Correcting people's grammar - acceptable?

Pollycat

coolcait wrote: »

As for correcting people's usage of English on a forum, there are some cases where it seems more wrong not to correct them.

For example, on the employment board, if a poster asks for comments on a statement which they intend to send to a prospective employer. Or, on this board, if someone shares a letter which they intend to send about an issue which is important to them.

Unfortunately, the document the poster has shared has quite a few errors in it.

Although I wouldn't go through it saying "well that's wrong, that's wrong, that's wrong", I might offer suggestions on different ways to word it - and I've seen other posters take a similar approach.

I would actually feel that it was more cruel not to comment under those circumstances.

But that is a totally different scenario - those posters are asking for advice as meritaten points out.

The OP is looking down her nose at someone who is less able to express themselves verbally than she is.
And in my book, that's not very nice at all.

meritaten

missbiggles1 wrote: »

What a terrible indictment of our education system.:(

LOL missbiggles - try reading my post again. Pollycat 'Got it'!
and eres a clue! 'I don't take the same care when posting on the forum'.
in other words - I am capable of impeccable spelling, grammar and punctuation. even though I have some degree of word dyslexia. I just cannot be bothered on a 'forum'. you are lucky I use the Queens English! Though I have been known to lapse now and again.
also, its plain that some posters are very upset when they start a thread - the last thing on their minds is SPG! they just need to get their thoughts down.

meritaten

and another thought - Do you use the same language down the pub or chatting with your friends as you would at a job interview or addressing a public meeting? I don't. I view the forum as more 'chatting with friends' - its not a job interview or a written assignment or examination. it SHOULD be more informal. and that means some posters have to be more tolerant of people's writing style.
if you really DONT understand what the poster means then it's ok to ask for clarification - just don't correct their post for them (I hate that - I always imagine the corrector as this fuddy duddy English teacher), or put them down (I hate that too - I always think OOOOOhhh and how perfect are YOU?). Some very intelligent people I know can barely string a sentence together coherently - but, they are very, very good at their jobs.

Lily-Rose_3

meritaten wrote: »

and another thought - Do you use the same language down the pub or chatting with your friends as you would at a job interview or addressing a public meeting? I don't. I view the forum as more 'chatting with friends' - its not a job interview or a written assignment or examination. it SHOULD be more informal. and that means some posters have to be more tolerant of people's writing style.
if you really DONT understand what the poster means then it's ok to ask for clarification - just don't correct their post for them (I hate that - I always imagine the corrector as this fuddy duddy English teacher), or put them down (I hate that too - I always think OOOOOhhh and how perfect are YOU?). Some very intelligent people I know can barely string a sentence together coherently - but, they are very, very good at their jobs.

FWIW Meritaten, even though your posts are not perfect with the spelling and punctuation and capital 'I's etc (as you said yourself ) I can understand perfectly, what you are saying. Same with a number of other posters on MSE. One on DT has problems with her sight, and her posts are a wee bit muddled at times, but you can still understand her IYSWIM.

duchy

Newlyboughthouse wrote: »

The vast majority of people aren't living with MS/dyslexia, yet most people can't seem to get it right. I know there are some that are living with dyslexia/brain diseases and I wouldn't dream of correcting them if I did usually correct people, and wouldn't think anything of a grammatical error that they made.

The point surely is that on a forum you have no idea if someone has medical issues that contribute to how they use spelling or grammar though. You say if I knew as if you have some right to be informed. You don't .

Pollycat

Posted by coolcait (post #140)

Thinking about real life, where I have a good idea of the background and level of education of the writers, the clearest pattern I can see is that ability in English is age-related. The older the writer, the more likely they are to get the basics right. In my view, that is linked to the fact that the approach to teaching English has changed over the years.

If you think about it, if people are coming out of higher education, including teacher training, writing 'would of' etc, then they won't be able to correct it when pupils write it. Worse, that's what they will teach as the 'correct' version.

But is a pubic forum where - as meritaten points out:

meritaten wrote: »

also, its plain that some posters are very upset when they start a thread - the last thing on their minds is SPG! they just need to get their thoughts down.

really the place to start educating people?

However, I chose the examples of 'loose/lose'; 'except/accept'; and 'defiantly/definitely' because there have been a number of occasions on MSE where I've seen one of those combinations used - and I've had to read the post several times to be (fairly) sure which meaning the poster was actually aiming for.

Then if the post is too difficult to understand, move along.
Don't - as the OP seems to want to do but won't because she appears to be bothered about 'winning friends' - point out deficiencies in the poster's ability to express themselves coherently.

Has anyone actually read the post that seems to have affected the OP's sensibilities so much?

Newlyboughthouse wrote: »

Everywhere I look, I see terrible spelling and grammar. It is shocking. Check out the post in Pets and Pet Care titled 'out of hours vet', for example.

Clearly lacking in paragraphs and punctuation and contains spelling mistakes.
Use of 'too' instead of 'to'.
Misspelling of 'know' (no).
Use of 'their' instead of 'they're'.

The thread had 6 replies.
Two of those replies concentrated on the lack of parapgraphs & punctuation and said that the post was hard to read.
The other 4 replies offered advice or asked questions.

Reading a wodge of text is never easy but I did read it and I understood the OP's points.

Newlyboughthouse wrote: »

Question: is it acceptable to correct perpetrators? I feel that I can't without fear of being accused of being the grammar police or a grammar nazi. So I just seethe on the inside.

If the OP of this thread had her way, the OP of the thread in question would have had her issue - the reason she joined MSE for help with - lost under a barrage of corrections.
I certainly wouldn't wish to be part of any forum that made other posters aware of perceived inadequacies in their education.

And is 'perpetrator' really the correct word?

Pollycat

ETA to my post above:

Newlyboughthouse wrote: »

The vast majority of people aren't living with MS/dyslexia, yet most people can't seem to get it right. I know there are some that are living with dyslexia/brain diseases and I wouldn't dream of correcting them if I did usually correct people, and wouldn't think anything of a grammatical error that they made.

The OP of the thread mentioned by the OP of this thread said several times that she was disabled and in a wheelchair.

So what's to say that she doesn't have some disability that impairs her ability to write with sufficient eloquence to satisfy the OP of this thread?

There's nothing to say that at all. We simply don't know.
Exactly the same as we wouldn't have known about the problems experienced by Mupette and SailorSam until they shared that information with us.

But, despite the OP of this thread's assertion that she would never dream of correcting someone with a problem, she went right on ahead and sneered at someone else's attempt at getting her story across.

BucksLady

Newlyboughthouse wrote: »

Everywhere I look, I see terrible spelling and grammar. It is shocking. Check out the post in Pets and Pet Care titled 'out of hours vet', for example.

Question: is it acceptable to correct perpetrators? I feel that I can't without fear of being accused of being the grammar police or a grammar nazi. So I just seethe on the inside.
...

If all you have to worry about is whether posts submitted contain grammatical errors - you are exceedingly fortunate.

pollypenny

meritaten wrote: »

and another thought - Do you use the same language down the pub or chatting with your friends as you would at a job interview or addressing a public meeting? I don't. I view the forum as more 'chatting with friends' - its not a job interview or a written assignment or examination. it SHOULD be more informal. and that means some posters have to be more tolerant of people's writing style.
if you really DONT understand what the poster means then it's ok to ask for clarification - just don't correct their post for them (I hate that - I always imagine the corrector as this fuddy duddy English teacher), or put them down (I hate that too - I always think OOOOOhhh and how perfect are YOU?). Some very intelligent people I know can barely string a sentence together coherently - but, they are very, very good at their jobs.

Hey! We English teachers are not all fuddy-duddy , ya know!

I've never corrected a spelling or punctuation on a post. However, I did pm a young teacher about a mistake once. It was a teacher-bashing thread and I didn't want her to give away more ammunition.

Pollycat

pollypenny wrote: »

Hey! We English teachers are not all fuddy-duddy , ya know!

I've never corrected a spelling or punctuation on a post. However, I did pm a young teacher about a mistake once. It was a teacher-bashing thread and I didn't want her to give away more ammunition.

Out if curiosity, why wouldn't you correct a spelling or punctuation mistake in a post on MSE?

Do you think it's not appropriate or do you think as the OP does - that it's not the way to 'win friends'?