Comments on: Its vs. It's

By: Noelegy

Noelegy — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 21:55:02 +0000

My mom was an English teacher for many years, and the rule of thumb she always said was that if you can't use the uncontracted words ("you are," "it is," "they are," etc.) in the place of the contraction ("you're," "it's," or "they're"), don't use the contraction. Simple as that. I love Bob the Angry Flower, by the way.

By: Justin Lynes

Justin Lynes — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 03:46:35 +0000

It's been nice to read this. But no one has mentioned "it has."

By: teradome

teradome — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 22:59:52 +0000

"Alright."

*GACK*

By: jen

jen — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 22:16:45 +0000

http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k83/JennyCrackCorn/greatest-animated -gif.gif

By: jen

jen — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 22:00:54 +0000

I am loving the grammatical slant on some of these posts today!

My peeve: LOTS.
Lots are things you park cars in.
The term is A LOT.
This has bugged me forever. A few years ago I saw a billboard for a car dealer and it simply said, "We have LOTS of cars!" I about died from laughter. Come on! That's funny!

By: heather

heather — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 20:20:07 +0000

Can't tell you how many times I've been tempted to flame people who can't seem to apply their complicated third grade grammar skills to distinguish the difference between it's and its. Don't even get me started on your and you're. Good goiven it irritates me.

By: L

Wed, 20 Feb 2008 19:28:35 +0000

That flower's expression perfectly sums up my feelings when I see someone butcher the English language. If I see someone write something like "I definately need to loose some weight" one more time, I think I'm going to "loose" it. Unfortunately, most people don't even realize how stupid they look... because their friends can't spell or tell the difference between homophones either.

By: Rocky

Rocky — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:47:45 +0000

Another pet peeve: "alot" is TWO WORDS. A LOT!

By: Tempscire

Tempscire — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:15:36 +0000

Orjans Morjan, I think you're giving native English speakers too much credit. Really. Waaaaaaaaay too much credit.

Also, it's been my experience that non-native speakers (who can converse easily, admittedly) have a better grasp of grammar than the natives.

By: Orjans Morjan

Orjans Morjan — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 17:20:34 +0000

People who write 'to' instead of 'too' or 'your' instead of 'you're' on the internet are usually second speakers, or third. So yea, cut them some slack. Not that I can myselv. I just height it when people make these errors.

By: kuanes

kuanes — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:08:21 +0000

you know what else drives me insane?

your VS. you're.

people who write "Your very smart..." make me want to do unspeakable things to their appendages...

By: Fran

Fran — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 13:35:38 +0000

YEAH!!! My pet peeve in cartoon form. LOVE it.

Now if they'll just come up with a way to teach people the difference between to and too. Another of my pet peeves.

By: Alex

Alex — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 10:57:28 +0000

The confusion stems from possessive apostrophe: mother's, girl's, boy's ...

By: Thespian24601

Thespian24601 — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 05:59:19 +0000

It's funny and clever, but come on, making up a contraction like y'gotta? Really?

By: Tempscire

Tempscire — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 05:47:49 +0000

I don't get what's so hard about "it's" = "it is." Really, is it that difficult to pause for half a second to consider the unshortened form? I can occasionally understand pluralizing some things with an apostrophe (to say you "made all As" this semester looks slightly off), but arrrgh, it's not hard! If Grammar Nazis are really such pedants about stupid, pointless things... well, then, more people should be able to correctly use those pointless things. How stupid do you have to be to not be able to achieve such a simplistic construct?

By: Aaron H.

Aaron H. — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 05:20:05 +0000

Years of schooling and the rote memorization of it's/its would just never stick. Then, finally, a few years ago someone made it so clear and simple I don't ever have to worry about it.

All possessive pronouns simply end in s. They are all exactly the same: his, hers, its.

Everything else gets an apostrophe.

Seriously, why don't they teach it this way in school?

By: Rob

Rob — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 04:59:49 +0000

Now if only someone will create a cartoon detailing the differences between "loose" and "lose."

By: VonSkippy

VonSkippy — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 04:46:54 +0000

Spelling/Grammar Nazi's - for them, it's not a hobby, it's a pathological obsession (or perhaps they were dropped on their noggins when they were small).

By: JM

JM — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 04:29:55 +0000

Uhh... I think it's supposed to be use not us. Moron.

By: Matt L.

Matt L. — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 04:04:11 +0000

My favorite way of remembering comes straight from Strong Bad himself:

Oh, if it's supposed to be a possessive, then it's just I-T-S! But if it's supposed to be a contraction, then it's I-T-apostrophe-S! Scalawag!