The Sad Passing of a Friend

I like English. I know ... bizarre. But I have always liked it. So it is with a sad heart ...

I'm torn. How do I face this rising tide?

In my youth I was given an education that apparently isn't offered anymore. It's not that I'm brilliant. I'm not. It seems, however, that I was taught the English language and it simply isn't taught anymore.

We've all seen it coming - the demise of the language. It nibbled around the obvious places, the "weak members" of the herd, so to speak. How do you spell "misspell"? Sure, it's "I before E except after C" most of the time, but it likely is no surprise that "weird" is one of the exceptions. There have always been difficult words to spell, and they were the first to fall. The dictionary, then, started listing not what was supposed to be, but what was. They didn't define the language as much as explain it. So they started including "the norm" as well as "the right" ... which automatically made "the norm" "right". Word processors incorporated "spell checkers" (which in and of itself is bad grammar) which insisted on errors. "Judgement" (the correct spelling), for example, was judged incorrect in favor of "judgment" (the "normal" spelling).

One might think it is a matter of education, but working at a university, as I do, it doesn't seem to be any better. I heard a cheerleader the other day tell her friend, "We told them to bring it, and they brung it." A physics major confessed to his buddy "I shouldn'ta did it." And a new student came out of the bookstore to tell his parents, "I've boughten all the books I need." This isn't abnormal; it's the norm. You hear it a lot (which is now spelled as one word - "alot").

So after a while one begins to wonder. There are basically three possible types of responses. One is to "go with the flow". Give up. You're fighting a losing battle. No one really cares what you think "English" is. I mean, look at the dictionary. Doesn't that prove that it's a fluid concept? Don't fight it; join it. The other is the obvious response: I will fight for English to the death. Start campaigns. Write wrongs. (That's a pun, not a mistake.) Correct folks when they make these foolish mistakes. Defy spellcheckers even when they tell you that "judgement" is wrong. Too much work. I suspect I'll opt for the third type. I'll stick to my English, complain quietly about the others, but essentially do nothing at all about it. Isn't that, after all, the Christian thing to do?