People saying pack lunch instead of packed lunch

[tiredtiredd]

This makes me irrationally angry

It's "whom"

Just the rules of grammar

Whom is a great example.

No-one says "to whom" any more. It's archaic. In fifty years time, it will be dead.

Usage triumphs arbitrary rules because no-one has the authority to define the rules.

No one is stopping you saying “needs fed” or “needs changed”, but it’s definitely not common usage at the moment

1. Not common usage does not equal not correct.

1. "Needs changed" is extremely common usage in Scotland and Ireland.

👏👏👏

I still say and write to whom.

Generally speaking I would say that the rules of grammar do matter. Language does change over time. For example indifferent used to mean impartial. However, how one speaks and writes does create an impression on the listener, even if only subconsciously.

“To whom” is still in common parlance in the correspondence I send and receive. Don’t be so quick to dismiss correct grammar.

Where I live, a lot of people say “we was”

Using your argument, because it is common usage, it must be grammatically correct?

To whom
For whom
From whom
With whom
About whom
On whom

Are all common in written English today.
My dad would use 'thou' and 'thy' abbreviated to 'tha' in his speech, but i havent heard that for maybe 20 years so that is an example.

Heck, I've found my tribe! I don't want to seem bias, pack lunch etc. drive me insane, see also been instead of being and could of/would of/should of.

Bait is the term for food in a lunchbox that used here in rural North Yorkshire though, and as the recent interloper I'm trying to let that one wash over me!

Can I join? The Missing ‘-ed’ Society might advise me whether the past participle of ‘to text’ is actually ‘I text [my husband] last night’. Genuinely wondering, as the verb is so recent itself, and may have brought with it another new formation. Though mostly, it’s the ubiquitous usage which is making me wonder.

Yes, “She is bias/ prejudice” etc has been infuriating me a good while. We know nobody reads good prose any more unless at gunpoint, and this is parallel to deteriorated diction/ enunciation on tv and in films (people swallow the end of many words, hence ‘She is bias’, I guess)

My mum used to call my lunchbox ‘packed up lunchbox’.
Every morning we’d hear “YewNork and YewNorkSibling, can you bring me your packed up lunchboxes, please?”
I used to think “It’s not a packed up lunchbox is it?! It’s an empty lunchbox until you fill it up.”

I use it correctly automatically, being ancient, and taught by very strict nuns when young. (No creditable reflection on me, any more than my turning on a tap would be)
But many use it incorrectly, in a very new way.
We all admit as passable the colloquial use of ‘who’ where ‘whom’ is strictly correct, because we are polite, and because we understand what we are reading or hearing perfectly well.
But what about those who have hastily grabbed onto ‘whom’ as an indicator of being one of the élite, très classy, and one who employs only the luxe-est of luxe lingo?
‘She’s the wife whom is dressed by Donatella!’
Needn’t mention where this is rife of course.

It’s the same basic error which gave us ‘I want my car washing’ (itself morphing through an inverted process to ‘My car wants washed’.)
A rule of grammar, noticed but only partially absorbed, and then applied erroneously ever after.

(Another rule which was noticed but misread is I vs me, where we read, even in supposedly decent newspapers, or hear in the mouths of educated types ‘The director asked Cumberbatch and I to try…’ )

"Grammatically correct" is just a snapshot of arbitrary conventions at any moment in time. There is no independent language authority to tell you or me what's "correct" or not. Correct for whom?

"We was" is clearly non-standard English in 2026 but there's nothing objectively "incorrect" about it. It conveys meaning perfectly adequately.

("Needs done" is standard Scots English, btw.)

I use "texted" because it follows the standard pattern found in "I fix/I fixed".

But I don't say "I swimmed" or "I runned" because not all verbs follow the standard pattern.

I squirm a bit at "I text him yesterday" because it's not to my taste, but there is no reason why "to text" shouldn't use an irregular form. It's not incorrect.

That's my point. There is no-one to tell us what is correct and what is incorrect. There is no incorrect, no matter what some 20th century nuns said.

a) They're not that common. They are on the way to becoming archaic.

b) In spoken English, which is what I referenced, they are even more archaic.