Can You Tell I'm a Former Two-Time Schoolwide Spelling Bee Winner?

[queerbychoice]

Okay, that's it. No more suffering in silence for me. It's high time I call your attention to an urgent social issue - the dangerous epidemic of spelling errors in LJ interests lists, which is threatening to render the entire neat little hyperlinked interests system worthless, because whenever you click on the links in your interests list, all you'll really find is the people who made the same spelling errors as you.

More to the point, if you're on my friends list or I'm on yours or I know you at all, and you have a spelling error in your interests list, then you should be aware: I am obsessed with this spelling error of yours. I'm so obsessed by it that if only you really knew how obsessed I am with it, you'd start worrying about getting a restraining order to keep me away from it. You need to realize that every other day for the entire time I've known you, I've been clicking on your userinfo page just to stare in obsessed exasperation at that spelling error for an hour or more, debating in my head again and yet again as to whether I know you well enough to get away with informing you that you can't spell, whether now is the right moment to do so, whether I'll come across as rude or petty or condescending, whether you won't like me anymore once you find out what a shallow, surface-oriented, spelling-obsessed person I secretly am. But I can't keep it quiet any longer. I'm coming out of the closet to plead with all of you to relieve me of my spelling-error-induced agony!!

The following is not necessarily a comprehensive list of all spelling errors occurring in the LJ interests lists of everyone I know. It's merely a small collection of the ones that I'm sufficiently obsessed with that they came to mind when I sat down to make my list. These spelling errors keep me awake at night. I have nightmares about these spelling errors.

• abstracted misspelled "Emily Dickinson"


• allyx misspelled "narcissism"


• asrai_d mistyped "intuition" (but she/they also list(s) "incorrect spelling" as an interest so, um, it's fitting . . .)


• dlfke misspelled "Paul Cézanne"


• eeek mistyped "electronica")


• frankepi had previously misspelled "civil disobedience" and "first amendment," but he has obligingly corrected them already because I pleaded with him to relieve me of the extreme mental distress they were causing me. You can observe the extent of my former distress, however, by the fact that I still remember the exact spelling mistakes he had previously made, even though three or four months have now passed since the time when he obligingly corrected them for me.


• khudirambose misspelled "Howard Zinn"


• lentrot mistyped "atheism"


• moistgrrluk misspelled "weird people"


• ohandrea mistyped "reservoir dogs"


• theobscure misspelled "existentialism"


• tikarass and transientdyke both misspelled "Audre Lorde" in an identical manner to each other, and to five other people plus a community, though in a different manner from the manner in which arapahoe_centro and one other person misspelled "Audre Lorde."

Again, I plead with all of you: Relieve me of this agony, for I cannot endure it another second!

Comments

[subzerochic.livejournal.com]

thats the best stuff i've heard on Lj in a while!!!
do you think you could check mine for me?
i think i have it all right.
now that you've mentioned something i may have to go re-check it.
lol
thanks :)

[elfbabe.livejournal.com]

You have no idea of the kind of things people misspell in their interest lists. It's absurd. Sometime, when you're bored, try doing searches on random flagrantly misspelled words.

Or see how many people are interested in "and [interest]" or "i dunno" or similar.

You "spelling snob", you...

[(Anonymous)]

Don't...don't...don't...be a spelling snob, in LJ

Words are for communication. If the words that people use to communicate do just that, that should be enough. OK, it's not enough in real life, but it's fine in LJ.

A brief look through a few dozen LJ's should convince you that you are surrounded by people who can't spell perfectly. Many can't spell properly. But they are communicating what they are trying to say, OK, and in their own words, so put up with it. Be happy that they are communicating at all. They (or most of them) don't want to be told that this or that world isn't spelt like that. Put up with it.

Emm

Re: You "spelling snob", you...

[(Anonymous)]

Sorry, word not world!

[theobscure.livejournal.com]

Thanks... noted and fixed. ;)

[illscientist.livejournal.com]

i was gonna change everything on my list to, y'know, be incorrect. Just for you... But man, that's a lot of work.

[grecianurn.livejournal.com]

I didn't make it to your list...whew!I get very annoyed too when I see spelling errors in interests lists...some people spell the word corectly,and then include a semi-colon,which can be more distressing.

[grecianurn.livejournal.com]

corectly = correctly

thanks

[tikarass.livejournal.com]

I hate spelling errors in LJ lists too and somehow had missed that I spelled that wrong... Thanks for calling my attention to it :)

[moistgrrluk.livejournal.com]

*blows raspberries at Gayle* Dear , you come from a nation that seems to view the butchering of the English language as a sport , so my misspelling of wierd is of little consequence - note humour , and colour as the most glaring examples !

[deathbystereo.livejournal.com]

Feel free to point out any of my mistakes, I won't mind :) I misspelt "Spiritualised" for the first few months of having a Livejournal but luckily I spotted that one for myself.

Forgive me if this comment isn't up to much...I'm a little tipsy.

[moistgrrluk.livejournal.com]

That depends on which side of the Atlantic you are on ..... in Britain (the home of the English language) you would be deemed to be wrong unless you spelled it with a z , not an s . Just thought I'd point that out ! It's all down to the evolution of language ... as Kahlil Gibran said 'We shall never understand each other until we reduce the language to seven words' .

[lilith-morgana.livejournal.com]

I was relieved to see my name's not on that list.

[elfbabe.livejournal.com]

Glad I made the cut, I hate it when I misspell things. My spelling used to be wonderful, but then I started taking Spanish, and it got worse. Then I took Russian... and Japanese... and Latin... and it's just gone downhill completely.

[steph-dammit.livejournal.com]

LOL
you speak russian, too?
awesome.
=)
personally, i've taken spanish, russian, french, german and swedish...leaving my english hurting. sometimes i can think of how to say something in every language except english. *grins*

[crazyredhead888.livejournal.com]

I don't have anything spelled wrong on my interests list. I'm a fanatic about it, just like you.

[aliendreamer.livejournal.com]

Oh Gayle, I knew there was a reason I loved you. That is such a neurotic, crazy, anal thing to do. In fact, it's *exactly* the kind of thing I would do, right down to making the list. I just wouldn't have been able to help myself. Spelling errors drive me absolutely insane, I can't cope with them at all.

_Imp

[groovycat.livejournal.com]

yuu are sew funy sumtimes. =)

Thought you might like to know...

[elfbabe.livejournal.com]

38 people are interested in "dyeing my hair"
263, and two communities, are interested in "dying my hair"

19 are interested in "hair dyeing"
59 are interested in "hair dying"

Dwah!

[lentrot.livejournal.com]

Um... Actually no I didn't spell it wrong. I was writing in swedish and in swedish atheism is spelled ateism:) I might change to the english spelling now though, so all the english speaking atheists can find me.

[eeek.livejournal.com]

it was more like....forgetting a letter than mispelling it..

but i cant spell...though i read quite a bit....guess i never got into the swing of things after i learned english...

[abstracted.livejournal.com]

[moistgrrluk.livejournal.com]

I think another important point to remember (which I didn't when I posted earlier) is that language isn't a static thing , it changes and evolves ... at one time it was the norm to spell certain English words without vowels - e.g. plwch (plough) , thrwch (through) and even now we use the word cwm to describe a type of glacial hollow . I must admit I'd agree with whichever of the people above said that it's more important that people are communicating than how precisely they do it . I know that there are many people , like myself , who don't always spell correctly , and who are scared of posting/joining chats because of the 'you must spell correctly' attitude of others . I may sound a bit defensive/harsh , but it just really bugs me , sorry !

[foldingspace.livejournal.com]

Let's not even talk about people who are using English as a secondary language? And what about the various schools of spelling?! British, American... is it colour or color? civilization or civilisation? pretention or pretension?

[foldingspace.livejournal.com]

I have to ask: did I spell "balky bartokomous" properly?

[cici.livejournal.com]

::applause::

...I've been waiting for someone to address this for a long time. :)