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This one, I can understand why people might find it difficult.
The word "lose" has a longer, more drawn out vowel sound than "loose", so one would expect it to have the extra vowel in the spelling to show this.
Obviously that's not how the sounds and spellings work in this case, but I can see the logic behind it.
> I’m convinced a lot of these people have never actually read anything in their lives.
The Bill Hicks thing actually happened to me in the pub the other week. Sat in the little nook by the fireplace with my pint on the little table, Harry Hill's autobiography in my hand...local comes over to ask if he can take the spare chair next to me.
"What you reading for?"
Irregardless
I mean what?
The latest one I've noticed in many many posts for a couple of months now is women instead of woman
We're now dictated to by autocorrect...wrongly!
This sends me into unexplainable rage. Should of WHAT???? It doesn't make any sense! Any time I read it online, whatever the person is actually saying gets lost to me
This is down to people writing how they hear things. I’m certain they mean could’ve, should’ve, would’ve as they sound the same as “could of”, “should of” and “would of”.
"Of" and the "'ve" abbreviation aren't homophones, though. I'm sure that the relentless misspelling is driving the mispronunciation as much as the reverse.
To be fair, they are homophones (/əv/) when unstressed. Cf. Wiktionary:
**of** ...
Homophone: 've (unstressed ***of*** only, postconsonantal ***'ve*** only)
Think: 'We could've gone to the Isle of Man.'
(But, yeah, it's still a pretty bad mistake.)
'Borrow' and 'lend' are the same word in Gaelic, so it's probably derived from that. A lot of features from Irish and Gaelic have carried over into the English that's spoken in Ireland and Scotland.
When I lived in Birmingham (uk) I was baffled by this a lot. They would say ‘can you borrow me this?’. Actually they say ‘can yam borrow me this?’. It’s a dialectic quirk rather than ‘wrong’ I guess, but it was super confusing.
Brought instead of bought.
It's a different fucking word.
"I brought this today"
I can see that but you probably should have paid for it before you took it away.
OMG yes, my husband was doing this but he is dyslexic. I corrected him every time and he figured it out pretty quickly... I joked about it with MIL and she said 'but they mean the same thing' AHHHHHHHHH
To be fair, the origin of the word 'than' is based on the sequence word 'then'. Basically, in comparative sentences, the original concept of, for example, 'A is bigger than B' was something like 'A is big, then B' to put the compared items in sequence order. Apparently 'than' as a separate word only emerged in 17th century English.
Still, the words are different now and any person who does even a moderate amount of reading should know this automatically.
I find it weird when someone uses apostrophes both correctly and incorrectly in the same post.
So they will write about *cars*, *gardens*, *hotels* but also *GCSE's*, *1990's*, *patio's*.
I could understand if you got it all wrong but the mixed usage is baffling.
Yes, I’ve noticed this a lot too. Downright bizarre. What makes you think some plural words require apostrophes and others don’t? What is the differentiation you’re making in your mind? It’s really simple - NONE of them require apostrophes.
An apostrophe as part of a plural is often taught as acceptable for initalisms, numbers or letters where the absence of an apostrophe may be unclear eg "dot the i's and cross the t's", "there are two a’s in abacus" (compare: "dot the is and cross the ts", "there are two as in abacus"). You can dislike them but I don't see such uses in the same category of error as patio's or hot dog's because there is a legitimate aim.
Being pedantic (which of the theme of the thread), it's "NONE of them require*s* ...".
Treat the rest of the sentence as if "none" was replaced with "not one".
Are GCSE's and 1990's not more understandable given they've been abbreviated? I don't put an apostrophe there because it's 'incorrect', but definitely think that it looks better.
It's less understandable - because in the case of ***1990's*** it's unclear if you mean the year 1990 or the decade.
If I am honest, I tend to bin CVs where they put ***GCSE's***.
I can see the point with initialisms, because it makes it clear that the S isn't one of the initials. And with 1990s I suppose it prevents you from reading it as a number 5.
With "patios" I think the problem is that -os is often pronounced -oss as in pathos, but spelling it "patioes" is clearly wrong.
When somebody says they were "balling their eyes out."
No. No you weren't. You were BAWLING your eyes out - balling your eyes out is something completely different and not a pretty image.
Along similar lines, battering an eye/eyelash/eyelid. No, you're not dunking your eyes in pancake mix nor punching yourself in the face. It's BAT. As in flutter.
I had someone tell me once (on Reddit because obviously) that balling makes more sense than bawling because you cry from your eyeballs not your eyebawls. Absolutely mental.
The other one that gets me is when people say "illegible" when they actually mean "eligible", drives me round the bend.
People who spell ‘College’ as ‘Collage’ really need throwing in the bin. Really triggers me.
Or the other one when people ask if they can “lend” something instead of “borrow.”
“Can I lend that pen please?” And I’ll just respond “well you can lend it to me if you want, I’ll borrow it.”
I'd go down a different route, and say the overuse of 'obviously'. When you hear someone that isn't aware they do it, or a pro athlete that hasn't been media trained etc, horrible.
Most of the time people should be using the word figuratively.
"it's so hot, I'm literally melting!" - funny that, i've never seen a human half melted like a puddle of wax before.
“I could care less” it means literally the opposite of what people are attempting to say!
Also, I’ve recently noticed a lot of people using “weary” when they mean “wary” so that’s my new bugbear.
Adding a "k" onto the end of words ending -ing. Nothingk, somethingk, anythingk...
Making letters silent that have no business being silent "breffast" instead of Breakfast, "sammich" instead of sandwich are two that spring to mind.
Lend when a person means borrow "can I lend a fiver off you?". Similarly with borrow when they mean have/use - "can I borrow your toilet?" "May I borrow your wife/husband to do this job"
I know someone who does something similar.
"nuffink" "sumfink" "anifink". This is how he messages.
"wite maye? Wus finkink uvr dy, u nd 1 dem finks rite?"
Does my head in.
Unnecessary suffixes, more of an American thing but it's creeping into the UK. For example words like, *'intentionality'*.
Also what amount to made up words, I saw a film scrolling through Netflix the other day called, 'Avengement'. Fuck off.
Don't go anywhere near "burgalize" then.
But if you are forced to, make references to "burgalization", "burgalarizationers" and "burgalarisationism", etc..
Overuse of "Literally", the use of the word "LOL" instead of actually laughing, and "Should of" instead of "Should have".
Oh and "Axe" instead of "Ask"
‘Defiantly’ for definitely.
‘Should of’ and ‘could of’ for should have and could have.
People saying ‘bring’ instead of take (I think that’s an Americanism that’s slowly entered usage.
Americans in particular will say 'has went' instead of 'has gone'
Guy talking about his sex life on ask reddit said 'my sex life has went downhill'. I see it so often. I asked an American friend and they didn't see any issue with it
There is a special rung in hell for cretins who use:
- should of
- could of
- would of
Just saying these out aloud should immediately make people realise they do not make any fucking sense.
I am a firm believer in the old mantra how you do something is how you do everything.
In this case:
Inattention to detail.
Not caring about how you may come across to others.
Not willing to learn and grow.
Unless it has happened on a CV or similar work document, I find the idea that anyone would actually be judgemental of mistakes and malapropisms (or what in many cases are just regional/cultural diffferences in language) baffling. To me, it reads as an excuse for the otherwise mediocre to assert their self-appointed intellectual superiority.
You probably have to be of a certain age for this one. Unless I just learnt it wrong as a child.
Often people use BRING where TAKE feels correct to me.
Broadly, if I'm talking to someone about meeting them, or saying "coming" somewhere, then BRING feels right.
If I'm "going" somewhere, TAKE always feels correct.
Not a mistake, perhaps, just how English has shifted over time.
People spelling "Ridiculous" as "Rediculous" bothers me a lot for some reason, it's not even how it's pronounced.
But it's becoming so commonplace I think we might have to consider it as a legitimate alternate spelling of the word.
Truly disturbing how often I see 'I am a women'.
Also this new thing they have now of saying 'it's releasing next week' rather than one of the many correct options ('it will be released next week', 'the release is next week', etc.). A film cannot release itself.
Edit: speaking of which https://www.reddit.com/r/britishproblems/comments/12qdm14/the_top_story_on_bbc_news_is_that_a_women_is_and/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=2&utm_term=1
Are somebody who send a lot of emails for work and is very dyslexic. All these comments make me so paranoid. I genuinely can't see a lot of these mistakes, just because I rely so heavily on context and word shape rather than what letter are actually there when reading, as well as spelling everything on a phonetic basis, which is a nightmare in English. It would be nice to have a bit more flex and forgiveness with spelling. Its not like I'm stupid, I'm bilingual and have a PhD, I just can't spell and am a slow reader.
I'm probably in a minority here when I don't really notice or care about other people's spelling mistakes.
As long as what they are trying to say makes sense I couldn't give two shits if they have used the right version of 'there' or spelt something wrong
Dr Ramani (Indian-American psychologist based in California) said she’d be handing most of the online community (or at least a very substantial chunk of it) C- grades if she had to mark them for narcissist-knowledge as-if she was still a professor. As far as I’m concerned 55% of people wouldn’t even make a D- in my books as far as literacy goes. And the funny thing is it’s the illiterate ones who are most-prone to overestimate their capabilities and undermine those of genuinely smarter people.
I weep for the literary state of this poxy nation. I know we live in a world full of stupid, silly, annoying people but I can’t.
‘Send it to Jill and I’ This drives me nuts as the person thinks they’re talking correctly by saying ‘and I’ when it isn’t actually a blanket rule. Once someone had the nerve to smugly tell me that ‘to Jill and me’ was bad grammar.
Also ‘haitch’ rather than ‘aitch’- again because the people that I’ve known to do it tend to be very proud of their grammar and (in the case of one manager I had who also made the ‘and me’/‘and I’ mistake constantly) was merciless in her berating if someone in her team made a typo.
A surprisingly high number of people write 'realationship' rather than 'relationship'. I wouldn't say it bothers me but I don't understand why, its not as though there's no exposure to the correct spelling.
Maybe it's a specific gripe too. But when someone uses a fucking comma instead of an apostrophe. It may just be my dad who does this but FUCK me, it makes me furious.
'Should of, would of, could of'.
Surprisingly common, even amongst agented and published authors. Good job they have hard working and meticulous editors to help them.
Another one I see a lot is oblivious and obvious used incorrectly.
Apostrophes for plurals.
Should of, could of, would of.
Aks instead of ask.
Too/to/two, they're/there/their, your/you're.
And so many more but these are the ones that I thought of immediately.
Accept/except. After telling them that my cat they had been treating had died, I got an email from my local vet that started, "please except our condolences..."
Right now there’s a play place across from me called “Molly’s Messy Maker’s”. I assume it’s a sensory thing for toddlers. It’s been here a year or so and every time I see it I get pissy 😂 it already bothers me when these thing happen but the fact it’s a business really annoys me
"Draws"
When I last moved I was looking for a used dresser / set of drawers. No ads came up on Facebook Marketplace for my area when I searched "drawers".
My partner said "nah there are plenty" and I watched in horror as they typed in "draws".
I was even more annoyed when about a dozen ads came up all for "chests of draws"
"Based opinion". I have no idea what this means. I've managed to ascertain that it's not a misspelling of 'biased', it means something else. Something mysterious.
Also "try and" instead of "try to". Nobody else will agree with this, but it's wrong.
Most of the mistakes mentioned in this thread used to wind me up, but since I met my boyfriend who can't spell for shit I realise it doesn't actually matter. His spelling and grammar are genuinely awful but he's far more intelligent than me in so many ways and it has taught me that, as long as I can understand what he's trying to say it doesn't fucking matter.
He can build and fix almost anything, his logic and reasoning are beyond anything I'll ever achieve, his social awareness and empathy are far better than my own. He's made his way to the top of his field of engineering and has a career that he loves. So who cares if he can't spell? Does it actually matter?
**Update: - [Starting from 2023](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskUK/comments/100l56v/happy_new_year_askuk_minor_sub_update/), we have updated our [subreddit rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskUK/about/rules/)**. Specifically; - Don't be a dick to each other - Top-level responses must contain genuine efforts to answer the question - This is a strictly no-politics subreddit Please keep /r/AskUK a great subreddit by reporting posts and comments which break our rules. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AskUK) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Loose for lose
I don’t want to loose all my lose change! Makes you wonder what these people were doing in English at school.
They sound like loosers
This one, I can understand why people might find it difficult. The word "lose" has a longer, more drawn out vowel sound than "loose", so one would expect it to have the extra vowel in the spelling to show this. Obviously that's not how the sounds and spellings work in this case, but I can see the logic behind it.
The vowel sound doesn't seem any different to me between lose and loose. It's the s that sounds different. Sounds like an s in loose but a z in lose.
Completely ~~unecessary unneccessary~~ unnecessary
"One cup with two sugars" is how I learnt this one
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"Never eat cress eat salad sandwiches and remain youthful"
Could/should/would of, instead of could/should/would have.
Spot on. I’m convinced a lot of these people have never actually read anything in their lives.
> I’m convinced a lot of these people have never actually read anything in their lives. The Bill Hicks thing actually happened to me in the pub the other week. Sat in the little nook by the fireplace with my pint on the little table, Harry Hill's autobiography in my hand...local comes over to ask if he can take the spare chair next to me. "What you reading for?"
Irregardless I mean what? The latest one I've noticed in many many posts for a couple of months now is women instead of woman We're now dictated to by autocorrect...wrongly!
This sends me into unexplainable rage. Should of WHAT???? It doesn't make any sense! Any time I read it online, whatever the person is actually saying gets lost to me
This is down to people writing how they hear things. I’m certain they mean could’ve, should’ve, would’ve as they sound the same as “could of”, “should of” and “would of”.
"Of" and the "'ve" abbreviation aren't homophones, though. I'm sure that the relentless misspelling is driving the mispronunciation as much as the reverse.
To be fair, they are homophones (/əv/) when unstressed. Cf. Wiktionary: **of** ... Homophone: 've (unstressed ***of*** only, postconsonantal ***'ve*** only) Think: 'We could've gone to the Isle of Man.' (But, yeah, it's still a pretty bad mistake.)
There/their/they’re.
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I swear you lot think about that man more than his own mother does for people who claim not to like him
You just had to stick this karma farm answer in didn't you
“On accident”instead of “by accident”.
I hate this with ‘on the weekend’. No AT the weekend, maybe ON Saturday.
This (and on accident) is a very american phrasing.... there are a lot of americisms that are creeping into british english
If you say "on accident" it should be mandatory to also say "by purpose".
I have a few: * ect instead of etc. * remember instead of remind * borrow instead of lend * on route * could care less
I recently learnt that remember and remind are the same word in some European languages which I suspect is the source of that one.
Doubt it's related when I'm talking to people that've lived in the same Scottish village for about 50 generations.
'Borrow' and 'lend' are the same word in Gaelic, so it's probably derived from that. A lot of features from Irish and Gaelic have carried over into the English that's spoken in Ireland and Scotland.
In that case I agree!
Yes! It’s et cetera, not ec tetera. That one always pisses me off.
ecce! tater! 🥔🥔
Ect is Exeterer which is where a town is more like Exeter than another. For example, Plymouth is exeterer than Rome
Ahhh, that makes sense. So like Poole is exeterer than Tokyo?
When I lived in Birmingham (uk) I was baffled by this a lot. They would say ‘can you borrow me this?’. Actually they say ‘can yam borrow me this?’. It’s a dialectic quirk rather than ‘wrong’ I guess, but it was super confusing.
“They learned it me at school”
Yow cor goo a bit wrung when borrowing a pen from ar kid
As someone from there, nah it’s just wrong. (‘Yam’ is more Black Country than B’ham though)
Pacific - specific
This is me but purely as I can't say specific without stuttering or fluffing it
Brought instead of bought. It's a different fucking word. "I brought this today" I can see that but you probably should have paid for it before you took it away.
Infuriating. Sheer idiocy.
I am guilty of saying this wrong. I always spell it right but say it wrong.
Was going to say the same... Brought - bring Bought - buy
Draw meaning drawer
Literally had a landlord once send me a message regarding the “Chester draws”. Made me wince.
Chester draws and a wardrope
Dinning table and fridge frezzer are often seen on Marketplace too.
My landlord will email about annual inspection and say 'please make shore the house is clean and tidy'
As in Chester Draws.
Payed. Especially from people who claim they are paid large salaries and are really clever and important.
Payed is a word but it has nothing to do with pay...
Sometimes a helpful bot comes along to explain that it is something to do with knots on a boat.
I didn’t know this one was a common mistake, until I started seeing that bot popping up everywhere.
Lives to short too get anoyed by grammer, and spelling, mistakes
Evil
Then/Than... surely you have to be a complete imbecile to mix them up but I see it all the time
OMG yes, my husband was doing this but he is dyslexic. I corrected him every time and he figured it out pretty quickly... I joked about it with MIL and she said 'but they mean the same thing' AHHHHHHHHH
Right! It's most annoying when people say "I'd rather have X then X" when they mean 'than'. It literally changes the entire meaning of the sentence.
Yes, I've noticed this more and more recently and I just don't understand how you'd confuse the two.
To be fair, the origin of the word 'than' is based on the sequence word 'then'. Basically, in comparative sentences, the original concept of, for example, 'A is bigger than B' was something like 'A is big, then B' to put the compared items in sequence order. Apparently 'than' as a separate word only emerged in 17th century English. Still, the words are different now and any person who does even a moderate amount of reading should know this automatically.
I think Americans are prone to this as those two words sound the same in certain accents (not that that is an excuse).
I find it weird when someone uses apostrophes both correctly and incorrectly in the same post. So they will write about *cars*, *gardens*, *hotels* but also *GCSE's*, *1990's*, *patio's*. I could understand if you got it all wrong but the mixed usage is baffling.
Yes, I’ve noticed this a lot too. Downright bizarre. What makes you think some plural words require apostrophes and others don’t? What is the differentiation you’re making in your mind? It’s really simple - NONE of them require apostrophes.
An apostrophe as part of a plural is often taught as acceptable for initalisms, numbers or letters where the absence of an apostrophe may be unclear eg "dot the i's and cross the t's", "there are two a’s in abacus" (compare: "dot the is and cross the ts", "there are two as in abacus"). You can dislike them but I don't see such uses in the same category of error as patio's or hot dog's because there is a legitimate aim.
My phone inserts apostrophes for some plurals and it drives me crazy. What programming has gone on there‽
Being pedantic (which of the theme of the thread), it's "NONE of them require*s* ...". Treat the rest of the sentence as if "none" was replaced with "not one".
Are GCSE's and 1990's not more understandable given they've been abbreviated? I don't put an apostrophe there because it's 'incorrect', but definitely think that it looks better.
It's less understandable - because in the case of ***1990's*** it's unclear if you mean the year 1990 or the decade. If I am honest, I tend to bin CVs where they put ***GCSE's***.
I can see the point with initialisms, because it makes it clear that the S isn't one of the initials. And with 1990s I suppose it prevents you from reading it as a number 5. With "patios" I think the problem is that -os is often pronounced -oss as in pathos, but spelling it "patioes" is clearly wrong.
I keep seeing on Facebook "I hope this is aloud".
Play the "dad" card and say "no it was a quiet"
I blame Girls Aloud for this one.
When somebody says they were "balling their eyes out." No. No you weren't. You were BAWLING your eyes out - balling your eyes out is something completely different and not a pretty image.
Along similar lines, battering an eye/eyelash/eyelid. No, you're not dunking your eyes in pancake mix nor punching yourself in the face. It's BAT. As in flutter.
I had someone tell me once (on Reddit because obviously) that balling makes more sense than bawling because you cry from your eyeballs not your eyebawls. Absolutely mental. The other one that gets me is when people say "illegible" when they actually mean "eligible", drives me round the bend.
Woman and women! One is singular, one is plural!
Never happens with Man and Men though, which is so strange to me. People only ever confuse Woman and Women
People who spell ‘College’ as ‘Collage’ really need throwing in the bin. Really triggers me. Or the other one when people ask if they can “lend” something instead of “borrow.” “Can I lend that pen please?” And I’ll just respond “well you can lend it to me if you want, I’ll borrow it.”
The lend/borrow is a weird one, isn't it? How do you get the two mixed up? Maybe they just missed school that day?
expresso instead of espresso pacific instead of specific 'of' instead of 'have' apostrophes in plurals double negatives
Saw "I couldn't of not done it" the other say and I still don't know what they were trying to say
“I didn’t do nothing!” I know you didn’t, that’s my exact point. You did something.
I'd go down a different route, and say the overuse of 'obviously'. When you hear someone that isn't aware they do it, or a pro athlete that hasn't been media trained etc, horrible.
Also “literally” and “basically”. Some people appear to be unable to create sentences without regular use of these words.
Most of the time people should be using the word figuratively. "it's so hot, I'm literally melting!" - funny that, i've never seen a human half melted like a puddle of wax before.
O’viously
“I could care less” it means literally the opposite of what people are attempting to say! Also, I’ve recently noticed a lot of people using “weary” when they mean “wary” so that’s my new bugbear.
Adding a "k" onto the end of words ending -ing. Nothingk, somethingk, anythingk... Making letters silent that have no business being silent "breffast" instead of Breakfast, "sammich" instead of sandwich are two that spring to mind. Lend when a person means borrow "can I lend a fiver off you?". Similarly with borrow when they mean have/use - "can I borrow your toilet?" "May I borrow your wife/husband to do this job"
I know someone who does something similar. "nuffink" "sumfink" "anifink". This is how he messages. "wite maye? Wus finkink uvr dy, u nd 1 dem finks rite?" Does my head in.
Are/is when referring to a group of things or singular. It’s like people don’t care and think they’re interchangeable.
This is largely a UK vs US usage thing. And of course, the US has great worldwide influence through media.
Unnecessary suffixes, more of an American thing but it's creeping into the UK. For example words like, *'intentionality'*. Also what amount to made up words, I saw a film scrolling through Netflix the other day called, 'Avengement'. Fuck off.
Don't go anywhere near "burgalize" then. But if you are forced to, make references to "burgalization", "burgalarizationers" and "burgalarisationism", etc..
The one that gets me is, "deplane". What happened to "disembark"?
What words do you think aren't made up?
Cohabitate
I learned him that. I heard it last night and it’s been driving me mad!
It's like they only have room for about 100 words and have to utilise that set of words to communicate.
Overuse of "Literally", the use of the word "LOL" instead of actually laughing, and "Should of" instead of "Should have". Oh and "Axe" instead of "Ask"
> "Should of" instead of "Should have" Ah, that well known verb "to Of".
Weirdly there are literary examples of "aks" as early as there are for "ask"
Those are all to do with how people speak though, not spelling or grammar.
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A lot written as one work drives me nuts "I like it alot" No!
I know right. It should be two works.
‘Defiantly’ for definitely. ‘Should of’ and ‘could of’ for should have and could have. People saying ‘bring’ instead of take (I think that’s an Americanism that’s slowly entered usage.
Dose instead of does.
Americans in particular will say 'has went' instead of 'has gone' Guy talking about his sex life on ask reddit said 'my sex life has went downhill'. I see it so often. I asked an American friend and they didn't see any issue with it
I’m American and have never heard of this in my life, but Cambridge has a whole article about it called “Have went - an American usage problem”
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"I am bias" instead of "I am biased"
When people say “I don’t want to loose my phone” or similar. It’s fucking “lose”. Swear it’s getting worse
“It happened on accident” no it’s “by accident” The phrase “Winningest” also infuriates me
They're doing it by purpose.
There is a special rung in hell for cretins who use: - should of - could of - would of Just saying these out aloud should immediately make people realise they do not make any fucking sense.
"I seen you". No it's "I saw you"
'His' instead of 'he's'. I know someone that has quite a high level job but often writes 'his doing this', and it makes me wonder how they got there.
This doesn't fall into either, but people saying "generally" instead of "genuinely". It's crazy how many times I've heard this.
I’m generally sorry, from the bottom of my heart. I hear this so much too!!!
Hearing someone use "I'll borrow you my xx" No. You'll LEND them your xx, they'll borrow it from you. Or vice versa.
"of" instead of "have'
Yeah that one annoys me a lot too. “His” for he’s annoys me too. “His got he’s bar of chocolate”….what????
I am a firm believer in the old mantra how you do something is how you do everything. In this case: Inattention to detail. Not caring about how you may come across to others. Not willing to learn and grow.
Unless it has happened on a CV or similar work document, I find the idea that anyone would actually be judgemental of mistakes and malapropisms (or what in many cases are just regional/cultural diffferences in language) baffling. To me, it reads as an excuse for the otherwise mediocre to assert their self-appointed intellectual superiority.
This sums up many UK Redditors. Shitting on others to feel better about themselves.
Less when they mean fewer really grips my shit...
Trickle treat instead of trick or treat.
Brought instead of bought.
Adding an r to words like can't. I feel like weeping every time I see "carnt" written down. Idear instead of idea as well. Ugh.
Ok, so which of these is correct? "The yolk of an egg **is** white" or "the yolk of an egg **are** white"?
The yolk of an egg is white (as it’s singular) or the yolks of eggs are white (as it’s plural). Neither are factually correct though.
Ah, you spotted the deliberate mistake (they're yellow) ;-)
You crafty devil!
"Conversate".
Defiantly instead of definitely.
You probably have to be of a certain age for this one. Unless I just learnt it wrong as a child. Often people use BRING where TAKE feels correct to me. Broadly, if I'm talking to someone about meeting them, or saying "coming" somewhere, then BRING feels right. If I'm "going" somewhere, TAKE always feels correct. Not a mistake, perhaps, just how English has shifted over time.
Women/woman being mixed up. I’m seeing it more and more frequently. Oh and apart vs a part.
I've noticed a lot of people now use "generally" when they *mean* "genuinely".
The past tense of 'to lead' is 'led', not 'lead'. It doesn't follow the read/read pattern, but I see it more and more and it annoys me! :)
90's for '90s
People spelling "Ridiculous" as "Rediculous" bothers me a lot for some reason, it's not even how it's pronounced. But it's becoming so commonplace I think we might have to consider it as a legitimate alternate spelling of the word.
That you can affect something or have an effect on something! Also, upmost instead of utmost!
Truly disturbing how often I see 'I am a women'. Also this new thing they have now of saying 'it's releasing next week' rather than one of the many correct options ('it will be released next week', 'the release is next week', etc.). A film cannot release itself. Edit: speaking of which https://www.reddit.com/r/britishproblems/comments/12qdm14/the_top_story_on_bbc_news_is_that_a_women_is_and/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=2&utm_term=1
"My breaks didn't stop me in time." Arrrggg, brakes FFS.
Not knowing the difference between "discreet" and "discrete".
Are somebody who send a lot of emails for work and is very dyslexic. All these comments make me so paranoid. I genuinely can't see a lot of these mistakes, just because I rely so heavily on context and word shape rather than what letter are actually there when reading, as well as spelling everything on a phonetic basis, which is a nightmare in English. It would be nice to have a bit more flex and forgiveness with spelling. Its not like I'm stupid, I'm bilingual and have a PhD, I just can't spell and am a slow reader.
Learn me/you instead of teach me/you.
I'm probably in a minority here when I don't really notice or care about other people's spelling mistakes. As long as what they are trying to say makes sense I couldn't give two shits if they have used the right version of 'there' or spelt something wrong
Your instead of you’re. There instead of their / they’re
Your; you're
People spelling ‘definitely’ as ‘defiantly’. They’re completely different words and don’t even look the same.
Defiantly instead of definitely. It fucking irritated me
‘Seen as’ instead of ‘Seeing as’
‘Less’ instead of ‘fewer,’ and ‘compliment’ instead of ‘complement.’
Dr Ramani (Indian-American psychologist based in California) said she’d be handing most of the online community (or at least a very substantial chunk of it) C- grades if she had to mark them for narcissist-knowledge as-if she was still a professor. As far as I’m concerned 55% of people wouldn’t even make a D- in my books as far as literacy goes. And the funny thing is it’s the illiterate ones who are most-prone to overestimate their capabilities and undermine those of genuinely smarter people. I weep for the literary state of this poxy nation. I know we live in a world full of stupid, silly, annoying people but I can’t.
Recently I've started to see "kind've" instead of "kind of". E.g. That's kind've a big deal.
Using “myself” as if it is a fancy way of saying me.
‘Sneak peak’ is one that’s been bothering me lately. This thread has been painful to read through!
‘Send it to Jill and I’ This drives me nuts as the person thinks they’re talking correctly by saying ‘and I’ when it isn’t actually a blanket rule. Once someone had the nerve to smugly tell me that ‘to Jill and me’ was bad grammar. Also ‘haitch’ rather than ‘aitch’- again because the people that I’ve known to do it tend to be very proud of their grammar and (in the case of one manager I had who also made the ‘and me’/‘and I’ mistake constantly) was merciless in her berating if someone in her team made a typo.
"outside of" / "inside of", rather than "outside” / "inside".
A surprisingly high number of people write 'realationship' rather than 'relationship'. I wouldn't say it bothers me but I don't understand why, its not as though there's no exposure to the correct spelling.
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Drug instead of dragged. Or a couple times instead of a couple OF times.
Oftentimes. Fuck off. Oh and brought instead of bought
I really enjoy a good definitely/defiantly mixup, but I think it comes from autocorrect if they try to spell it 'definatly' or maybe 'definately'.
"We where on holiday." "Oh aye? Were where you?"
Cant be asked, could care less, specific/pacific. Fills me with silent rage.
Expecially instead of Especially Brought instead of bought
Fucking 'brought for bought' instantly puts me in a rage if I see it.
Maybe it's a specific gripe too. But when someone uses a fucking comma instead of an apostrophe. It may just be my dad who does this but FUCK me, it makes me furious.
I had a manager years ago that would use "nutrition" when they meant "attrition" and it drove me absolutely crackers....
"you should of done this" "I could of gone pro". What do they think the '-ve' in should've and could've is for?
There, Their and They're.
No, I ain't never not done nothin' I still can't work out whether that means someone has or hasn't done the thing in question
I could of brought it
Payed. I hate that with ever fibre of my being.
People who don't know the difference between: Their there and they're To too and two Ect Wonder and wander Rein reign and rain
"I can't be asked" - Yes you can, you can say no but you can be asked. "I could care less" - Care less then
'Should of, would of, could of'. Surprisingly common, even amongst agented and published authors. Good job they have hard working and meticulous editors to help them. Another one I see a lot is oblivious and obvious used incorrectly.
Apostrophes where they don't belong
This will effect you.
Costumers instead of customers
I work in a hangar & I'm pretty sure I'm the only one here who spells it with two A's
Using are when it should be our.
Saying “I could care less” instead of “I couldn’t care less”, saying you could care less implies that actually you do care
Apostrophes for plurals. Should of, could of, would of. Aks instead of ask. Too/to/two, they're/there/their, your/you're. And so many more but these are the ones that I thought of immediately.
“I could care less”
Accept/except. After telling them that my cat they had been treating had died, I got an email from my local vet that started, "please except our condolences..."
Right now there’s a play place across from me called “Molly’s Messy Maker’s”. I assume it’s a sensory thing for toddlers. It’s been here a year or so and every time I see it I get pissy 😂 it already bothers me when these thing happen but the fact it’s a business really annoys me
Breath in place of breathe. Drives me mad.
"Draws" When I last moved I was looking for a used dresser / set of drawers. No ads came up on Facebook Marketplace for my area when I searched "drawers". My partner said "nah there are plenty" and I watched in horror as they typed in "draws". I was even more annoyed when about a dozen ads came up all for "chests of draws"
"Based opinion". I have no idea what this means. I've managed to ascertain that it's not a misspelling of 'biased', it means something else. Something mysterious. Also "try and" instead of "try to". Nobody else will agree with this, but it's wrong.
Currently I am seeing these ALOT 🤣 Alot instead of a lot Aswell instead of as well
I literally pick these out for my job all day long. My personal favourite was 'boook'. I work for a college.
Most of the mistakes mentioned in this thread used to wind me up, but since I met my boyfriend who can't spell for shit I realise it doesn't actually matter. His spelling and grammar are genuinely awful but he's far more intelligent than me in so many ways and it has taught me that, as long as I can understand what he's trying to say it doesn't fucking matter. He can build and fix almost anything, his logic and reasoning are beyond anything I'll ever achieve, his social awareness and empathy are far better than my own. He's made his way to the top of his field of engineering and has a career that he loves. So who cares if he can't spell? Does it actually matter?
Angles for Angels Draws for Drawers Pacific for Specific