standards.

Of course, those considerations don't apply when someone is dashing a response to a discussion on a chat forum, and in that context it's harsh to judge someone on the basis of language errors.

Teachers could write *See me after the thread, if they want to mark someone's post.

I wrote this on the other thread but I'll put it here too...

I live in an area with an alarmingly high rate of poverty, child poverty, domestic violence, drug addiction, alcohol addiction, homelessness, child obesity and also a pretty high rate of immigration.

From reading my local Facebook group, it's also clear that illiteracy levels are pretty high and there are also people struggling to express themselves because English is not their first language.

I'm constantly biting my tongue so that I don't recommend MN, because I know Mumsnet could help so many of these people, but on top of all their problems, they don't need some patronising, smug little wankers correcting their grammar and spelling, because they 'simply have to point out it's could have and not could of etc. Or worse still, those who are so deluded they actually think they're helping to teach them, rather than ridiculing them.

If you want to be an English teacher, go and friggin train to be one but leave people alone when they've come here for help and advice.

HQ need to crack down on this behaviour instead of constantly politely reminding people not to be assholes.

Lack of paragraphs, text speak and the could of/would of thing all drive me mad. I'm not bad mannered enough to correct the poster though, I just close the thread and bugger off to another one.

OP has put the fear of God into me though by speculating that could of/would may be acceptable someday lighthearted, before someone gets a bee in their bonnet

Round of applause for WorraLiberty.

For what it's worth, I don't even believe the people claiming they're just trying to help/educate/stop them making future mistakes at work etc really do believe that's their motivation. They're just too cowardly to own the fact they feel good about themselves when ridiculing someone else who needs advice.

'It's not that hard' is just another way of saying, 'well, I can do it, so anybody can do it'. Just because it's not that hard for you, does not mean that for others, it cannot be hard.

I've always find writing easy. However, I found doing the school cross country rather excruciating. For many of my friends, it was entirely the other way around.

I'm surprised that teachers could say with a straight face that 'it's not that hard', when they're dealing daily with students who are dyslexic, are SEN, have visual or hearing impairments, who are too wrung out with dealing with chaotic and impoverished home lives to have anything left with which to focus on their school work.

And when it comes to teachers saying that it just comes naturally to them as a by product of their profession - as with everything else, not all teachers are equal. I became furious with a particularly smug and patronising teacher who persistently gave my DD's spelling lists - with words incorrectly spelled upon them. I had to mark the damned spelling list, and then argue with the teacher (armed with a dictionary) who would not accept that she had incorrectly spelled these words - in a seven year old child's spelling list.