There’s a lot of stuff floating around Facebook of late dealing with typos of all kinds: cute homework misspellings, SMS autocorrections, misspelled graffiti, flubbed tattoos, missing or rearranged lettering on signs, blown cake inscriptions, and so on ad nauseam — and now, “Weird Al” Yankovic’s viral hit video “Word Crimes.” And since I am an editor and I am known to consort with editors, many of these items find their way into my feed on a daily basis, usually accompanied by wails over the precarious state of civilization.

The thing is, I’m one of those editors who is not a grammar pedant. I don’t get worked up over a misplaced apostrophe or an incorrect homonym choice. I find Lynne Truss and her ilk to be tiresome, boorish, condescending snobs. In my opinion people who wander the city with markers correcting punctuation on signage aren’t defenders of good grammar, they’re just vandals. An original piece of spray-painted street art under a bridge is worth infinitely more to our society than all of their smudges combined.

That’s not to say that I don’t laugh at great typos (particularly ones that convey an ironic, double-entendered, or scatological meaning). I just don’t hold to the idea that a typo is an indicator of intelligence or a sign of declining standards.

What does dismay me about typos is that they have become a cheap way for people to heave bucketloads of schadenfreude and scorn upon the heads of people they don’t know via the safe distance of social media. We do not engage or persuade using debate and reasoned argument; we merely mock. In the reductio ad absurdum of social media-driven pop culture, we overlook a tattoo’s message of empowerment and confidence and focus instead on the misplaced apostrophe that means nothing.

In my job, I correct typos made by incredibly smart people. Likewise, editors correct typos that I’ve made all the time. No one’s intelligence is doubted. No one’s credibility is damaged. If people didn’t make mistakes, I would probably have to go out and get a real job. It is that way because language is really fucking hard to do well.

Believing that you’re striking a blow for language by going after typos is like saying you’re standing up for classical music by going to a concert and blowing a raspberry every time a musician fumbles a note or misses a beat.

Pretty dickish behavior, right? Well, same damn thing. So just don’t do it. Don’t be a dick.

Categorised as: Life the Universe and Everything

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