"Yeoman Strunk, energize the Philippicizer."

A throbbing sound deep in the hull of the vessel builds to a feral roar, then throttles back to a steady, chattering ostinato of ire: (rrrrrrrrRRRRRANT-rant-rant-rant . . .)

"Thank you, yeoman. Gunner? You may fire at will."

bozon's on the right track here. People who can spell are oppressing the poor darlings who can't. How? By making them look like illiterate boneheads. That's mean and unfair because being an illiterate bonehead is a good thing! People who can spell think they're special! They think they're so smart. People like that should be punished. They should be taught a lesson. It's not fair that they use their brains, because some people don't have brains or don't feel like using them. When somebody's not as dumb as you are, you feel bad, don't you? You do, and they're making you feel bad! It's not your fault. It's mean and bad to make people feel bad about themselves. It's much better to tell them that everything they do is good, because nobody really cares whether it's good or not anyway, as long as teacher gives you a good grade. The only important thing is to feel good, because feeling bad isn't nice.

We don't need no education.

bozon's remedy may seem harsh, but in fact it's far too lenient. If we stop with banning dictionaries and spell checkers, there will still be millions of books out there just riddled with correct spelling. Does no one think of the children?! Imagine your own children, your own dear little ones, happening across some damned BOOK, some filthy piece of READING MATTER, when they could be doing something creative and egalitarian like rotting lifelessly in front of the television. Imagine further that they are young and foolish enough to read that book! They could be infected with literacy. It could take you years to get their IQ back down to a nice healthy 40 or so. Do you want that to happen TO THE CHILDREN?! I thought not.

We can't just ban dictionaries and spell checkers. We must ban all printed matter. Spell checkers will of course have to remain in the hands of the Antie-Eleetism Poleice: They will be invaluable in apprehending offenders against the Iliterrisy Lawws. After all, the Poeliece won't know how to spell, so they won't know correct spelling if it bites them in the ass. They'll need some help.

The web is less dangerous, because there's no quality control: Most of the text there is illiterate gibberish. There's no danger that your child will learn to use language properly from the web, because the vast majority of what's there is written by people who have childlike mentalities themselves. The few good bits are lost in the noise. In fact, there's really no better way to teach your children valuable illiteracy skills than to expose them to the wonderful world wide web.



Hey, kids, you learn to spell by reading. That's a fact. If you think reading is "work", you've got a serious problem. Poor spelling is a reasonably reliable indicator of A) lack of attention to detail, and/or B) lack of education (either you can and you don't give a shit about doing things well, or you just plain can't). Both of those are real real live honest-to-god deficiencies. When you hire people like that, you live to regret it. If this be elitism, let us make the most of it.

100% true.

If you don't know how to spell, people think you are stupid. At the very least, they think that you're lazy and sloppy, which in some cases (think job application) can be worse.

So, how does one learn to spell? Uncounted hours of hard mental labor. Each and every one of us has spent thousands of hours (count them) learning how to spell. Our spelling system is unesesarily complex, making it hard, slow work to learn to use it correctly. We have achieved some equality by giving everybody a chance to learn this esoteric branch of kowledge for free, under the guidence uv trained professionals in our public schools.

Aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Wharfinger is incorrect. Reading a lot is not sufficient for skill in spelling. This I say from direct expirience. Throughout my childhood I read more than most people, and I still do so now. I am a very poor speller. Reading is an inexact task--in most cases you need only see a few letters in a word to reconise it. Spelling takes exact and specific memory of each of a 100,000 words. I have not yet discovered how one does this, but it is not through any amount of reading.

We still have people mispelling many words, because as one moves up in education, one is constantly given new, quirkier words to learn. If one stops learning these inconsistent irregularities, one will be seen as stupid, undereducated, and lazy, either in life in general, or in ones field of specialization.

The knowledge of 'correct' spelling is inconsistent enough that it requires constant upkeep. Learning the basic rules can take you only so far. There are exceptions to every rule, and you are expected to remember them all. (Or rather, the person who remembers the most gets to look down on everybody else).

Allow me to point out that typos are due to sloppiness, and are a different issue from spelling.

Our system of spelling is elitist. While it is not as serious a problem as racism, sexism, or creedism, lack of initiation into our spelling system can cost you a promotion, or a job.

The situation could be made better by eliminating some of the kinks and quirks of which our language abounds. It would not be hard, and it would hurt no-one. To reassure Coby, we would not need to give up having standardized spellings.

We will use our pitiful, inefficient system of spelling for the rest of this decade, if not this century.

We are stupid.

And ellitist.

As a strong speller and as a teacher, I think sometimes we often assume that those who can't spell well are just lazy. This is really unfair, because consistently spelling correctly requires an enormous amount of mental energy on the part of most people. For me, spelling always came extremely effortlessly, and I always thought that people who had trouble with spelling were just careless. But now, being exposed to the writings of others, particularly teenagers, I see that spelling well, especially in idiosyncratically written languages like English or French, is very difficult. Our brains are hardwired to process verbal language, but associating written marks with sounds and then with ideas is a cognitive skill, which is independent of language itself. Spelling was decided upon by literati/cognoscenti in a time when literacy was the province of the elite. A system designed by elites to be used by elites is very often elitist, even if it wasn't meant to be.

Other languages don't have spelling issues, like Italian or Spanish. Very often, there is only one possible way to spell a word, and only one possible way to pronounce an unfamiliar word encountered in a written form. Does this mean Italians and Spaniards are more intelligent and conscientious? Certainly not! Their spelling system was purposefully streamlined to make it easy. Spelling should be a tool to aid us, not a sacred cow to torture children and adults with.