10 brain cells or fewer?

The Plain English Campaign have been working very hard lately. Finally, after years of a glaring error in our supermarkets, Tesco have bowed to the will of the Campaign... and changed their checkout signs saying "Ten Items Or Less" to "Up To Ten Items".

[Let's ignore the fact that this introduces the ambiguity of whether ten items are permitted, or if you're allowed nine or fewer. Sometimes, I try to bring eleven items to those queues if I can. They never notice until it it's too late. Mwahaha!]

English fail is widespread it seems. One of D's favourite places to go on the interweb is the English Fail Blog, a place where you can either say "LOL, ESL/EFL speakers got it wrong", or "LOL, native English speakers fail at basic grammar, sentence structure, and apostrophe placement." Really, we should be looking at native English speakers, people who grew up learning English in school as a first language and wondering where it went wrong with a sense of ZOMG, O_o and sadness, not LOL.

I think what you notice the most going around town is the complete lack of awareness of the correct location of apostrophes. Even the Apprentice candidates couldn't work out where the apostrophe in "National Singles' Day" should go. [Mind you, they managed to make a spaghetti bolognese that tasted bad. That is pretty impressive.] The local Italian restaurant [which is never anything but empty or closed] serves the following: pasta's, risotto's, pizza's, and lasagne's. According to Wikipedia, Tesco is guilty of more SPAG fail, with such classics as "mens magazines", "girls toys", "kids books" and "womens shoes". Note the lack of apostrophe.

Whut!?

I just... it's such an easy rule. Apostrophes get involved when you're possessing something. Or abbreviating. But, mostly possession.

Then there's text speak. Of course, I love to use LOL and woot! and ZOMG as much as the next intertube dweller, but I don't use u or ur or 2day or anything that's just an unnecessary abbreviation. Yes, it saves you half a second. It also makes you look illiterate.

The Plain English campaign have said: "Well, gosh. Isn't English tricky? People can't spell. Maybe we should make it easier for them, and just... let poor spelling slide in exams, you know?"

I don't understand. I can't really speak for the generations before, but I don't think it was as much of a problem as it is today. Schooling was different back then. More learning by rote than "let's explore the world of learning, Jimmy". But, it got results, right? Admittedly, some kids fell through the system. Those labelled as dyslexic, etc today would have been labelled stupid, lazy, whatever. There's some good things that happen with education today... but, it can't be that good if university students come out not being able to use apostrophes consistently.

*shakes fist angrily*

~~~

Am I being an intellectual snob here, by writing this? I went to a good school, was in the top sets, with good teachers, and the right mindset. All of these are so important to getting the most out of education. I can't work out if it's reasonable to feel this way about English, or if I should just accept that some people just can't do as well with language as others, to the point of basic English fail.

And, I apologise for my own SPAG errors. I may be a writer/poet type, but above all, I do maths, okay? We're not supposed to be any good at English!