Re: OT -- "its" vs "it's"

[Michele Davis <michele -at- krautgrrl -dot- com>]

Oh dear. Jeff has opened a can of worms. Why do people go to school then? In
Minnesota you can't drop out of school legally until the age of 18. Let's assume
that people attend high school until there are 16, they should, by that point,
with an IQ of 80 or above, be able to know the difference between something
plural and a contraction, in addition they should damn well know the
multiplication tables, and basic addition and subtraction.

As an aside, my ex-husbands lawyer's office sends out letters to my lawyer
littered with typo's. Not only that, but my last name's Davis, my ex's Meyer.
The clerical support staff writes stuff like, "Mr. Davis states..." Who is Mr.
Davis????? These are people that should have some sort of high school diploma,
writing legally binding documents and they don't know how to spell---and what,
we're supposed to "cut them slack" because it's not their occupation to KNOW how
to spell????

Well, I'm a writer, so it's OK for me to not know what 8x8 is? Oy.

Michele (imagine trying to explain to people the accent on the first e on my
birth certificate in America. What do the French say about us? Oh, right, we're
crass, and apparently stupid as well.)

Jeff Hanvey wrote:

> While I believe that writers should use rules of
> grammar, can we really expect those who aren't writers
> and haven't been trained in language quite the way we
> have to know and understand the rules - and use them
> fluidly?
>
> I don't think so! That would be equivalent to a
> programmer expecting everyone to know how to use a
> computer fluidly - Not everyone has the use for it, or
> has the skills for it.
>
> That is, after all, why our jobs exist!


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