I’d cut slack to nonnative-English speakers and to people who are handicapped in some way, such as MS sufferers. But 13-year-olds? No way. Assuming they don’t fit into either of the first two groups, they should be held to the same standards as the rest of us if they want to post here. The thing is, I’d say most if not all of the teenagers who post on this message board are exceptionally intelligent anyway, and wouldn’t make several egregious spelling errors in one post.
Spelling errors–even huge, preposterous, easily-misconstrued ones–don’t bother me too much and are really not worth my time to nick-pick…EXCEPT when someone is proclaiming their intellectual superiority over a significant portion of the human population. In such an instance, you better damn well expect me to jump on their backs!
I agree; I’m not bothered if the error rate is low. Everybody makes mistakes, after all. But what if the number of errors is astounding? In the example you linked to, I believe that the meaning is clear, but the extremely poor spelling and grammar betray the ignorance of the writer. In this case, it’s not just that his position is extremely controversial, but the poor presentation makes it obvious that he is probably just trying to bait people. In this case, is it o.k. to bring it up, or does one still have to ignore the mistakes and focus only on the “content”?
If we look at this post objectively, the meaning is clear, and there are actually a couple of examples given to back up the assertions. So why do we shudder when we read it? For one thing, it’s controversial; but controversy is not the only issue. It’s just really poorly written, and virtually screams: “flame me”. So, is it o.k. in this case, or still taboo?
NO-O-O!!! I just got out of the ending a sentence with a preposition debate over on the Hell’s Mensan list!!! I’m not going back into this here!! Oh, the humanity!
I have been waiting for this to happen. I am not sure whether the misspelt word was a result of a sticky key or a otherwise. Either way, it seems inexcusable from the author’s point of view.
I do believe that when one is communicating in a voluntary fashion (this is not a school or office situation where one has to speak up or write memos compulsorily), one does leave oneself to flames if their written skills are not acceptable.
If you particpate in a basketball game for example and cannot even dribble properly, please do not expect the others to let you through nor call you for travelling.
blowero, I definitely started with the smartassosity – no argument there!
And it was Churchill who famously (apocryphally?) wrote, in response to an editor who changed one of his sentences so that it didn’t end with a preposition, “This is the sort of English up with which I will not put.”
Since we have the option to preview our posts, I don’t think it is unreasonable to ask the poster to preview it and correct any spelling errors that jump out. I’m not saying proofread it like it’s your college thesis, just fix the obvious ones.
Other than that, the focus should be on content, not grammar and spelling.
I’m sure you’re right, dantheman – I looked around a bit after posting that, and read that the anecdote predates Churchill. Still, if it’s not true, it’s a good story, eh?