The you're/your and their/there/they're debate

I'm a grammar nazi... and dyslexic. Which means that the very second I point out someone else's mistake, I'll make one of my own that's even worse.

So I don't point them out. If I don't understand what someone is saying, I'll skip the post.

That's too funny I also have dyslexia guys. I find that sometimes it makes playing video games a complete SOB....sucks for the nerd within me

pili90 you are quite possibly the coolest and most considerate human being I've ever meet, seriously awesome! Will you marry me?

read (reed) & read (red)

My son has learning issues and I have had to learn to accept that he will never be a great speller and learning things will always be a struggle for him. I have learned to be patient and try to show him different ways to learn things.

I feel for you all. It is a struggle and really at the end of the day are people dying over the spelling of certain words? Does one sit there and stew upon some randoms strangers misspelling? I don't stress over and neither should other people.

I too am a closet grammar nazi. :blushing: But being a Special Education teacher I dare not point out other people's grammatical mistakes. There is no one alive with perfect grammar usage, we all have our faults. There are times when even I make a grammatical mistake in front of my students and I correct myself and apologize them, showing them that you don't have to be "special" to make mistakes. Why bully others about them?? Express yourself in the best way you can.

Great responses guys. Thanks. You are restoring my faith!

The question of illiteracy is one I was going to mention as well. Particularly in reference to modern developed society. Illiterate/word blind people cope with amazing things without even realising it. They manage to drive, pass eye tests, join a bank, get jobs, vote and do all manor of things that I would find impossible if I couldn't read. What is that other than intelligence writ large?

First of all, language entails communication, so everyone deserves respect because they have the ability to communicate, and the right. Being communication the main aim of language, and the main reason why we have succeeded as a species, it can’t be understood in such a limited way(right or wrong). Language is not written, but spoken. Now, in the world, there are many, many languages that are currently being spoken, out of all the languages in the world the vast majority is not written, and for the longest part of history it wasn’t written. Children are able to fully comprehend language, in all its complexity, before learning how to read and write. People are able to cope with the “missing pieces” because language is more than just written words.

For me intelligence is a somewhat mischievous word, it is far too limited. Ok, I know that sounds odd, yet if you think about languages and what they are, you’ll see that it is easier to talk about skills and abilities. Blind people have impressive skills and abilities when it comes to phonology and phonetics, people who tend to have more analytical minds are much better at syntax, and so on. This is why intelligence, however useful as a term, cannot fully explain the phenomena of language.
So a long as people have a purpose, and a need, they will be able to master languages, unless of course they have some speech impediment, some type of aphasia. This is why I just cant get the idea of mocking others.

And the final piece of the puzzle, unless you are Chomsky's ideal speaker, I find it really hard to believe that you live in a mistake free zone.

I was just reading through a post from someone who seemed to be asking a genuine question from a perspective of helping others with their goals and some people shot them down for the incorrect use for your and basically said if you're not intelligent enough to spell I'm not going to dignify your question with an answer.

Being an English and Creative Writing grad, up until the moment I read that post the your/you're and their/there/they're was on my pet peeves list. But this person made it clear to me that this is a form of snobbery that I want no part of. And, worse than that, it is bullying and belittling.

When I was a teaching assistant I had a class with learning difficulties that had these SPaG (spelling, punctuation and grammar) issues and many others. What amazed me about them is that every one of them new sign language because they had previously been in a special needs school with a deaf child in their class. It amazed me because as good as my English may or may not be, it is my only language. These kids already had two without even realising what an achievement that was!

Anyway, my point is that SPaG is not an indicator of intelligence and people need to get down off their high horses and realise they should treat people as human beings even if they are only represented by an avatar.

This rant was instead of reporting the person...but I am still tempted.

Totally agree, I'm dyslexic and sometimes type the wrong word or spell a word wrongly even when I know what's correct. I can't proofread my own posts easily for spelling (due to how my eyes and brain don't always work together that well), and spell checkers don't pick it up if you make a spelling mistake that results in the wrong word (correctly spelled for that word).

Just because someone misspells a word does not mean they're not intelligent, it doesn't even mean that they don't know how to spell that word. My spelling is really good when all I have to do is spell words without thinking about anything else. If I want to write something that has intellectual content (as opposed to, say, a list of random words), then I need a spell checker.

Also, not everyone here has English as their first language.

know people IRL who get their panties in a bunch over this type stuff and quite honestly most of them can't balance their checkbook or have a decent conversation about current events because they're too busy looking for reasons to use their red correction pen .

in any case, arguably the main purpose of human language is to communicate ideas. as long as you understand the idea that some is trying to get across then that should be enough. from what i've seen on the internet and on here, the grammar and spelling fascists come out when someone they agree with an idea but can't think of a good enough counter argument, so the only thing left for them is the ad hominem attack.