Is it just me, or has anyone else noticed the high level of incompetence shown, (especially where the young guys are concerned), in the arena of grammer? Dare I say spelling, but I am a lousy speller as well. Sister Virginia would kick my ass if she thought I was killing the English language the way these people do. As would most of the other teachers I've had, not to mention my mother! How does a person make it through life without the ability to communicate? I fear we as a society will be overrun by a culture of profesional communicators that can only say correctly, "Would you like to supersize that sir'? Am I just an idiot for noticing this or should I be happy that my son will grow up with the ability to speak and write? Or is that speek and rite?
I believe this issue was in its infancy way before cell phones came about. I remember being in elementary school, and English teachers correcting us (the students) about alot versus a lot. But I do agree that the advent of text messaging, instant messengers (most of which I use quite often) and general laziness (not taking the time to spell out you versus using the letter u, for example).
No matter the cause, we're definitely on a downward spiral.
Wow- this little thread took off from the time I viewed it this morning to coming back to it at lunch. Unfortunately, Tiger, I'm also a closet proof-reader of my children's reports, etc., which is funny because my children attend Catholic school as I did for a while. Fortunately, the reports I get from Sister are well written and correctly punctuated (and she's a sweetheart too, which is radically different than my own experience).
But while we're on the subject of correction, I was inspecting my daughter Emma's handwriting homework the other day and made a comment on the quality of some of her letters (she's 6), and she looked at me and said, "I've seen your handwriting, Daddy, and I can't believe YOU went to Catholic school".
Those who can't write: type, I always say. I actually print everything when I write, in an all-caps engineering style of handwriting. (I was in engineering for 15 years.)
In fact, I've been doing that so long that the only letters I could form today in cursive is my signature.
With 13 letters in my last name, that has been reduced to a series of large loops to minimize hand-cramping.
And, I had no choice but to become an ace at spelling. It took me until the first grade to hone my accuracy at S-C-H-M-I-T-T-E-N-D-O-R-F.
It's a good thing I didn't go to "catlick school" or I'd have the scars on my arms to prove it.
I turned out wrong nonetheless. Check out my most recent blog just to prove the point.