this post was submitted on 14 Apr 2025
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No Stupid Questions

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This is quite recent but I've been browsing Lemmy a bunch lately and quite often I see extreme grammatical errors.

I'm not talking about like, incorrect stylistic choices between commas and dashes, or an improper use of ellipses or missing commas or incorrect use of apostrophes in its/it's or in multiple posessive articles or just plain typos or any nitpicky grammar nazi shit like that, but just basic spelling specifically.

It's one thing when you can't spell some pretty uncommon words and you're too lazy to look it up and/or use autocorrect, but it's a completely different league to misspell very basic words, very recently I saw someone spell "extreme" as "extream" which is just kind of baffling, I actually can't even imagine how one would make such a mistake?

And it's not been an isolated thing either, I've seen several instances like that lately.

Am I going crazy? Is it just me?

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[–] Avenging5@sh.itjust.works 7 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Ayi wudnt sei its oful, jast difarent

[–] SirQuack@feddit.nl 1 points 2 hours ago

Been hitting the rum supply again, ye scallywag?

[–] BlackSheep@lemmy.ca 4 points 3 hours ago

Completely agree. I cringe on a regular basis. I never know if it’s “stylistic”, typos, laziness? Sentence structure has also gone for shit.

[–] Letsdothisok@lemmy.world 2 points 3 hours ago

It's the public school system. It's amazing that our country still functions. I was lucky being private schooled.

[–] Jarix@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago

My older friend and i were talking about this a about 6 months ago. We both are convinced auto correct functions are getting worse. I suspect AI injection into the function somehow, but tin foil hat me also thinks it's strategy to force more people to use microphone. Seems way more valuable to data miners

[–] Underwaterbob@lemm.ee 3 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

I feel like it's gotten better. I certainly don't miss the days of "definately". I feel like that one was everywhere. Its death is maybe the one good thing auto-correct did for the world.

[–] wild@lemmy.world 3 points 2 hours ago

I still see "defiantly" on a regular basis.

[–] Sunsofold@lemmings.world 15 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago) (2 children)

Don't forget the internet is global. People for whom English is a second language are much more common than they once were.

[–] Asfalttikyntaja@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

Came here to say that.

[–] BlackSheep@lemmy.ca 2 points 3 hours ago

True. Good point.

[–] jaxxed@lemmy.ml 11 points 13 hours ago

I blame these f'ing phone keyboards and autocorrect. I can't see what I am touching, I can't feel it, there's no feedback, and I have to look up while I type. Whoever came up with approach deserves... A bad case of indigestion.

[–] steeznson@lemmy.world 4 points 11 hours ago

Could be people using a second language like others have mentioned. Another thing could be British vs US english. Webster changed how words were spelt in the early 20th centry to make them more phonetic for Americans, i.e. "colour" -> "color"

[–] TronBronson@lemmy.world 3 points 10 hours ago

Mine has always been bad, but autocorrect seems to be bipolar as the years pass.

[–] collapse_already@lemmy.ml 10 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

I would not be surprised if autocorrect was a major culprit along with phone keyboards. You can type something correctly and have autocorrect make it wrong. It's also super easy to get the wrong letter if you have normal sized hands and are typing on a phone keyboard. I have turned autocorrect completely off and am significantly less error prone as a result.

I frequently decide against correcting an error if I think my intention is clear, and I am in a hurry. I don't really care what strangers on the internet think of my editing skills.

[–] Raiderkev@lemmy.world 4 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

I hate this. For instance, using u instead of you, autocorrect often turns it to I. It also will fucking "correct" your to you're when you typed your on purpose. I'm ready to just turn it off. It fucks up my posts, texts, emails all the time. I don't have this issue on my laptop.

[–] collapse_already@lemmy.ml 3 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

I think you mean it will ducking correct...

I turned mine off completely because it has bo comprehension of when an apostrophe is appropriate in front of the letter s. Forever making words possessive that were intended to be plural. Apostrophes do not mean "look out, here comes an s."

[–] SpraynardKruger@lemm.ee 3 points 7 hours ago

Thi's i's new's to me. Can you give example's of when its appropriate to use apostrophe's?

[–] TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world 1 points 10 hours ago

In my case, autocowreck is the main reason for incorrect spelling and grammar.

[–] Mouette@jlai.lu 3 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

Honestly I'm not doing much effort to be correct when writing English. As long as people get more or less my point I do not really care

[–] LanguageIsCool@lemmy.world 2 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

Like those “isn’t it amazing” posts.

Aoccdrnig to rscheearch, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteers be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

[–] Jarix@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

Yeah but you are misspelling the words your are intending to use.

Today's typos (i laterally just had to fix "typos" because it wrote "trips") are not even the words you are trying to use and just spelling them wrong

[–] BlackSheep@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 hours ago

Punctuation is correct here, though. That helps a lot.

[–] octobob@lemmy.ml 3 points 16 hours ago

I swear to god working in an engineering field for the past 10 years or so has dramatically changed my grammar. Do you know who has the absolute worst grammar and spelling of anyone I've ever met? My boss. "First 2 channels shoul dBe woired for 0-10vDC" was a note he left on my desk yesterday. Do you know who's the smartest person I've ever met when it comes to electrical? Also my boss.

It's never a 1 to 1 comparison of intelligence fwiw. Everyone in this field spits out emails in half-cobbled together sentences and phrases and it just works somehow. When I type out multiple paragraphs and overexplain things, half the time they'll just come down to the shop to talk instead.

But yeah I have realized that this will bleed out into the rest of my communication haha. I'll look back at texts I send quickly to my fiance and see that I'm skipping words or saying shit wrong. Oh well, the ideas are communicated just as well most the time.

[–] wildwhitehorses@aussie.zone 9 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

I'm burnt out man. I just dont have the energy or the careth to be accurate or even care about a small thing.

[–] Irelephant@lemm.ee 3 points 21 hours ago (1 children)
[–] faythofdragons@slrpnk.net 4 points 16 hours ago

No, he just doesn't carrot all.

[–] Fingolfinz@lemmy.world 7 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

A majority have always been bad at spelling

[–] scroll_responsibly@lemmy.sdf.org 7 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

A majorrity have always been bad at spelllng

[–] Fingolfinz@lemmy.world 2 points 15 hours ago
[–] PanArab@lemm.ee 4 points 19 hours ago (2 children)

No you aren’t getting crazy. I stopped double checking my spelling after Trump became president the first time. Clearly most people don’t mind bad spelling so why bother?

[–] Jarix@lemmy.world 1 points 2 hours ago

Because it's worth it to be better than they are and it fights entropy

[–] twice_hatch@midwest.social 1 points 16 hours ago

I double check my writing because there are some "errors" that don't matter (I stopped caring about "me" versus "I") and then there are some errors that silently cause me to misinterpret the message

Like as an analogy if I ask how much milk is left in the carton in the fridge

  • "haf" I know you mean half, no big deal
  • "three" I know you didn't read my question, frustrating but not the worst thing
  • "full" but actually it was full three days ago when you last checked and this is stale information, and so I don't buy another carton, then we're out of milk because of a miscommunication

You know?

[–] gnu@lemmy.zip 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It's not a recent thing, but I would say there has been a decline over the last decade or so. Not only does it seem like spelling and grammar are getting worse but I feel it is much more likely these days to find comments defending improper English rather than correcting it.

I saw someone spell “extreme” as “extream” which is just kind of baffling, I actually can’t even imagine how one would make such a mistake?

Maybe they had just come from dealing with large quantities of paper? Or enlarging a bunch of holes?

[–] 3xBork@lemmy.world 7 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago) (1 children)

Anti-intellectualism has been on the rise for decades and spelling gets worse? I am shocked I tell you!

Also: inb4 the "language evolves!" crowd arrives.

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[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 1 points 17 hours ago

Just imagine you having to fix a thousand pages of this. I feel your pain.

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