Does grammar matter to you?

OK, I came across a post venting about grammar nazis. She hates it when someone ignores the content of what she said, zeroes in on one little typo, and shames her for it. Well, I don't blame her. That's the same as when people find they can't argue with the logic in something I said, but they want to put me down some other way, and they come at me with, "Yeah? Well, you're fat." It's rude to go around nitpicking people's grammar, especially in a way that ridicules them.

Unfortunately, there's a problem here.

I answered, "I see both sides." I then went on to explain exactly what I said above, but added, "On the other hand, I learned the difference between 'there' and 'their' in second grade, and it confuses me when adults don't know which one to use." This met with a sentiment full of profanity, but devoid of punctuation and capital letters, while someone told me, "get over it" and "sounds like a personal problem." This was my first introduction to the group, so I left it.

Here I address the general "you," not any specific person. If you have a learning disability or a comprehension disorder, I understand. If English is not your first language, I understand. If your typing skills are low, I definitely understand. If you are using technology that autocorrects you to death, I understand. However, if the only reason you don't know "to" from "too" is that while the teacher was explaining it, you were busy carving your name in your desk and texting your friends about how you couldn't wait to get out of this lame class and party, then I'm not the one with the "personal problem" who needs to "get over it." I won't go around correcting your grammar, but when someone else does, it isn't my fault if it makes you "feel stupid."

My opinion only. Yours may differ. You have that right, same as I do.

It doesn't matter much to me as long as I can understand what the person is saying. Communication is what it's all about. If they use a lot of shorthand or eponyms or acronyms that I don't know... then it becomes annoying.

I agree with all of your caveats, but have to admit...the to/too thing and the there/they're/their and the you're/your thing drives me, quietly, nuts. I realize it can seem a**l retentive which is why I rarely, if ever, comment on it. I just clench my teeth, briefly swear under my breath as my TMJ catches, again...and go on.

I also dislike all the acronyms that seem to run rampant, not only in texting, forums or message boards and I can actually visualize an eventuallity of text based communication relagated to 'words' of 5 letters or preferably less. Adding to my dismay, is my growing ability to read them.

I temper this annoyance with a little cautionary tale of my own, but this exchange was verbal. Whilst in work one day, one of my coworkers was snidely commenting on the pronounciation of the word 'library', as said by another coworker i.e. it was being pronounced "libary". The first coworker was making great hay of it, and the poor victim was feeling decidedly picked on...I watched and listened, and at one point said.."Hey, as long as we know what she's saying..does it really matter?" and tried to defuse the situation.

Literally 2 minutes later, the first coworker received a call regarding a fund raiser to be hosted by the Marine Corps in our area....she announced the call to us with a rather chipper, "Well, the fund raiser is going to happen as planned." I asked where...

Her reply: "At the Marine Corps" and she pronounced the second word 'corpse'. I looked her and burst out laughing.

"Ahh," I retorted. "As long as it's not at the Libary."

Thanks for this.

When I'm on the internet I generally don't worry too much about how other people write. I do get really irritated by colleagues who insist that spelling and grammar aren't important in the workplace. Good communication depends on accuracy and poor spelling and grammar can easily confuse the reader. I've noticed that my standards have been slipping recently and I've been using there instead of both they're and their and my to, too and twos have gone awry. However, one thing I won't apologise for is my English spelling, as in apologise and counsellor.

You should put an apology on your shedule :P

I posted this same rant on my Facebook page. My daughter's boyfriend replied that grammar is the difference between "knowing your s***," and "knowing you're s***." I answered that the one I'd heard is, the difference between helping your Uncle Jack off a horse, and.... (blush). Another friend offered "let's eat, Grandma" versus "let's eat Grandma."

To the Facebook friend who remarked that there's a right way and a wrong way to do things, I agreed, but I added that there can be more than one right way, and any right way is fine. British spelling as opposed to American is a good example. I also understand that there are different ways to pronounce words like "tomato" and "either." But... there are also wrong ways. When people are putting on airs, trying to come off like they're all educated and upper class, and then they pronounce the B in "subtle," and talk about "shammily" tea when they mean chamomile, do you find it hard not to laugh?

Yes, grammar matters to me. So does punctuation and spelling. I find it absurd when someone posts online and I can't make sense of the post because things are misspelled, the wrong words are used. etc. I won't spend more than a few seconds trying to understand a post that has a bunch of gibberish written on it.

That's a pretty sounds opinion. Well expressed. And I love how you're able to see both sides of the story.
Personally, I'd have to agree with you for the most part. I generally only correct someone's grammar or spelling if I know them well enough. Other than that, yes it does bother me, but I'll survive.

I hear you about airs of pretentiousness. If there are little grammatical and spelling errors, in an informal setting, yet, the point is made clear, it's informal, wasn't designed to be anything more than some back and forth live or semi-live banter. Formal letters, on the other hand, now that irks me.

It may very well be important in a business setting but... I know some very successful people whose grammar is poor despite the fact that they have degrees from fine schools. What they possess (in addition to business skills) is the ability to communicate.
That is funny Affectations are annoying but so are rants :P As for laughing at the way someone speaks.... I could never do that. I might explain the correct pronunciation of a word but only to save them from possible hurt and embarrassment if they made that mistake in front of someone who would laugh at them. If they truly understand subtlety or nuance I'd just be impressed and want to hear more.
I could have some fun grading that sentence
I have a cousin who teaches English at a school for exceptional students. We come from a poor white trash background. She never corrects nor makes fun of the way our relatives back home speak. I respect and admire her for that.
I have an eighth grade education. I have friends with advanced degrees including a couple of PhD's. I also have friends who didn't finish high school and wouldn't know a comma from an apostrophe... but they are intelligent and interesting conversationalists. Like I said before, communication and content are much more important to me than correct grammar and clean syntax. If I can understand what someone is saying, and what they are saying is interesting, I don't care how they say it.
Sorry but life is just too short to sweat the small stuff.

You are correct, George.

It's the airs I tend to laugh at, not the mispronunciations as such. The mispronunciations are funny because they give away the airs. I picture Hyacinth from Keeping Up Appearances. There's a certain family member that my family often compares to her, and I think the evaluation is spot-on. She, not surprisingly, hates that show and that character, and doesn't at all see where she is just the same. At one point, she didn't want the public to know she was running her business out of her home. She wanted potential clients to think they were calling some big, major corporate headquarters in the city, so she had a multi-box voice mail system put in, and recorded her voice telling callers to press one for this, two for that.... out of her HOME. She has a master's degree in handwriting analysis, and does that for a living. If you see her listing in the phone book, she puts more letters behind her name than any brain surgeon ever has, showing every degree, diploma, or certification she's ever earned in her life. Reason, she's trying to look big and important to the outside world. There's nothing wrong with being from a rural, poor, or uneducated background. What is wrong, I think, is pretending you're not rural or poor when you clearly are, and claiming more education than you actually have. Plus, it's only supposed to be a phone book listing, not her resume.

She's the one who enjoys "shammily" tea, although in total fairness to her, I looked it up and found out I didn't quite have it right either. I was pronouncing it "camo-mill", rhymes with bill, but it's actually "camo-mile," rhymes with smile.

Poor spelling and grammar, and even lack of education, are certainly no indication of intelligence. My father's IQ was over 180, but he didn't finish high school. He may have had a learning disability. I don't know. He himself once remarked that he couldn't spell "cat" if you gave him the C and the A.

^^
Yeah, you're right.

Eh, it's not something I actively look for or ponder. Probably because I am learning disabled and have pretty horrid dyslexia.

So my whole life, despite the content of my work, I was seen as "under achieving" or "lazy". Even when I was one of the only people in my classes working themselves to death. I am intelligent, I can say that with certainty. Verbally, I speak clearly, use "proper" pronunciation. I am also a writer, and I can say, read any first draft by a writer or a novelist and it will be filled with grammar issues.

Spelling and grammar do not equate content or what can be taken away from a statement. If you have the patience to read a statement and move past the urge to correct someone, you'll come out with something. I think some people get far to involved with correcting someone that they nearly create their own ignorance on a topic that they miss the point of the statement anyways.

I want a single quote on the primary keyboard! Im gonna boycott using it til i get one. Aside from that, people tell you who they are with how they spell.

It's also been reasonably pointed out that some people do a lot of typing and want to save keystrokes, so they tend to leave out punctuation, not capitalize, and maybe even abbreviate words. They figure typing "u" instead of "you," and not bothering to shift to capitalize "I," saves seconds that add up in the long run. I can understand that too. However, I have a degree in business administration, and I'm looking for a job. If I'm going to claim skills in typing, form design, proofreading, and such, on my resume, I'd better be careful what my typing looks like. It's not unlike models having to be careful everywhere they go that their hair is neat, their makeup is right, and they don't have a giant zit on their nose. You never know who might be impressed or turned off, and that could mean a job.

Not that I never make a typo, though. Most of them, I catch before I post. I just hate it when I see some major goof, like a word left out, or a word doubled, after it's too late to go back in and edit. There is some merit to keeping up appearances, I suppose, especially if earning a living depends on what people think of you. If they think I'm uneducated about grammar, or can't type well, I don't get the job. The graphoanalyst in our family apparently thinks if clients know she works from home instead of in a big downtown office building, they'll think she's some hack instead of a businesswoman, and not hire her. I do understand these things. It's taking it to extremes that has me shaking my head.

I love that you know a real life Hyacinth. My mother wont watch Everybody Loves Raymond for the same reason!

I feel grammar, spelling, and how a person expresses themselves in writing is part of that person's experience and how I respond to a person is my issue (my pet peeve is people who don't break long posts into paragraphs but just have a solid block of text :-) I was a grammar nazi here until 15-20 or so years ago when I realized why I was being a grammar nazi and then I stopped because I did not need that for myself anymore.

[QUOTE=Lovebird;3689693]OK, I came across a post venting about grammar nazis. She hates it when someone ignores the content of what she said,

I hear you but likely she is just attacking from fear over made to look bad and not admitting her faults. Give her some tools for improvement.

I have come to accept that there are many who just aren't careful in writing or speaking just like they aren't aware of their dirty teeth, bad breath and chewed off fingernails. Screw it! Just let 'em go. You can't change everybody and there will always be these types. Also many have English as a second language and you have to accept that. Have you ever tried to learn Spanish or other and then tried to have a conversation with it? Get any weird looks?

But even though offended she will quite possibly in the future stop and give some thought to doing better with the whole image she puts out.
Maybe you done good!

GreyMatter--you type, spell, and communicate extremely well. I wouldn't have known otherwise if you hadn't said you have a learning disability and dyslexia. You've obviously worked very hard to manage it. Many congratulations.

Simulposted with several others that all came in at the same time.

I won't watch Everybody Loves Raymond for the same reason.... Marie is just too triggering for me. In our family, the Hyacinth is also the Marie Barone. Elements of both.

Actually, I do speak Spanish, although not fluently, and I'd like to learn more. I'd hate to have my intelligence judged by how well I do or don't speak Spanish. It's the "fish judged by how well it can climb a tree" analogy.

My "pet hate" is double negatives. "I aint done nuffin", yuk.

I am what you call a grammar Nazi - - but only in my head. I would never correct anyone's English, except occasionally I will correct my husband's just because I know he doesn't mind. My mother was an English teacher and harped on grammar with me, plus I was raised to be a perfectionist, so I pride myself on pretty decent grammar. I agree that "to" vs. "too" and "there" vs. "there" are pretty basic. I CAN'T STAND IT when someone says "I seen" or uses the word "ain't."

I can't break my husband of "nuke-you-lar." That's just the way he's going to say it.

Sometimes grammar mistakes deserve to be called out. I'm thinking of the very judgmental woman who had posted at length how a certain lifestyle is "WORNG," typo and all caps both hers, and that just jolly well settles the matter, the end. Without addressing the content of what she said, she was raked over the coals for her error, as I feel she should have been. Whether or not I agree with her theology is beside the point. She was coming off like she had all the answers, and needed a lesson in humility.

I think it is hard and stressful enough having a WORNG () belief and attitude without getting raked over the coals. Teaching another person humility like we have all the "right" answers. . . not much different from what they're doing? When other people are at the extreme ends away from me, that's when I try to get most gentle and feel the most condescending (a trigger for me). What is "obvious" to us is obviously not obvious to the other person. That does not make them right/wrong, just not us.

I think I see your point. Getting huffy with someone for being huffy is fighting fire with fire? I did once tell a rabid anti-vax advocate, whose long, ranting posts were full of a lot of spelling and grammar errors, I wasn't going to take medical advice from someone who doesn't know how to spell "meningitis." It felt good to say that, I have to admit, but I can see how some people might feel I was just as out of line as she was.

Hey, but sometimes feeling good is good enough, hang the morality of how we get there

I had a coworker who was less well educated than I was and a guy so hadn't learned to spell :-) and it became one of my jobs to proofread his writing and fix his typos in our program! I complained bitterly that that was backwards, he should learn to spell but the boss (also a guy :-) didn't see it that way.