Apostrophe

This blog is not entitled Nobody Cares About My Gripes for good reason. I did not begin writing these silly things because I wanted to vent. I could have done that. It certainly seems like I spend a fair amount of time complaining about various things. But it just happens. I did not set out to find a new thing about which to complain each day; I don't need any help in that regard.

By the same token, I didn't name the blog Nobody Care's About My View's. Why? Because I'm not a complete fucking moron. Yes, I will swear on that, because it needs to be said. It does not take rocket science to realize that plurals do not take apostrophes.

I can understand that some people (the feeble-minded, but a larger population of them) don't understand apostrophes in certain applications. I admit that the rules for "its" and "it's" could be a little clearer (but they aren't rocket science). But for the most part, apostrophes serve two purposes: contractions and possessives. Notice that I did not list plurals back there. Why? Because there is NEVER a reason to use an apostrophe in a plural. Never. That's an easy rule to follow.

The vast majority of the population don't have much to worry about; they aren't expected to be smart enough to understand basic rules of grammar. The fact that emails, text messages, chat, and other methods of communication which have recently taken over the world do not expect perfect English means that once most people leave school, never again will they be required to think about those pesky grammar rules. I am also not perfect, and I don't always do things which could be considered completely grammatical. Don't accuse me of hypocrisy. This is all about apostrophes.

If you are a professional who is required to write, one would hope that you would hold yourself, if no one else holds you, to a higher standard of writing. And if you are a professional writer, or one who sells written text as part of their product, aside from typographical errors, it strikes me that you should be responsible for producing a product which does not have obvious, trivial problems. Whether you are a novelist, a reporter, or indeed a cartoonist (it's not all about the art unless you don't write any words at all) your words are a product which you are selling.

Apostrophes are not complicated, nor are they things treated differently by different style guides (unless you count the use of apostrophes in the pluralizations of acronyms, which I still say is wrong, confusing, and unnecessary, but which continues to be a matter of style, and which I am not referencing in the current discussion). There is a right and a wrong way, and far too often, people do it the wrong way. If it's an honest mistake, something the editor didn't catch, that's merely careless. But if it occurs time and again, or even if every single instance is caught by an editor, one has to wonder why. Why can't people learn a simple, stupid rule, and follow it? Are they all too stupid?

I think not. It's laziness, reinforced by a lack of accountability and poor education. No one calls people on these mistakes anymore, because they think it's either too picayune or it doesn't make a difference to anyone. It should. Good writing is not instant messages or advertising copy, and unless we want all of our literature to degenerate into such, we need to make a stand, even at the risk of seeming overly sensitive.

There are no plurals which use apostrophes. Period.