I’m an English grad myself and certainly notice errors my brain is wired that way.
However, unless it’s the topic of the thread or a poster is claiming spag higher ground when their own is shit I don’t comment.
I have many very intelligent, including well educated to phd level and beyond friends and family who struggle with spag for various reasons, some its learning disabilities (not just dyslexia! There are others), some it’s eyesight issues with typing/reading, some English is not their first language (and I generally find they tend to speak/write English a damn sight better than many Brits manage with other languages! We’re pretty appalling on this actually) their opinions and ideas are just as valid.
I make plenty of typos and errors myself too. No edit function on mn either and I often find a post I’ve written correctly there’s words changed from when I wrote to when it posts! Don’t know if that’s my phone (which does do some weird and wonderful autocorrects at times) or the mn app.
I also struggle with eyesight even with glasses and I also sometimes post when tired or stressed and concentration isn’t great.
I think it’s especially out of order when spag crap is brought up on threads where the op is clearly in some kind of distress!
In my opinion that should be deletion and possibly ban worthy.
I’ve seen people getting all spag high and mighty on threads about miscarriage, domestic violence, ops just found out partner cheated etc I mean seriously! Time and a place!
It’s extremely rare a post is so bad it’s unreadable without a little thought and common sense applied, the few that are generally tend to turn out to be drunken/anaesthetised posters or a young child has been messing with phone/tablet
Also mn is not an English exam! It’s sm people are usually typing quickly and more occupied with the topic they’re posting about.
And yes I’m sure there’s errors in this post I only got 2 hours sleep last night and had a busy day and one eye is giving me grief! So what!
It has been my experience in real life that the more highly educated someone is, the less likely they are to do this that’s been my experience too
and the true English language will be lost. this is such an amusing error!
As a linguistics grad I can assure you the English language - including its spelling and grammar - evolves constantly! All languages do, what’s REALLY interesting about the English language is that it doesn’t really exist! There are SO many loan words, borrowed grammar rules etc that it’s really a very “mixed breed” of a language. This is of course mainly due to our colonial past but even now we are constantly adding, and losing words and usage. It’s fascinating to me. We don’t still speak or write as shakespeare or Chaucer or many English monarchs did now.
American English is closer in many ways to historic English.
It’s also in use in many non Uk countries in various forms that can seem very odd to Uk speakers and writers
There is no “true” English language at all.
now flame me because, horror, of horrors i never use capitals on here I’ve noticed posts of mine ending up with errant capitals in the middle of words! So annoying
I must admit though one that I find particularly grating but don’t comment on - and I have seen it several times on here is “his” when they mean “he’s”
Often the “corrections” are wrong too.
To be honest most of the time when I see it happen it’s because the poster correcting is pissed off they’re losing a completely unrelated argument and they’re just lashing out!
@emeraldshamrock - I once had a poster arguing/disagreeing with me make a ridiculous post about what would I know about the topic (iirc it was about benefits or poverty or budgeting or something like that) as I was clearly a privileged middle class Londoner! I’m a working class disabled single mum and Glaswegian who’s been on benefits in one form or another (mostly too ups as I was in work) for almost 20 years now. And no she hadn’t confused me with someone else as she quoted me several times! Someone else who was familiar with my posts and circumstances corrected them and they flounced! Bizarre!
From my years on mn now (anyone know how to check how long we’ve been here? I can’t remember and I’d love to know) I’ve become aware of quite a few other working class, Scots - a fair few fellow weegies, disabled and/or on benefits mners we’re certainly not in the minority
@magmell I agree that class etc is generally irrelevant when it comes to language proficiency
No.....everybody who speaks English has an accent. Scouse, Geordie, Essex, RP, posh Southern, Nigerian, whatever...we all speak with an accent. haha I agree
The problem with mine is it’s very confused geographically! I have a lot of fun challenging people to guess where I’m from and I’ve had guesses as whacky as Australian and South African! I’m an army brat so it’s a mix of Glaswegian, northern Scots, welsh, Yorkshire and south west England as I’ve lived in all those places while my accent was developing so it’s a real mish mash! And that’s before we get into slang!
I LOVE all the different accents and found the history of how they developed utterly enthralling, I’d love to study that more, I’m also nerdily interested in place names.
@ViciousJackdaw but that example (job applications) is one where I would consider it on topic and helpful to point the poster in the right direction
I’ve been in the position of reading applications by educated people and I’ve seen some crackers but they weren’t applying for English teaching roles so 🤷♀️
@morgendorffer - interesting argument. I have dx ocd but mainly of the germophobic type although I do also do lots of counting and checking. I can see how it could become an ocd behaviour though