To not believe in policing spelling and grammar?

[Ethelfleda]

I used to, I admit.
But now - I think it shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how language evolves and changes.
Language is not mine to own and tell others how to use!
I feel that the onus is on me, as the receiver of words, to understand what someone is saying - rather than the onus being on the person who is delivering it - to make themselves understood. Why cut the legs out from someone who wants to put their thoughts out there, by belittling them, when they just want to put their equally important views out for all to see?

Show me a person who ‘misuses’ reflexive pronouns. Who ends an email with ‘please do not hesitate to contact myself should you require further information’ and I will show you someone who is attempting to compose an email with absolute respect for the recipient. Not someone who is ‘incorrect’ with their grammatical structures.

So - go fourth! Use language as you see fit! It is wonderful and inimitable and it is YOURS! And I promise, I will always understand your message!

This post is probably written completely wrong. But please, dear reader, reach behind the order that I put the words in and try to understand the sentiment. And speak in return however you see fit.

I love words.

Poor or sloppy English is still likely to be a disadvantage when it comes to finding jobs and progressing up the career ladder.

Unless you want to be president as even despite the constant negative press covfefe

This is an interesting one from my point of view. I don’t have a go at people for getting spelling or grammar wrong, even if I do internally eye roll at ‘should of’ etc.

There is an additional issue though. I am blind so use speech when reading written material. Sometimes it’s difficult to understand things, in particular when a writer doesn’t use punctuation. Reading a long stream of text where somebody doesn’t put any punctuation can make it incredibly difficult to follow when something is being read out, because you don’t have the option of putting breaks in yourself. Text speak is particularly jarring, because where you would see the shape of a word, even if the vowels were missed out, I just get a stream of incomprehensible letters I then have to try to decipher.

Genuine mistakes are genuine mistakes however, and if someone has Dyslexia for example then it’s understandable that there will be mistakes.

The thing that really winds me up is when adults, who have read written material every single day of their lives since the day they learnt to read, write things like ‘would of,’ or spell words like definitely ‘definately’. Because I can’t see, I don’t see words everywhere, so I don’t constantly get reminders of how things should be written. I have to make a point of remembering how to spell things, and while I make occasional errors I do try to spell correctly, punctuate appropriately and be grammatically correct. Most adults have an easier time of it than I do in this respect so I find it bloody annoying, and a bit disrespectful when they can’t be arsed to write in a comprehensible way.

TL; DR You might think you’re making yourself understood when you’re using text speak/not using punctuation etc, but if others are having to read via a different medium it might be utter gobbledegook to them. There is really no excuse why an otherwise capable adult shouldn’t write comprehensibly so if you choose not to, you probably just look like you’re a bit lazy.

Just reading back over my post I can see straight off that I have used ‘were’ in one place where I should have used ‘are.’

As the saying goes 'Grammar: The difference in knowing your shit or knowing you're shit'.

Context means a lot.

Muphry's law is an adage that states: "If you write anything criticising editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written." The name is a deliberate misspelling of "Murphy's law".

@DdraigGoch

Muphry's law is an adage that states: "If you write anything criticising editing or proofreading, there will be a fault of some kind in what you have written." The name is a deliberate misspelling of "Murphy's law".

I love this.

Proofreading is part of my job so I need to do it but I do sometimes get so bogged down in ensuring consistency in weird grammatical situations I wonder if it’s all worth it

But if a person genuinely doesn't realise their spelling is not correct or their grammar is poor, and no one mentions it - how are they meant to learn? Or are we saying that we don't think grammar and spelling are important anymore and we all just have to embrace whatever people right. I'm not talking about typos or autocorrects but where people clearly don't know the difference. "I would of" rather than "I would have" being a good example. I have a colleague who uses this in formal reports, so I do pull her up on it (because I think its looks poor). It would be much better for the colleague to learn this was wrong in a more informal setting.

Sometimes the spelling/poor grammar genuinely leads to confusion in people who aren't skilled at "reading between the lines and working out what the person actually meant". So it's much harder to read, and I can't always be bothered.

I remember a particular example where a poster had put something like "I'm planning an extension on my house. Hopefully the planning permission should go through ok because there is a president just down the road". I had already written my response asking what the president was responsible for and this sounded very corrupt, when I realised the poster meant "precedent".

Similarly if a poster says "your right" - my immediate thought is that they've accidentally deleted the end of the sentence, before I realise they just don't know the difference between "your" and "you're".

Using correct grammar as much as possible is a courtesy to your reader. It is harder to understand a piece of text which is littered with mistakes. Of course, a lot of people are not really interested in communicating effectively anyway.

But if a person genuinely doesn't realise their spelling is not correct or their grammar is poor, and no one mentions it - how are they meant to learn?

I think what I'm saying is that smug (and frequently incorrect or incorrectly explained) corrections by smug randoms on the internet are not an effective way of teaching people correct grammar and spelling. Nor are they actually intended to help. They are a way of expressing superiority or irritation with 'the state of people's English these days'.

100%, nothing worse then the grammar police.

As long as I can understand what you have written I genuinely don't care. I was once reduced to tears as someone tore into me about the wrong use of 'Your' should of been 'You're. - Knob.....

I don't agree with correcting people unless you count asking for clarification as correcting. But it is difficult not to sometimes. Also I think a lot of people don't assimilate correct grammar and spelling by reading it at all, even when they read a thread about common grammar errors! So pointing out mistakes is probably not going to help unless they are in the right mindset to want to learn.

Totally agree OP. I hate when people correct others on here, so snotty and superior. Stop being assholes

I think it shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how language evolves and changes.
It shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how language works. I teach English as a second language and ma y of my students make mistakes but none of them would write should/could of because they know that shoul/could are followed by a verb in the infinitive without to. A lot of native English speakers don't actually know this and so they write what they hear and get it wrong. Something is very wrong with the way we teach grammar that so many people don't know this (along with apostrophe use, abbreviated forms etc).

I feel that the onus is on me, as the receiver of words, to understand what someone is saying - rather than the onus being on the person who is delivering it - to make themselves understood.

That is completely wrong! Barring age and disability it is up to all of us to attempt to make ourselves understood.

On an Internet chat forum spelling and grammar don't have to be perfect but come on, it has to be understandable!

But it is difficult not to sometimes.

Most people wouldn't correct the grammar of an adult they don't know well in a face-to-face situation because they know full well it's rude. And yet they will happily do so safely sitting behind their keyboard. It's rude and cowardly, like a lot of other unnecessary online confrontation and virtue-signalling.

Most people wouldn't correct the grammar of an adult they don't know well in a face-to-face situation because they know full well it's rude. And yet they will happily do so safely sitting behind their keyboard. It's rude and cowardly, like a lot of other unnecessary online confrontation and virtue-signalling.

Hear hear, social media is becoming so toxic lately

”Let's eat Grandma"

Ageist!

The problem is that language is only a collaborative, agreed system of communicating - changes and evolves over time but at a given moment for one person to understand another they need to both understand the code at that time.

When one side of a communication is using a different spelling of a word ( I’m not talking about dialect variations) , or the wrong tense or syntax then it is confusing to the other side. If something is full of misspellings or the sentence order is arranged very differently then the person who is on the receiving end is going to have to work harder to understand and will get irritated by the constant mini trips in the flow of the message.

So, no I don’t agree with you, OP. Correct spelling and grammar does matter if you want to be sure that you are understood - it’s arrogance, really, to want everyone else to make accommodations for laziness ( NOT including dyslexia, obviously , before I get jumped on.

I like to use what I believe are correct forms myself and I would tell someone if they actually asked me whether something was right, but I try not to criticise other people's language if they haven't asked.For example I don't call a vacuum cleaner a Hoover if it's not a Hoover, but I don't interfere if someone else does. I have done that sort of thing in the past (my parents both did it too, and I guess I picked it up from them), but nowadays I just don't want to be seen as that person.

For example I don't call a vacuum cleaner a Hoover if it's not a Hoover.

But that's not incorrect grammar or spelling. Besides, 'hoover' is in the Oxford dictionary, both as a noun (meaning a non-specific vacuum cleaner) and as a verb. There's a difference between using correct grammar and spelling and objecting (even silently) to perfectly standard modern usage!

I refuse to say Hooverfor a vacuum cleaner as their customer service were crap.

Language policing on social media is very poor form. It is indicative of cuntish behaviour.

I do think there are some social standing considerations here. In a simplistic theory, we would only socialise with the people of a similar level of intelligence (to ourselves) and therefore you’d only be talking/writing to someone who has a similar standard of grammar and spelling.

The only three reasons I can think that anyone would write anything down nowadays (so S&G become relevant) are:

1. Social media or texting
2. In a professional setting
3. Publishing something such as a book or news article

In #1, my point above comes into play. On MN, if S&G are so bad that it either makes me cringe or I don’t follow the point then I tend to walk away anyway.

In #2, it potentially doesn’t matter - plumbers sending estimates for work springs to mind but I hate to generalise all plumbers! I’ve never once rejected an estimate because of bad S&G. Or if it does matter and it’s part of the expectations of a job to communicate clearly with a range of stakeholders then S&G errors should be picked up on and policed. Just like any other aspect of a job description.

In #3, the audience is unknown so the writer needs to avoid errors so that the message is clear. And to be honest, even if S&G errors don’t make the piece incomprehensible then it tends to affect reputation anyway (here’s looking at you The Guardian!)

I refuse to say Hoover for a vacuum cleaner as their customer service were crap.

I expect they're gutted!