Thursday, April 16, 2015

Bad Wordplay

When Twittering, messaging and whatnot, kids have apparently moved beyond the Internet shorthand we're still not familiar with. Now they write subordinate clauses without the normally expected sentence bit that completes the thought. They expect YOU to complete the thought.

I realize that written history is filled with overly complete thoughts. For example, old books with chapter headings that go on and on: "Chapter 2: In which our hero finds that disagreeable occurrences will take place on a Cruise."  I grant you this is overdone, but at least it is a sentence with a subject in it.

The Internet and early mobile phones spawned those awful shortcuts ("LOL" and such) and emoticons (😃, etc.). Now they are messing with syntax. They're making you figure out what they are writing about (e.g., "When you cross the street, but your friend waits for the oncoming car".)  Neither a sentence nor a complete thought. You have to figure those bits out.

Sheesh. Curmudgeons have enough to complain about. Just write in plain old English. Works for me.

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