Thank you. In all honesty I did wonder if there was something reflexive going on there but whilst I have an ear for grammar, I can’t hold the explanations in my head very well: I never have been able to.
Having said that, I wonder if perhaps this example gives an inkling of where this usage comes from?
I have no doubt that there are examples of the incorrect usage that we are describing, which go back centuries. Though I feel nervous about “should” and correct versus incorrect, but you know what I mean.
It’s all just so clunking. My own theory is that many people don’t read as widely as we all used to do and also just don’t read as much. I could never get to grips with grammar at school but I read voraciously and that helped me absorb the way that words are used.
Though, as I have said elsewhere on here, it was only Microsoft that taught me what the passive voice is and how to avoid it. And that despite attending a reasonably good school.
Another thing that I found is that “who“ and “whom“ completely passed me by at school. I have no idea whether we were taught about these or not. As I grew into adult food and kept on reading it began to seem more important to me that these should be used correctly because they assist in understanding what’s being talked about. It is interesting to me that those are two words that are also frequently misused and, whilst I can understand why people use “who“ where “whom“ should go, because it is a bit pedantic, it completely confounds me that they will insert “whom“ where it shouldn’t go and cannot hear that it’s incorrect.
We were also told never under any circumstances to start a sentence with “and“ or “but“. I take frank and enduring delight in doing exactly that, as you can see.