Word Crimes

[86 Grand prix]

I see a lot of posts on there that you can hardly read and barely understand. It seems to be a pet peeve of a lot of people these days. You have to listen to weird Al's new song, Word Crimes. It speaks for all of us.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gv0H-vPoDc

 

[popeye1978]

Thank you for posting! ... brightened my day after spending the entire workday dealing with email chains about this or that "fire"

 

[rustyroger]

The book by Lynn Truss, "Eats Shoots and Leaves" is worth a read if bad punctuation gets you hot un der the collar.
My sister was in responsible for recruiting at her last job before she retired. She told me of many application forms filled out in text speak, or written in Gangsta style, or with profanities. Sometimes all three.

It's fair to say that some of the most intelligent people I have met have struggled with the written word, I worked for such a man once. But he could perform feats of mental arithmetic and think through a situation coming to a logical judgement with breathtaking speed.

However for us mere mortals perhaps hitting "review" and checking spelling, syntax and punctuation before hitting "submit" would do no harm. It may also stop us sending an inappropriate post if the subject has hit a raw nerve because we have strong feelings about the issue and posts made about it.

Roger.

 

[DoubleV]

She told me of many application forms filled out in text speak, or written in Gangsta style, or with profanities. Sometimes all three..

My girlfriend told me the same thing. How stupid do you have to be to do that? People like that deserve to be mocked

Let me 'translagate' that for the idiots;

my b*tch told same thing how stoopid do u have 2B 2 do that peeps like that dezev 2b mookd

 

[pontiacgp]

it's sad where the English language is headed.....when I went to school we got an education as well as corporal punishment so maybe we should go back to that cause it sure worked a lot better than what they have now

what one mother wrote in an article ..

I already knew they didn’t teach phonics anymore. I thought it strange, but my daughter seemed to pick up reading and writing relatively easily, so I didn’t worry about it (though I did realize I had to spend time teaching her to sound things out instead of guessing). But the next year, I had an interesting conversation with her grade one teacher, who told me that she was doing spelling tests in her class, but the marks could not be recorded for the children’s grades, because she wasn’t actually supposed to do spelling tests anymore. I asked her why on earth spelling tests were taboo, and she said that every few years some new theory of teaching comes to the forefront, and everyone has to adopt it. The current theory? Spelling tests don’t help kids learn how to spell.

and what a ex-student wrote for that same article

The truth is, I was never taught grammar. Our parents were told that the latest research showed that knowing grammar didn’t make people better readers or writers, so they dropped it from our school’s curriculum. I’m bitter about this. As a writer and editor, I can say unequivocally that they were wrong, and that having to teach yourself grammar rules — rather than them being drilled into a young, developing mind — is no easy task.

 

[rustyroger]

The book by Lynn Truss, "Eats Shoots and Leaves" is worth a read if bad punctuation gets you hot un der the collar.

However for us mere mortals perhaps hitting "review" and checking spelling, syntax and punctuation before hitting "submit" would do no harm.
Roger.

Oops. 😳 :shock:

Roger.