Am I Silently Correcting Your Grammar?
The answer may surprise you
Every so often—okay, pretty much on a weekly basis—someone will make a comment on a Facebook post of mine, or they’ll DM me to ask a question, and they’ll follow up with “Oh, I hope I wrote that right,” or “Gee, I’m not sure if that’s grammatically correct! Don’t judge me.”
If I comment on one of their social media posts, they’ll occasionally answer with, “Oh my gosh, I’m so embarrassed. There was a typo there and now you probably think I’m so stupid.”
This happens often enough that I thought it might make an interesting flow chart. Since most people don’t want to bother with deep editing truths and punctuation philosophies during the month of December, I decided to go for a wee bit of editing humor instead this week.
The bottom line is this: the answer to this question is almost always NO.
No, I’m not judging your grammar or punctuation on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or anywhere else.
No, I don’t expect the average person to know all the rules of writing and punctuation. Other editors and I look things up all the time.
No, I don’t get a kick out of telling strangers (or friends) online how wrong they are.
In fact, in this era of phone typing, lightning-speed communication on social media, “fat-finger” syndrome, text swiping, speech-to-text dictation, and a host of other ways to produce the written word, I’m amazed we get it right as often as we do.
If the law of averages and Murphy’s law had a baby, my own comment if calling someone out on their grammar would undoubtedly have a typo.
All the real editors I know (those who make a living from it) are not fans of publicly shaming others. Granted, we do our best to make sure our own posts are error-free, since our job is to convince writers we can help to polish their work. But that’s where it ends. The Facebook editing groups I’m in actually have a rule against members correcting each other’s comments, or calling them out on typos. We all know what it’s like to post something in a rush.
So there’s the long answer to the short “Are you judging me?” question. Everyone needs down time from their work, and I’m no exception. I’ve learned to gloss over the things I’m not getting paid to pay attention to. I take off my editing hat when I step away from my desk, and unless someone specifically asks me for advice, I don’t give it.
Nobody likes a smartypants.
