Just curiosity, I know teens strive for individuality, but why have they taken up speaking with such bad engli

Question

This new internet dominated english is causing some serious problems in communication with adults. Also it sounds extremely uneducated.

Answer 1

Richard:

At 58 years of age, with a lifetime of experience behind me, I feel very qualified to address many of the issues young people might raise. Unfortunately, like you and many others, I only speak and write English. If a child insists on using a childlike language they can only expect responses from children. I have adopted a simple position on whatever one might want to call this "New Speak". I ignore it.

And if I may, I would like to address two other issues.

Why is it so difficult to put the mouse cursor on the spell check box and click it? Most of us realize that a spell checker will only find misspelled words without regard to whether or not they are the correct words. However, just cleaning up the spelling a bit would help in understanding what the person asking the question wants to know.

Secondly, what is it with the mixture of capital and lower case letters? I have tried to write that way just out of curiosity. It is difficult, time consuming and reading it borders on impossible. These I also ignore.

A famous line from a movie goes something like this, "what we have here is a failure to communicate". In that light I suggest, "an answer can be no better than the question asked".

Thanks for the intelligent question. I hope enough children see it and the answers to it to make a difference.

Answer 2

It drives me absolutely insane. Besides, it's no longer a matter of individuality when so many people are doing it.

I, myself, am only 18 years old and recently graduated from High School. As a freshman, I remember having my senior friends write notes to me, and I would literally have to find someone to translate for me. I cannot understand what it is that people find so appealing about talking that way. I'm particularly picky about proper English, because I'm a novelist (published a book my freshman year, actually) and I have a deep love for words and an serious obsession with spelling. I think I may be the last of my kind, however...

I'm sure it can't stem from a lack of education, because I recieved the same free, public education and *I* learned better. Some people purely refuse to learn, and others just want to sound "cool."