Can we make a rule about punctuation/ grammar?

I am pretty sure that I am not alone in that posts with no punctuation are very difficult and painful to read. I can understand non-native speakers having problems with grammar and this is not my gripe. My gripe is those who know the language but refuse to use punctuation and capitalization. If there were a rule in the rules section about at least attempting to use proper English punctuation (and grammar) then maybe, possibly, people would type like they had finished the 5th grade.

Yes, some people post huge wads of text with no paragraph breaks, no capitalization (including the personal pronoun “I”), and/or no punctuation, making reading the posts pretty much unbearable.

Personally, I tend to summarily ignore such posts.

Yup, I agree.

For instance, look at SuchAFob’s handle --> no spaces! :wink:

Also look at her location – > What? No capital letter to begin a sentence? What’s this? :wink:

Just kidding, really!

Honestly, does punctuation really matter all that much? I personally would just ignore the poster (no pun intended) :slight_smile: if I find the punctuation unacceptable. But to make a rule? I don’t know. Whatever, I guess. :s

Yeah. I just skip over to the next post, usually.

Sometimes you have to read the posts to understand parts of a discussion. I can think of 4 constant offenders of this off the top of my head.

I can understand grammatical errors caused by lack of understanding of English. I can even understand native speakers occasionally doing the there/ their thing or the it’s/ its thing. But capitalization is an extremely basic and easy skill to master.

Nope. If someone lacks the courtesy to post in a comprehensible manner, I don’t bother extending the courtesty of reading what they have to say. It’s as if they’re not taking part in the discussion, at worst. At best, they’re treated as you would treat a hyper kid who won’t stop jumping up and down babbling while the grownups are speaking. The Internet is serious fucking business, after all.

This has been discussed before, and one of the concerns expressed was that not all of our members are native English speakers, and we don’t want to put them off. On the other hand, the native speakers (some of whom are even English teachers) who don’t even make an attempt to get it right are a bit of an embarrassment to themselves. :laughing: But there’s no rule against looking foolish, is there? And the ones who intentionally misspell all the time, thinking they’re cute, should probably just be put on ignore.

EDIT: Of course some people are dyslexic and can’t help but misspell. No shame there. And some of the misspellers are probably fine English teachers in other ways.

Well, my poster name is not capitalized so I can’t really say too much. If we make a rule, it could lead to further ones such as a quota on the number of posts referring to boozing.

I usually skip the retard posts (but have no prob with non-native English speakers). The same goes for e-mails I receive.

There IS a relevant passage in the rules, btw:

Clearly then, the moderator is allowed to use her or his discretion, blood caffeine level and bad hair day index in deciding whether to dump such posts in the circular file.

In that case, I nominate SuchAFob to be a free-roaming Punctuation Moderator.

On the other hand, posts that contribute nothing but correction of the spelling and/or punctuation of an earlier post are technically off topic and can also be temped.

[quote=“Dragonbones”]There IS a relevant passage in the rules, btw:

Take the effort? TAKE the effort? How exactly does one “TAKE” an effort? Goddammit, this foolery HAS to STOP!

wherz webdoctors when u need hiz azz?

JD,
You’ve been spending too much time with Miltownkid. :astonished:

Man…I take a little nap and wow…a revolution!

Oh…and for what its worth…I agree about the no punctuation, capitalization and no paragraph thing.

Mwahahahahaaaaaaa! Where is my red pen!!!

Hey Fob, would you like to join me on a day jaunt around Taipei with a red marker to fix more “English” out there? I’m kidding…mostly - but there are some days when that sounds so appealing.

Today I received a letter from a doctoral candidate at a local university asking me to edit a paper, and there wasn’t any capitalization in the letter :doh: so I may reject her request. She’s a Ph.D. candidate, for crying out loud!

christ people get a life…i never use capitals and i’m an editor of 20 years standing…we’ve been through this before; if you’re so sensitive to english errors stay off the internet…and go to a bookstore, buy some e.e. cummings and stage a book burning… can we make a rule? no we can’t…personally i like posting in an environment where i can temporarily take off my proofreaders cap…

I thought the internet freed us from the slavery of normal writing?? But the English Nazis will have us bound by our balls.

Oh well, I suppose it all makes good sense. And its once again the Brits who are behind all this :slight_smile: