I Am Not A Grammar Nazi

Complaining about stuff and adding to the "Mountain Of Garbage" is seemingly the whole point of this blog. (Unless I am remembering wrong, this "mountain of garbage" reference came from a lecture from Paul A. Cantor at the Mises.org site. I'm not 100% certain, but I think that's where I got it from. To paraphrase, he was talking about how culture produces a mountain of garbage with only a few really good things at the top. For the most part I agree; the proliferation of mass communication technology has bypassed the conventional filtering processes and allowed the average schmoe to self-publish whatever the hell he wants. This is both a blessing and a curse and a continual source of conflict to me personally.) But I digress…

So on the topic of complaining, some of the things that really stick in my craw are: Bad spelling, bad punctuation and bad grammar. Especially when it comes from native, monolingual English speakers. Bilingual\multi-lingual people can usually get a free pass, as they are superior to me and thus I have less authority to criticize their mistakes. And most of the time the non-native-English writers will apologize for their English in a quick disclaimer. This courtesy is never employed by the shitty native English writer, but perhaps it should!

I don't demand perfection from people, but a reasonable grasp of proper English is not too much to ask. Some people's internet communication is just abysmal! No capitalization of proper nouns, commas and periods all over the place, excessive exclamation marks, lack of proper spacing…the list goes on. At worst it can completely confuse the reader, but more often than not you understand full well what they're saying, but you lose respect for them. The impression they give is one of laziness and carelessness. Their message is obfuscated when they annoy the reader with sloppy writing.

Unfortunately when you raise even a little hell on this issue the backlash and dismissal is almost guaranteed. You instantly become tarred with "Grammar Nazi". To point out someone's shitty English skills is equated with fascism. People are focused on the content alone, and the presentation doesn't seem to matter at all. It seems like a good thing, like a tolerant and understanding thing. Or is it just as lazy as the poor writers making the mistakes? Who is the "Bad Guy" here? Am I being an asshole for raising the issue? Common practice seems to be "shoot the messenger" instead of acknowledging the shittiness of the offending English.

Bad writing did not fly when we were in school, but out here in the real world we've abandoned our standards and put up with a continually degrading standard of written communication. Reading the web today makes your brain function as a digital converter; no matter how garbled the signal is our internal "error-correction" is engaged and we get the message anyway. I believe this is the root definition of "Half-Ass"; accomplishing your purpose, but with poor execution. One might blame text messaging on cell phones, but I think this is a separate issue. There are those who might slip text messaging-style codes into formal writing, but the people I'm talking about are the everyday slobs who apparently can't put down a cohesive thought properly.

So now you might be thinking, "geez--what a self rightchus blowhard!!!!...who, care's man!?!?" But dammit, I am not a Grammar Nazi! I am not trying to forcibly push some unrealistic standard down people's throats or trying to make the world conform to my world view. I only ask that you adhere to the standards which have been established over time. Language is not some political ideal created by fiat and handed down from on high, it's a complex and evolving thing. The standards and rules which arise from it are organic and natural, they are not arbitrary rules for their own sake. If they were then I would be The Heavy to keep hammering the issue, but it's not like that. So that's why I don't feel that I am being fascist or oppressive when I criticize bad writing. If you just spend a little extra effort you can improve your writing.

Look at YouTube comments for an example of how far gone things can get. This is a bottomless wellspring of abysmally written English. (in addition to the often ludicrous content-based things people say) People are always screeching at each other on YouTube, it's usually constant conflict. Perhaps the reason is that the majority of the population are morons; but putting my pet theory aside for a moment, could another reason be that people's sloppy writing is causing an unnecessary friction point? If people took their time and crafted their thoughts with more care would relations improve?

Everyone can make mistakes, people can make typos, there's nothing evil about that. But continual, consistently poor writing can and should be fixed. I can't assume to know everyone's story, maybe people had a bad education or something, but my feeling is that many of these people are smart, but lazy. I don't expect perfection, but I at least would like to see people CARE that their writing needs improvement and be willing to address the problem. Willful ignorance is truly a nasty thing. To write a bunch of slop and then defend yourself as if it didn't matter is really indefensible.

You're also probably saying, "Jeez man.,,U gotta pick UR battle's. It doesen't matter in teh big picture dOOD, just chill out!!!!!! dont get all bent out of shape over spellinj!" Yeah well, it's this kind of passive contempt and apathy which perpetuates the problem.