Plural apostrophe users: Explain your inconsistency.

In My Humble Opinion
1

This is not really a rant, but a serious general question, verging on IMHO:

To those of you who use 's to denote plural (admittedly probably not too many who visit this message board), why do I always see such inconsinstency in your usage?

What logic drives you to use the apostrophe for some words, but not others? Now, I am well aware that this topic has been done to death here on the SDMB, but I don’t recall seeing this aspect answered. I mean, you must have learned your rule from somewhere, right?

Wouldn’t you at some point notice that you apostrophize some plurals, but not other’s :rolleyes:, and then be forced to make an informed decision?

Those who apply the rule erroneously, but consistently, are excused from responding. Thank you.

2

But this is GQ…the place for neither rants nor polls. :stuck_out_tongue:

3

This is a sort of poll, so I’ll move this thread to IMHO.

bibliophage
moderator GQ

4

The funniest example I’ve seen of this was a car dealer who had this written on his window: Smith Motor’s

5

My grandmother uses apostrophes for plurals, but she’s quite consistent about it, and at age 102, I am NOT going to start correcting her grammar. Heck, she’s lucky to be able to still have it together enough to write. :smiley:

This is one I don’t understand, either. But I doubt you’ll get many responses here since most folks who do this consistently aren’t the type who’ll last long at the SDMB!

6

I’m not sure if I do it consistently, or even how much. I do know that when it happens, I usually have just done it without even noticing. I really do know how to use them though. :stuck_out_tongue:

::checking post very carefully::

7

No rule’s

8

Jpeg Jones - It’s pretty well understood that many people who know better sometimes mistype - the fingers take over. No logic at all, except the logic of your mighty fighting nerves.

Didn’t your mother ever accidentally call you by your brother’s name? Do you think that, for a moment there, she forgot who you were? Or, do you think she just called on the part of her brain devoted to screaming at children and the screaming started before she picked a scream for a particular kid?

How someone could make a sign like Smith Motor’s? I don’t know. First, we have to assume that the sign painter was working freehand without a plan or prelim sketches or anything that, you know, might be worthwhile if you were creating a sign to advertise your business. That’s a horse of a different color, a ratted, nappy horse with mange.

There’s some evidence that these kids today are goofy about how and when to use apostrophes. However, nothing I’ve read excludes the possibility that, although they know how to use them and recognized mistakes, after years of driving past Smith Motor’s, the youth of today ignore apostrophe and possessive errors just as they are blase about words like “lite” and “nite.” Let’s hope so.

Mama Tiger Your grandmother does this longhand? And she learned to write almost a century ago? That’s unusual. Even when you look at WPA collections chock full o’ the writing of ignorant mountain folk and ghetto dwellers, you don’t find this type of error.

In any case, you will, in fact, find plenty of people here who make that type or error, and others.

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=196377&highlight=typo

Jpeg Jones and Mama Tiger - speaking for myself, I don’t preview and triple check posts because this is my leisure time, the board is so freaking slow, and I prefer looking like a slob to spending my playtime proofreading. Opening another browser window and looking up that typos thread took a period equal to the time between commercial breaks on TNT. Here’s hoping I don’t get an error message when I hit submit!

Slight hijack - although I’m perfectly happy to type alwasy and it’s when I mean its, I’d rather die than run around with big stains on my clothes. I do understand that some of you react to my errors the way I react to day-old spaghetti sauce on white shirts - it’s work to curb my initial discomfort and stop judging the person’s entire personality on the basis of one little mishap that could happen to anyone.

9

All’s I can say is, thank’s for understanding. I didn’t know that plate was there when I sat down.

10

Apostrophes denoting plurals are frighteningly common among small businesses down here in Louisiana. I don’t know if it’s something in the water or what, but it definitely can’t be helping the kids with their spelling.

A good example of this shameful practice is a rural fruit stand on U.S. HWY 167 near tiny Plaisance, LA. There are dozens of painted wooden signs advertising “apple’s,” “tomato’s,” “potatoe’s,” and others. Oh well. At least they got “rice” right. :rolleyes:

11

That may have been meant “rye’s”, but what’s with that Quaylian spelling of potato?

12

My theory is that it’s caused by panic - a sort of “oh dear, am I or aren’t I meant to use one here? Better put one in just in case.” In my opinion the confusion is caused in the first place by people who contend it is legitimate to apostrophise abbreviations, numbers, and letters (e.g. “CD’s”, “10’s”, and “a’s” [sic] respectively).

This has indeed been done to death, but I’ll plug the Apostrophe Protection Society again (I draw your attention to the picture in row 5, column two of this page, which I took in Dublin and sent to them). Now what they need are a few lessons in site design…

13

I was hoping that the true purpose of this thread was to bring the apostrophe abusers out in the open so we could get a clear shot at them. I swear they’ll be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.

14

:smack: How did I know something like that was going to happen? :smack:

I’d always been taught to add an apostrophe to such words when the lack of one would cause confusion, so “10s” or “CDs” wouldn’t have an apostrophe, but “a’s” would, since, without it, it would be easily confused with the word “as.”

15

Thinking about it doesn’t help, and may make things worse - shortly after reading the comments here, I went to another thread and wrote a post with the dreaded 's on a noun for NO REASON.

No rule’s indeed.