Generation X is up in arms about millennials’ and Gen Z’s poor grammar. These are the grammar issues that bother them the most.
Note: Some quotes in this piece have been lightly edited for grammar. Yes, we get the irony.
1: Apostrophe Woes
Apostrophe over and underuse bugs several Gen Xers to the core. “Its a shame that they don’t give grammar it’s due,” says one commenter in the online forum that sparked nearly 1,000 comments on Gen X’s gripe with grammar mistakes. “I see what you did there,” responds another.
2: Pet Peeve
“Loosing vs. losing” is a big pet peeve for one Gen Xer. “You sound like a real looser,” jokes a commenter.
3: Nuances
One Gen Xer says it drives them mad when people mix up the words “advise” and “advice.” No, they’re not the same, millennials and Gen Z.
4: Loudness Wars
“It’s like the loudness wars in the recording industry but for text,” says a Gen Xer about the overuse of exclamation points. “No one should be that excited to pay for dry cleaning.”
5: A Good Laugh
A Gen Xer who wrote the one-liner “I took that for granite” sparked other commenters to follow suit. “Can you give me a pacific example?” asks one, while another says, “I see what you did their.”
6: Should What?
“Should of” instead of “should have” is a grammar mistake that annoys a Gen Xer to the core. They also don’t appreciate younger generations incorrectly using “your” and “you’re.”
7: Capital Frenzy
Using all caps for everyday words is another grammar sin made by millennials and Gen Zers, says one commenter. “It was a damp and chilly afternoon, so I decided to put on MY SWEATSHIRT!”
8: Goodbye, Oxford Comma
The Oxford comma becoming a thing of the past makes one Gen Xer “mad, angry, and sad.”
9: Here Are Mine
A commenter is proud that “good grammar is a way to identify ourselves, referring to Gen X. “Defiantly” instead of “definitely,” “breaks on a car” instead of “brakes,” and “peeked/peaked my interest” instead of “piqued,” are their biggest grammar pet peeves.
10: No Hope
“Yes,” Gen X is the last generation to care about grammar, “and it’s getting worse by the year,” comments one person. “The one I see online the most is weary rather than wary when one is being suspicious.”
11: A Paragraph, Please
“The worst is a wall of text with no paragraph breaks,” says one Gen Xer.
12: An Aisle Apart
“Walking down the isle instead of the aisle,” is a commenter’s biggest pet peeve, along with “being apart” of this conversation instead of a part. “Gilligan walked down the isle a lot,” comments another user.
13: A Six Whammy
“They’re/their/there and too/to/two” are among the worst grammar mistakes younger generations make, says one commenter. “They’re too lazy to retrieve their two balls that landed over there” is a sentence that many younger generations would have trouble spelling, in their eyes.
14: Adios, Cursive
A commenter implores the Gen X community not to tell the original poster “about what’s going on with cursive.” Another person adds, “My 25-year-old son can read cursive, but my 18-year-old stepson cannot. Some time in between the two, they reduced the cursive curriculum in our area.”
15: For 5-Year-Olds
“I don’t know what it is about our generation that makes us hold on to proper written communication,” says one Gen Xer, who also blames baby boomers for terrible grammar when texting. “I can’t help but text the way I write. You know, full sentences spelled correctly. Some people send texts that look like the SMS equivalent of the crayon written nonsensical scribbles and misspellings of a 5 yr old.”
Source: Reddit.
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I’m a Millennial and I hate it when my generation does this. It’s like, how do you forget the things you were taught in school?