I've seen a lot spelling, punctuation and grammatical mistakes both online and off. Sometimes people are in a rush and don't care (such as taking notes in a classroom), but if you're writing something that people WILL see, then it makes sense to check it over.
I think a large part of society's overall carelessness is due to online activities. I can understand typing quickly with little-to-no regard for spelling or sentence structure in an online game (try typing anything in TF2 and you'll see what I mean), but that sometimes extends beyond the game.
Unfortunately, people tend to judge one another on superficial issues. This might change when getting to know someone better, but first impressions often arise from relatively minor details. If someone misspells every other word, other people may believe that individual is an idiot or at best, sloppy and careless.
Jules wrote:Here in the south, people *know* they are wrong but don’t care to correct themselves. For example,
coarse instead of
course, and they use
loose for
lose. I don’t think I’ve ever seen/heard the word
lose used here before. They always always always use
loose instead. Another one southerners love is using
our or
oar instead of
or.
Jules, I know you really dislike the south (that's easy to gleam from this post and other posts before it), but I believe you're LOOKING for evidence of poor spelling and grammar, while ignoring it when it's properly used. Once you see something misspelled or grammatically incorrect, you notice and say: "There it is! These stupid southerners can't spell or write worth a damn!"
In reality, that's nothing more than a bad case of confirmation bias. To be fair, we've all done it and will most likely do it again. We like confirming what we believe is true, regardless of the topic or situation at hand.
Even if you don't believe I'm right, it's unfair to make such sweeping generalizations about southerners (or any other group). I've seen plenty of spelling and grammatical mistakes from people in all different states and including Canada, which is an entirely separate country that's located in the north!
These mistakes are nothing more than carelessness and that problem isn't defined by regional, state, provincial or national lines. If it were, we could easily fix the problem.
Jules wrote:I remember driving through a Hispanic neighborhood and I saw a sign made of cardboard, and with a black marker was written: “llard sale!” instead of "yard sale."
If you saw that in a Hispanic neighborhood, they were probably combining Spanish and English. The letters "LL" make a similar sound to that of "Y" in English. It's possible that someone whose first language is Spanish might write "yard" like that, especially if they didn't know English well.
Granted, that is a spelling mistake in English. However, if you're looking in a predominately Hispanic neighborhood, you have to expect to find Spanish spoken and written far more than English. The simple fact that the sign was even written in English at all is quite remarkable. That says whoever wrote it actually learned English to some degree.
I've been posting on message boards forever (ever since 1996 or 1997, I think), and obviously not everyone's English (or whatever language you post in) is perfect. But when you post, do you check your own spelling and/or grammar, never mind someone else's? 
