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Why are "Grammar Nazis" hated so much?

V

Voltekka_MK3

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I really don't understand why they're hated on the internet for correcting people's spelling and being compared to an extremist party which conducted cruel experiments on people.

Whenever they correct me it actually helps and improves my spelling. I usually leave a thank you to them and they kindly say your welcome.

If anything it helped me a lot in my writing since i started to use grammar a lot more properly and can spell a lot better.

So those who hate "Grammar Nazis", may i ask why?
 
It depends on what mood I'm in. A misspelling may just be because my finger hit the wrong key or the spellcheck sent the incorrect word. Me and my friend Julia spellcheck each others texts, but I wouldn't feel comfortable telling someone else they spelled something wrong. In NT Land, it's kinda like pointing out how stupid someone is. It also seems like the person correcting the other one is more interested in the spelling of the words than the actual message that is trying to be conveyed.
 
nurseangela I guess its mainly miscommunication then. About the person focusing more on the spelling than the actual words, say someone made a message using shortened words and some understand it, some don't. What if the "Grammar Nazi" pointed out the spellings so that its more readable and is more clearer to read?

But i guess i don't get it and probably will never understand the hate these guys get, because thanks to them my spelling and grammar has improved. But i am a guy who's pretty chill when it comes to being wrong, I don't mind being wrong if am factually proven to be wrong or if i myself am wrong. Failure is my friend and i kind of like failing because i learn from it.

As said before i don't think I will ever get why "Grammar Nazis" are hated *shrugs*.
 
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Well, it all depends. If it's something important that I need to submit to someone, then I don't mind the help. But if I'm talking to someone on IM, I would consider it very annoying. At the same time, it might be annoying for the reader that at a higher level than me writing wise. But my writing abilities are beyond my control cause of my disability. I like it that most people I do speak in the text is able to understand most of the things I write. So I prefer talking to them than someone going to go on about every bloody sentence that I write.

I had a huge conflict with someone I use to date who is an English major. She was interested proofreading content for my website. However, when she did proofread, she destroyed all meaning of my writing. She was the only person I knew in history that I worked with who have ever done this. But I guess I consider this an unfortunate bad experience.

Also, working with Grammar Nazis can be a problem as most of them don't have the patience to try to get me to understand how did I made the mistake. This relates to my learning disability and very hard for me to undnerstand when they explain. This is an issue I need to live with for the rest of my life. I do at times try to improve, but there is no cure for my disability.
 
Um, Voltekka_MK3, you spelled my name wrong - it's nurseangela. ;)

If there is a shortened word that I don't understand, I usually always ask what it is or look it up. Definitely, if I ask about how a word is spelled, tell me. Otherwise, I would just be really embarrassed and probably beat myself up (mentally) for hours.
 
Voltekka_MK3 said:
I really don't understand why they're hated on the internet for correcting people's spelling and being compared to an extremist party which conducted cruel experiments on people.
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It's quite ironic that you're calling people out for using the term "grammar Nazi" when you're essentially doing it yourself.

Anyway, the resentment comes from people being obnoxious about correcting others. It can be helpful, sure, but there's no need to nag about it. (I learned this as a child when I found out I overdid it and irritated my friends.)
 
Ereth I am using quotes to exaggerate how ridiculous this term is. I am not literally calling people who correct grammar "Grammar Nazis".

The Penguin I can understand you having a disability and its unfortunate about what happened but calling them "Grammar Nazis" , wouldn't that be going a bit too far? Its just Nazi part that i really do not understand. But other than that you gave me a good reason which was quite constructive to show me the other side of the coin.

I do have a dyslexic person in College though who stresses that if they spelt something wrong they must tell them since the dyslexic student in my class says it helps him remember the words a lot better, so i correct him like a supposed "Grammar Nazi" and he thanked me because his spelling and grammar got a lot better.

But to me this is harmless in a chat room:

Example 1:

"Me: Hey did you see that film? It was disapoiting?

"Person: Ah yeah man it was awful, i really disliked it. Oh and by the way its *disappointing."

"Me: Ah thanks :). I was having trouble spelling that word.

"Person: No problem".

But i can see this as being annoying to someone else:


Example 2:

"Me: Hey did you see that film? It was disapoiting?

"Person: *disappointing"

"Me: Ah thanks :). I was having trouble spelling that word.

"Person: So what were you saying again?".

I think i can understand why you'd get annoyed at the second example, they're ignoring the whole message and mainly focus on the spelling and kind of dismiss your whole message. This being repeated is not surprising, since the flow of conversation keeps being broken and the message of the person who started the conversation is being ignored.

So i can get what you mean though.

nurseangela Fixed :D. True about that, i do love my dictionaries.
 
I guess something else I want to add, what I wrote above took me 30 minutes to prepare. I tired my best to make it as readable as possible. Yes I know it could be improved bu
Voltekka_MK3 said:
Ereth I am using quotes to exaggerate how ridiculous this term is. I am not literally calling people who correct grammar "Grammar Nazis".

The Penguin I can understand you having a disability and its unfortunate about what happened but calling them "Grammar Nazis" , wouldn't that be going a bit too far? Its just Nazi part that i really do not understand. But other than that you gave me a good reason which was quite constructive to show me the other side of the coin.

I do have a dyslexic person in College though who stresses that if they spelt something wrong they must tell them since the dyslexic student in my class says it helps him remember the words a lot better, so i correct him like a supposed "Grammar Nazi" and he thanked me because his spelling and grammar got a lot better.

But to me this is harmless in a chat room:

Example 1:

"Me: Hey did you see that film? It was disapoiting?

"Person: Ah yeah man it was awful, i really disliked it. Oh and by the way its *disappointing."

"Me: Ah thanks :). I was having trouble spelling that word.

"Person: No problem".

But i can see this as being annoying to someone else:


Example 2:

"Me: Hey did you see that film? It was disapoiting?

"Person: *disappointing"

"Me: Ah thanks :). I was having trouble spelling that word.

"Person: So what were you saying again?".

I think i can understand why you'd get annoyed at the second example, they're ignoring the whole message and mainly focus on the spelling and kind of dismiss your whole message. This being repeated is not surprising, since the flow of conversation keeps being broken and the message of the person who started the conversation is being ignored.

So i can get what you mean though.

nurseangela Fixed :D. True about that, i do love my dictionaries.
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I only used that word as you choose it as the subject line.
 
The Penguin Oh yeah i know that you used the word as a subject line. I just use quotes when i do it. I should've been clearer so sorry about the confusion.

But about what you wrote. She should've read and got the message first about you wrote even if you struggled to make it clear because you can't control you disability. If someone makes grammar/spelling mistakes but i can understand then its fine to me. So i can agree with you about some of them taking it seriously and dismissing your whole message even though your disability makes it more difficult.
 
Another reason that it is just not mannerly to correct someone on their use of words and spelling is because like Penguin said - they may have a disability of some sort and be self conscious of themselves in the first place. I see some misspellings on this site, but you can also tell that the person is trying to communicate as best as they can. Unless you know the person really well (like me and my friend Julia), I would refrain from stressing their spelling and grammatical errors.

Another example is that my friend Mary gave Waldo a card for his Bday and some of the words were spelled wrong. I know Mary's background - she didn't graduate high school. We are really good friends, but I know if I corrected her on her spelling errors it would only make her feel worse about herself (she has depression and bipolar and has very negative thinking in that she always thinks she has done something wrong). Aspies may accept someone telling them when they have made a spelling or grammatical error, but I do believe NT's won't digest that sort of criticism for long without saying something.
 
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Now you have me reading everyone's posts in this thread and proofreading them. Isn't the word "I" supposed to be capitalized? That's another thing that can happen if someone knows you are a "grammar Nazi" is that they will not want to send you anything because they know you will be analyzing their every keystroke. :eek:
 
nurseangela said:
Another reason that it is just not mannerly to correct someone on their use of words and spelling is because like Penguin said - they may have a disability of some sort and be self conscious of themselves in the first place. I see some misspellings on this site, but you can also tell that the person is trying to communicate as best as they can. Unless you know the person really well (like me and my friend Julia), I would refrain from stressing their spelling and grammatical errors.

Another example is that my friend Mary gave Waldo a card for his Bday and some of the words were spelled wrong. I know Mary's background - she didn't graduate high school. We are really good friends, but I know if I corrected her on her spelling errors it would only make her feel worse about herself (she has depression and bipolar and has very negative thinking in that she always things she has done something wrong). Aspies may accept someone telling them when they have made a spelling or grammatical error, but I do believe NT's won't digest that sort of criticism for long without saying something.
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One thing I'm worried about since I starting a business that writing is critical. I lucky I do have a support network to help. I know I have many challenges to face but I have faith someone will see the great technology I can create instead focusing on the writing. Though I still try my best to improve.
 
Voltekka_MK3 said:
Ereth I am using quotes to exaggerate how ridiculous this term is. I am not literally calling people who correct grammar "Grammar Nazis".
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I am no fool. I understand the meaning of the quotes. But in your post you used "they" often enough to imply that you yourself are associating the label with grammarians, regardless of intent. I thought it prudent to at least point that out.
 
Ereth Guess i screwed up then i guess. I was mainly using it as a subject for this topic rather than associating with them but i guess i did use it incorrectly and messed up.

No i was treating it like a subject rather than calling people that term so whenever i talk about a certain thing i always link the subject to make sure that it stays on topic.
 
Please don't beat yourself up. You could have worded your post better, but that's not a big deal. I was just addressing what I perceived to be an unintentional oddity.
 
Ereth I am not beating myself up over it. I simply admit that i made mistakes, correct them and move on. Calling me out on my wrong's is respectable so i am glad you did call me out on that :D.

Failure is my friend, so today failure has taught me to be more organized with my wording and improve some aspects of it.
 
I have noticed everyone has good grammar and spelling here. ;)
I hate when people write quite instead of quiet. Just kidding.
 
I dislike the term "grammar nazi" but it is really annoying when someone comments on your spelling or grammar if you're just commenting on something online... it's petty and rather pathetic than someone is concentrating on that rather than what is being discussed. I've also noticed that people often use it to undermine someone argument, often because they clearly can't think of an intelligent response.
 
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