The Grammar & Spelling Nazi Rant

Twitter and 140 characters bring my little Grammar & Spelling Nazi bubbling to the surface. Actually, the blogosphere and online articles evoke it as well.

The Grammar & Spelling Nazi was created at the hands of the Ursuline nuns over ten years of my early life. In third grade, I had a teacher with particularly long nails who would drag those long nails down the chalkboard at every grammatical infraction. Being a voracious reader, the Spelling Nazi developed a bit more organically without screechy nails but the cringe is the same.

I am fine with shortening words for text or twitter. The Nazi gets that. The Nazi even gets obvious typos and typing too fast errors. The Nazi allows for creative license with blog and conversational style, so long as it is spelled correctly! I will even confess, I enjoy creative spelling if it is purposeful and clever.

The Grammar & Spelling Nazi does not get those who choose not to use spell check or other assistive devices - like a brain.

The repeated makes-me-want-to-stab-someone-with-scissors infraction is the Your versus You're.

I am always completely flabbergasted on my political twitter/blog how many times I get this from those who disagree with my stance: "Your a Moron."

Right. I'm a Moron because you can't even insult me properly? I started sending the comments back after correcting them. One guy continued to spit at me and in every tweet, he had incorrect usage or spelling errors. I finally ended it with: "YOUR KIDDING - WRITE?"

Kim's Other Pet Peeve - the automatic thank you's that are generated when you follow someone that are spelled incorrectly. My most recent favorite: "Thanx for the follow. Let me asist you in creasing your business."

Thanks, but I will reserve my business for someone who uses spellcheck properly. The person who sends this kind of thank you is the same person that uses those advertised services for thousands of followers in one day or sends out tweets about white teeth. Junk in, Junk out.

OK. Tuesday rant is over and I will leave you with two great links from Brian Clark on copyblogger. If you have not read Brian's posts, I highly recommend them!

Five Grammatical Errors that Make You Look Dumb by Brian Clark

The Inigo Montoya Guide to 27 Commonly Misused Words by Brian Clark