words have meanings

[Mercy]

I am just going to leave these here...

literal (adjective): taking words in their exact sense without metaphor


decimate (verb): to kill or destroy one in every ten of a group or set



J: O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?
R: Que?

[CJC]

I literally decimated the ants in my back yard... by stepping on one of them.

I figuratively decimated the ants in my back yard by laying out a line of salt.


Words are fun. You take a bunch of meaningless vocal chord vibrations, shape them with an orifice, and presto! It gains meaning.



Got any other good ones?

[Binx]

Oh, man. "Wherefore" is a personal pet peeve of mine. It means WHY, people!

[Gleeok]

Does that mean "whyfore" means where?

[Binx]

Um.... no. "Whyfore" is not a word.

It makes sense, when you think of it: Wherefore? Therefore.

[SUCCESSOR]

No, that means "Wazzup?!"

[Chris Miller]

"What are you doing?"
"What are you doing?"
"What are you doing?!"

[Gleeok]

Um.... no. "Whyfore" is not a word.

It makes sense, when you think of it: Wherefore? Therefore.

I admit I was going fishing a little..and now that you've bitten I can't really think of a good punchline... hmm.. howabout:

I don't trust anything that makes beer taste like furniture polish.
http://jacksonville.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/superphoto/photos/blogs/117/oldenglish_0.jpg

[Binx]

I admit I was going fishing a little..and now that you've bitten I can't really think of a good punchline... hmm.. howabout:

I don't trust anything that makes beer taste like furniture polish.
http://jacksonville.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/superphoto/photos/blogs/117/oldenglish_0.jpg
EEEWWWWWW..... Good beer only please...



YAAYYY!!! I suck all the funny away!

[Mercy]

Oh, man. "Wherefore" is a personal pet peeve of mine. It means WHY, people!
You get to be my favourite person this week.

[Binx]

Y'know, I was trying to come up with a funny response to that, but.... Yeah, the best joke I was able to come up with was some stupid comparison between English and ZScript that didn't make any sense unless you're me, anyways.... This is why I didn't become a comedian.

[Mercy]

No worries, lineas. This is just me trying to find a constructive way to vent about the death of literacy.

Without further ado:

whose (adjective): possessive pronoun form of "who" or "which"

who's : contraction for those who think adding a shift and eliminating a space is somehow a shorter/faster way of typing "who is"

(Contractions are slop unless used for diction.)

[Zim]

No worries, lineas. This is just me trying to find a constructive way to vent about the death of literacy.

Without further ado:

whose (adjective): possessive pronoun form of "who" or "which"

who's : contraction for those who think adding a shift and eliminating a space is somehow a shorter/faster way of typing "who is"

(Contractions are slop unless used for diction.)

Note about contractions:
Most words can become contracted with an s to become possessive, as in Larry's or the ball's, and in the plural forms of those words the apostrophe comes after the s, as in Kings' or jousters'.
There are few exceptions to this rule, such as the mentioned, 'who's' which is who is, possessive being 'whose', and the word it. It's is always it is, and never supposed to be used as a possessive form of it.

[Gleeok]

I have a plan for the education system similar to "Golf courses for the homeless". I call it "Hollywood for thought". All we do is cap annual salaries in the entertainment business at let's say $1 million dollars. Everything left over goes directly into schools and the education system, funding it perpetually.

[Zim]

I have a plan for the education system similar to "Golf courses for the homeless". I call it "Hollywood for thought". All we do is cap annual salaries in the entertainment business at let's say $1 million dollars. Everything left over goes directly into schools and the education system, funding it perpetually.

I'd second that.

[Beldaran]

I have a plan for the education system similar to "Golf courses for the homeless". I call it "Hollywood for thought". All we do is cap annual salaries in the entertainment business at let's say $1 million dollars. Everything left over goes directly into schools and the education system, funding it perpetually.

More money isn't going to improve shitty parenting, which is the cause of most shitty students.

[Mercy]

But, but, socialism!
"Public education (tax-financed socialism) has become the most widespread and devastating form of child abuse and racism in the United States." (http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/david_sarasohn/index.ssf/2010/10/art_robinson_didnt_really_mean.html)

I would really like to discuss this topic more seriously but that will have to wait for a later time.

Welcome to the party, Bel. I was missing you.

[Zim]

But, but, socialism!
"Public education (tax-financed socialism) has become the most widespread and devastating form of child abuse and racism in the United States." (http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/david_sarasohn/index.ssf/2010/10/art_robinson_didnt_really_mean.html)

I would really like to discuss this topic more seriously but that will have to wait for a later time.

Welcome to the party, Bel. I was missing you.

One time a completely random set of letters I wrote somehow became "America's #1 drug smuggler."

[SUCCESSOR]

"Public education (tax-financed socialism) has become the most widespread and devastating form of child abuse and racism in the United States." (http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/david_sarasohn/index.ssf/2010/10/art_robinson_didnt_really_mean.html)

Yes. I'd like to hear how anyone plans to divert private income into social assistance without further empowering a bloated and corrupt government that provides said assistance less than adequately.

[Xyvol]

I’ve been wondering lately if illiteracy is more abundant these days, or just more apparent. The digital age has given many more people access to the internet. No longer do you need to have a computer and know how to use it. Now any kid with a phone can post to Facebook and comment on Youtube videos. Kids are getting smartphones with data plans at ten years old, possibly sooner. Whether they know grammar and spelling or not, they don’t care. Hell, plenty of adults I know don’t care. Then you also have people of other nationalities who are posting English as a second language. Anyone can have a blog, journal, or website where they give their opinions and spell them wrong. Most of what I see is from the internet, although I do occasionally catch it out in the real world as well. Someone prints a sign from the office computer that says “Opens 24 hours.” If it were me I would make sure to proof read anything I put out for public consumption.

Another thing I wonder about is if people consider their “digital appearance.” Our society is very concerned about physical appearance. Not only the clothes that you wear, but hygiene too. Despite the saying, if you look slovenly people are going to get a different impression of you than if you are clean and groomed. With physical appearance missing from the internet, the way others perceive you, your “digital appearance” if you will, is in how you type. Spelling, grammar, capitalization, and caps lock all play a part. Even the best thought out argument is not going to get read if the paragraph doesn’t have any punctuation or capitalization. For me, it makes me think someone is uneducated when they mix up “their” and “there”, and use a word like “websight.”

The final factor, which may be the main one, is pure laziness. Textspeak is running rampant. In a chat room, where the printed conversation is scrolling rapidly, I can understand. Sending a text message, well maybe you were pressed for time. There is just no excuse for it when you sit down at the computer to write an email, or post on a forum. You wouldn’t be doing those things if you had such little time that typing “Y” and “o” would just take too much time. The thing that baffled me most is the girl who would reply to my email by saying she didn’t have time to talk. I would include Facebook too, but as I mentioned before most people are doing that from their phone now and can’t be bothered to type out full words. I have no problem with contractions, they are considered common and acceptable in anything other than formal publications. That’s because society is used to them and accepts them. With younger generations growing up to common uses of our laziness, I can see it’s only a matter of time before they become common place.