# People who cannot spell **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 24, 2005, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731 "2005-02-24T17:18:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Cazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cazzle/32/75_2.png) [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/61 "2005-02-25T00:43:52Z")
While telling us how everything suddenly got out of control, one poster on another board described it as “kayous”. I’m hoping she was under 10. That’s the only possible excuse. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/62 "2005-02-25T01:56:51Z")
I’m a huge bookworm and I’m constantly misspelling things. It’s not that I “can’t be arsed” to correct something, it’s that I’m not sure, and even trying to look it up on a dictionary site-it’s going to come back as “unfound”. The bad thing though about being a reader is that I know a lot of words-but constantly mispronounce them. ---
**Author:** ![dare\_devil007](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/3bc359/32.png) [@dare\_devil007](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dare_devil007)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/63 "2005-02-25T02:13:20Z")
My friend is a terrible speller. I read this one atrocious entry in her blog, in which she made the following errors (correct word on the left - what she typed on the right): Boring - Boaring Wasting - Waisting Epilogue - Epologue Controversial - Conrivertial Da Vinci - Divinci Depressed - Deppresed > [@](#): > > Originally Posted by **Musicat** > I really hate people who spell it “licence” or “colour.” They think there so smart, just because their from England or Austria or something. Are Canadians included in that group, too? ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/64 "2005-02-25T02:33:32Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > The bad thing though about being a reader is that I know a lot of words-but constantly mispronounce them. Yeah, me too. I can’t be arsed to look them up in the dictionary. Though I pride myself on my spelling, there are still words that give me grief. I usually go by what the words look like, not by what letters are in what order. I’ll type their thier their thier their thier their thier until neither of them look right! Then I’m in trouble. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/65 "2005-02-25T02:40:01Z")
I cannot spell for shite. I also have this problem that my keyboard (a rotten wireless model from Kensington I should just throw away) has extremely springy yet unresponsive keys. I can punch entire words in that somehow don’t show up. I type rather quickly and haphazardly, so I’ll blow right through sometimes without even noticing. Since I am also constitutionally incapable of using Preview, my typical post is a disaster. Sorry. I deserve to be pitted, but I’m not gonna lose any sleep over it, I’m afraid. ---
**Author:** ![jabiru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@jabiru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabiru)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/66 "2005-02-25T02:51:24Z")
Hypocracy. How can anyone even _think_ that’s correct? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/67 "2005-02-25T03:18:26Z")
The past tense of “lead” is “led.” Just so everybody knows. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/68 "2005-02-25T03:25:57Z")
I notice that the older I get, the more prone to misspelling I get. I blame it on my hands. Sometimes I inadvertently type “two” instead of “too” even though I know full well the difference and consider it an egregious mistake. It’s as if my hands are learning to write on their own, but they’re phonetic spellers. Either that, or my brain is no longer fast enough to keep up with my hands. ---
**Author:** ![Long\_Time\_First\_Time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ad7895/32.png) [@Long\_Time\_First\_Time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Long_Time_First_Time)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/69 "2005-02-25T03:48:36Z")
In my children’s school district they don’t pay much attention to spelling when kids write essays. It wasn’t even corrected until middle school, and even then sporadically. There’s a theory behind this (of course) about how it’s better to have the kids write, write, write without worrying about grammar or spelling because then they will learn to love writing and the rest will come in time. Hate to say it, but my oldest graduated from this school system last year and still is a pretty dicey speller [And she’s no dummy, she did very well in school and now in college]. So it could well be that kids these days aren’t the spellers that older folks are because it’s not emphasized in high school anymore. I’m a terrible speller, but I have an excuse. I’m dyslexic, and “see” words differently from most people. I recognize the shapes of words but not individual letters. It’s embarrasing at times, but spell check and dictionaries help when things have got to be right. What’s funny is that my sweetie is Sternvogel (a very frequent poster on SDMB) and he is i)the world’s best speller and ii) a person who finds it physically painful to read words like gaurd or genuine. Guess it’s true that opposites attract. ---
**Author:** ![Go\_You\_Big\_Red\_Fire\_Engine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/eada6e/32.png) [@Go\_You\_Big\_Red\_Fire\_Engine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Go_You_Big_Red_Fire_Engine)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/70 "2005-02-25T03:57:33Z")
> [@Fretful Porpentine](#): > > Like “alright” and “incase”? Gah, I hate that. [Alright](http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=alright) ---
**Author:** ![davmilasav](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9bcb4/32.png) [@davmilasav](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davmilasav)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/71 "2005-02-25T04:07:21Z")
I read fanfic. Lots of fanfic. It’s a disease. The first thing I do after downloading a story to Wordpad is to a Search and Replace on my personal pet peeve: ‘‘it’s.’’ The possessive of ‘‘it’’ is **NOT** “it’s.” The contraction means “it is.” Try this: Every time you find the word “it’s” pronounce it “it is.” If that’s not the meaning you want then for Og’s sake _don’t use it!_ Why can’t people use apostrophes properly? :smack: Davmi ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/72 "2005-02-25T04:20:33Z")
I just saw someone type **its’** several times on another message board. That’s what I call covering all the bases. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/73 "2005-02-25T04:28:13Z")
> [@This Year's Model](#): > > . I’ll type their thier their thier their thier their thier until neither of them look right! …Ow. ---
**Author:** ![Telperien](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/65b543/32.png) [@Telperien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperien)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/74 "2005-02-25T04:45:23Z")
> [@jabiru](#): > > Hypocracy. How can anyone even _think_ that’s correct? It’s when the hypocrites rule! OK, it’s not a real word, but it should be. I am a decent speller but some things do trip me up. I can never spell “efficiency” right the first time. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/75 "2005-02-25T04:58:26Z")
**Fire Engine**. you might want to read that link you posted on “alright” really carefully. “Non-standard” means that it is not widely accepted as an established spelling. The accepted spelling is _all right_. I see this misspelled more and more frequently in movie and television captions and predict that what is now considered a misspelling will become an established spelling by mid-Century. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/76 "2005-02-25T05:02:38Z")
I meant to add that it is particularly humiliating to be a retired English teacher and a bad speller. It just gets worse as I age. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/77 "2005-02-25T05:04:48Z")
> [@jabiru](#): > > Hypocracy. How can anyone even _think_ that’s correct? It’s the opposite of hypercracy, just the other side of isocracy. ---
**Author:** ![jabiru](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@jabiru](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jabiru)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/78 "2005-02-25T05:33:36Z")
> [@Harimad-sol](#): > > It’s when the hypocrites rule! > > OK, it’s not a real word, but it should be. Priceless. ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/79 "2005-02-25T06:30:21Z")
As someone else mentioned here, my spelling problems take the sneaky route of homonyms. I have actually typed the phrase “and he through another peace of would on the fire” before. Of course, the spellchecker at the time thought it was fine, but my roommate laughed her ass off at me. One habit I see among my students and others is the use of “so” and “such” without a qualifying phrase following. To me, when you use “so” and “such”, you’re implying that you’re going to follow up with a qualifier. Like: - “I’m so hungry” or - “I’m so hungry, I could kill and eat my English teacher.” - “We had such a good meal” or - “We had such a good meal, we’re planning a menu with the English department.” It bugs me, it does. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2005, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731/80 "2005-02-25T15:48:29Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > I really hate people who spell it “licence” or “colour.” They think there so smart, just because their from England or Austria or something. Dear, it’s _they’re_. You know, “they are” from England or Austria, or maybe Australia & Canada. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-cannot-spell/291731.md?page=5)