Anyone else really hate 'onto'?

[thatsgotit]

As opposed to 'on to', I mean.

I know it's now considered correct, and appears in the dictionary, and makes logical sense i.e. 'into', 'onto'.

But. I. Absolutely. Hate. It.

It just looks ... I dunno, sloppy. Ugly. And I'm pretty sure when I was at school we were taught not to use it, which might have something to do with my antipathy now.

I'm a copyeditor and sometimes I find it really hard to stop myself from changing all the ontos to "on to" just because I have such personal antipathy for it.

I'm probably overthinking this, but overthinking words and language kind of goes with my job. Just curious, though ... does anyone else share my disdain?

[DadDadDad]

I don't think over-thinking is your problem given, as you say, you're a copy-editor. But your emotional response seems a bit strong. You've giving some kind of aesthetic (or moral?) judgement over the difference between marks on a page, and seem to be aware that it might stem from what you were taught. If usage and whatever style guide you are working to say "onto" is acceptable and the author wants to use it and is not being inconsistent, what's the problem?

I might be biased by my maths background where "onto" is used as a technical term for certain functions, so it barely registers with me as odd.

[thatsgotit]

Re the emotional response, I was being slightly tongue-in-cheek but I can see how that might not have come over in my post. Having said that, I do find that my job gives me strong feelings about the written word generally. It's an aesthetic rather than a moral judgement, but it's definitely there.

I do leave it as 'onto' unless the style guide says otherwise, as it is generally considered accepted use, but I have to stop from grinding my teeth a little over it. (And again I'm being slightly tongue-in-cheek there.)

[PAFMO]

Surely as someone who is a copy-editor, you're aware that "on to" and "onto" have completely different syntactic origins and functions and the choice of which to use is nothing to do with "style"?
If you use "on to" when "onto" should be used, your writing is wrong. Whatever the "style guide" says.

@DadDadDad- lovely to see you back in these parts

[thatsgotit]

@PAFMO

Surely as someone who is a copy-editor, you're aware that "on to" and "onto" have completely different syntactic origins and functions and the choice of which to use is nothing to do with "style"?
If you use "on to" when "onto" should be used, your writing is wrong. Whatever the "style guide" says.

*@DadDadDad*- lovely to see you back in these parts

It's not that clear-cut - some style guides (BBC/Guardian & Observer among them) still specify writing it as two words when used prepositionally, and Fowler's states that 'onto' is 'still not wholly accepted as part of standard British English'.

(Tongue-in-cheek aside: I tend to agree with Kingsley Amis on this point: “I have found by experience that no one persistently using onto writes anything much worth reading.” )

[monkeysonthemoon]

Nowhere near as bad as 'alot'

[snoodle1]

My pet hate is: 'could of' or 'should of'. I see it a lot in forums and it really bugs me. I can't take anything they say seriously after that!

[PurpleCarpets]

To further infuriate the faithful, can I just point out that "onto" or indeed "on to" is just the opposite of "off of" which gives nice pedantic ladies life-threatening attacks of the vapours. If you believe that "off of" can never be correct, and must always be replaced with "off" then you should really be campaigning for "on to" to become "on".

[ABitBesottedWithMyDog]

You're underthinking it

[PAFMO]

@PurpleCarpets

To further infuriate the faithful, can I just point out that "onto" or indeed "on to" is just the opposite of "off of" which gives nice pedantic ladies life-threatening attacks of the vapours. If you believe that "off of" can never be correct, and must always be replaced with "off" then you should really be campaigning for "on to" to become "on".

Where's the heart emoji when we need one.

[PAFMO]

@thatsgotit

You may find this blog post interesting:

bridgingtheunbridgeable.com/2015/03/23/onto-doesnt-exist/

And then you can write to Cambridge dictionaries (and the OED among others) to tell them that you are correct and they are not.

[thatsgotit]

[quote PAFMO]@thatsgotit

You may find this blog post interesting:

bridgingtheunbridgeable.com/2015/03/23/onto-doesnt-exist/

And then you can write to Cambridge dictionaries (and the OED among others) to tell them that you are correct and they are not.[/quote]
I did, thanks.

As it's not a hard-and-fast rule, either way, though, I stand by my preference for 'on to' unless the brief specifically states otherwise.