Grammar Nazis

No one is infallible. I’ve seen the best of us make huge mistakes no matter how convincing their air of perfection was. That being said, I find it disconcerting how we all try to correct each other as if the corrector is somehow superior to the corrected. The Oatmeal published a very irreverent and painfully accurate (if not opinionated) comic about what we SHOULD have been taught in senior year.

I’ve been a writer for years but from time to time I make mistakes, usually due to haste. When others read anything I’ve published they love to comb through it looking for minor mistakes and sometimes will find one. There are two ways in which I find and rectify a mistake. Either I proofread or someone tells me.

The first way is far more preferable, of course, and should be encouraged of any writer, but, again, everyone makes mistakes. That’s when the Grammar Nazis come knocking at my door with their Nazi accents. They tell me to cross a “t” or dot an “i” – sometimes adding “Herr Nus” at the end of sentences. The more learned ones will tell me (between mouthfuls of knackwurst) that, according to publishing standards, punctuation such as commas and periods should appear inside quotations, not out. The thing is they’re right and, if they tell it to me nicely and discreetly, I will always make the correction. But they won’t because they’re Nazis.

I do, however, appreciate the private DMs that good friends and fellow bloggers send me when they find an error and I am happy to reciprocate. Being a blogger, I don’t always have a second pair of eyes to re-edit my posts before they go out. Also being a blogger who has recently come into some extremely busy times, it’s been a struggle to get out as many posts as I used to. This week has been extraordinarily busy and I apologize for this one, lonely post.

Where, however, do we draw the line for politeness when correcting another person’s grammar, spelling or usage? I see it happen all the time where someone will be ridiculed for spelling “ridiculous” as “rediculas” or for messing up the spelling of “definitely” to the painful “definately.” I suspect that these glaring and annoying errors in the written English language come from a lack of training in the importance of root words and some gaps in vocabulary. However I think they can be easily fixed and don’t merit being called “stupid” for bad spelling.

I know a lot of very smart people who can’t spell to save their lives. No one is really born smart. That is even if someone was predisposed to be a genius, would he/she really be considered one they had not learned the fundamentals of human knowledge and prose before pushing the boundaries to eventually become the celebrated genius (or lamentable mad scientist, despot, tyrant etc.) that they were destined to be? If a “born genius” was born in a cave and never saw the light of day would that genius really become as resourceful, as creative or as bright as they are predisposed to be. Plato would argue that it would not be the case.

Therefore we must be shown the light of knowledge and help one another to learn rather than punish those of us who for, one reason or another, did not grasp a piece of knowledge the first time around. I would say that you will feel better if you helped someone learn how to spell a common word, rather than lambaste them online in great spectacle. Don’t be a Grammar Nazi.