[SUBMITTED] The End of the End

by **Baggieland** » Sat Nov 07, 2020 2:42 am

Surprisingly, this is actually a thing in today's world:
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/full-stops-intimidate-young-people-22574524

I know there's already an issue about commas; that one is about is about correct usage, whereas this one is about abandoning punctuation altogether. So hopefully different enough.

by **SherpDaWerp** » Sat Nov 07, 2020 3:58 am

Good issue. ~~though if I had a dollar for every comment on that article going "pfft, snowflakes" I'd be very happy...~~

To use a phrase shamelessly ripped from the internet - Gen Z tends to write texts like they're being spoken, whereas older generations tend to write texts like they're doing a grammar & punctuation test. That's not necessarily a bad thing from either group, it's just that the two styles don't merge. The full stops fit into the "spoken text" method in a way that conveys ending the sentence with a flat (or even slightly downward) inflection, and speaking like that in real life can and often does come across as disconcerting.

I'd like to see more of that mentioned in the issue, rather than focusing on "full stops intimidate me wahh" because there are more aspects to it than just that. It also involves (among other things) more use of "filler" punctuation, like hyphens, ellipses, and commas, so texts read with pauses in the sentence like you'd have if you were speaking, and more (and varied) emphasis on words through asterisks, slashes, and more. Obviously "full stops intimidate me wahh" makes the easiest dilemma but the niece is already breaking short form texting to explain the passive-aggressiveness, so she could go into a more nuanced position.

Finally, if we're talking about Gen Z's texting style in an issue, can we satirise Gen Z texting? I have honest to god never seen anyone use "2" as a stand-in.

by **Servilis** » Sat Nov 07, 2020 4:03 am

I'd like to mention that I don't think you should refer to real world branding in issues, i.e. Twitch, aside from that, the effect from selecting the first option could be written better.

by **Honeydewistania** » Sat Nov 07, 2020 4:11 am

Servilis wrote:I'd like to mention that I don't think you should refer to real world branding in issues, i.e. Twitch, aside from that, the effect from selecting the first option could be written better.

I think Baggie meant Twitcher, the equivalent of Twitter

by **Baggieland** » Sat Nov 07, 2020 4:52 am

SherpDaWerp wrote:whereas older generations tend to write texts like they're doing an 8th grade grammar & punctuation test.

This is me, so...

SherpDaWerp wrote:It also involves (among other things) more use of "filler" punctuation, like hyphens, ellipses, and commas, so texts read with pauses in the sentence like you'd have if you were speaking, and more (and varied) emphasis on words through asterisks, slashes, and more

... I'd need some help from you younglings as to how to do this.

Honeydewistania wrote:I think Baggie meant Twitcher, the equivalent of Twitter

Thanks Honey. I'll change that in the next draft, it is indeed what I meant.

Servilis wrote:the effect from selecting the first option could be written better.

That one was my favourite of all the effect lines. Have you ever tried reading an essay that doesn't contain full stops?

by **SherpDaWerp** » Sat Nov 07, 2020 6:00 pm

Baggieland wrote:
SherpDaWerp wrote:whereas older generations tend to write texts like they're doing an 8th grade grammar & punctuation test.

This is me, so...
SherpDaWerp wrote:It also involves (among other things) more use of "filler" punctuation, like hyphens, ellipses, and commas, so texts read with pauses in the sentence like you'd have if you were speaking, and more (and varied) emphasis on words through asterisks, slashes, and more

... I'd need some help from you younglings as to how to do this.

The case I'd have her make is that your social media presence is very strict and formal, and you'd appeal more to a younger audience if you changed up the way you wrote.

"smh, your messages are all so Formal And Proper..." texts your niece, despite the fact that she's only just across the room. "were basically having a conversation rn, so you should write like youre actually speaking speaking out loud. add some *emphasis* and cut out those full stops - i mean, have you heard anyone speak every sentence with a flat inflection? oh, and while youre at it, you should def add texting literacy to the curriculum, yall gotta learn somehow"

That's roughly how I would write that option. It's difficult to satirise from an external perspective when you're trying to satirise something you do, so there's probably room for improvement. Plus, the "muscle memory" for typing in gen-z speak doesn't exist when I use a keyboard, unfortunately.

by **Fauxia** » Mon Nov 09, 2020 8:55 am

Is this actually a national issue? It just seems pretty easy to fix.

Is “Phileas Ogaria” perhaps a particular one of our esteemed ~~overlords~~ editors?

by **Noahs Second Country** » Mon Nov 09, 2020 2:23 pm

"smh, your messages are all so Formal And Proper..." texts your niece, despite the fact that she's only just across the room. "were basically having a conversation rn, so you should write like youre actually speaking speaking out loud. add some *emphasis* and cut out those full stops - i mean, have you heard anyone speak every sentence with a flat inflection? oh, and while youre at it, you should def add texting literacy to the curriculum, yall gotta learn somehow"

Youngling here to confirm that this is pretty much how I'd text a friend, though I at least use apostrophes (or my phone's autocorrect does).

by **Jutsa** » Mon Nov 09, 2020 3:24 pm

Eh, personally I try to use periods, although I do enjoy my fair share use of emoticons and the likes.

Option 3's pretty nifty but maybe making @@LEADER@@ use emojis would be a more go-to option. :lol:

by **Westinor** » Mon Nov 09, 2020 3:27 pm

Oh geez, this is a bit on the nose :blink:

I often try my best to avoid full stops by using emojis, commas, any other kind of punctuation that might needlessly communicate my tone o.O nonetheless love the premise!

by **Trotterdam** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 12:05 am

When you think about it, emoticons serve about the same purpose that exclamation points or question marks do: they indicate the tone of the preceding sentence without changing its wording.

Exclamation points and questionmarks aren't designed to resemble actual faces, while more recently-invented emoticons usually do, due to originating from different cultures, centuries apart.

But I still consider them to be the same kind of punctuation, and follow roughly the same spelling rules, including replacing a full stop.

Which, however, I do make a point (pun intended) to use. I remember one time when my keyboard was broken and a bunch of my letters didn't work, and I still made sure to spell everything correctly (using copy+paste for the missing letters) so nobody noticed

by **Australian rePublic** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 3:46 am

All texters us full stops somewhere

by **Trotterdam** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 7:23 am

Australian rePublic wrote:All texters us full stops somewhere

Where is the full stop in this post?

by **Baggieland** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 6:57 pm

SherpDaWerp wrote:smh, your messages are all so Formal And Proper..." texts your niece, despite the fact that she's only just across the room. "were basically having a conversation rn, so you should write like youre actually speaking speaking out loud. add some *emphasis* and cut out those full stops - i mean, have you heard anyone speak every sentence with a flat inflection? oh, and while youre at it, you should def add texting literacy to the curriculum, yall gotta learn somehow"

That's roughly how I would write that option. It's difficult to satirise from an external perspective when you're trying to satirise something you do

Thanks, Sherp, I've gone ahead and used your suggestion as it is, because as I alluded to earlier, I have no knowledge of the above. You had "speaking" twice in there, I deleted one of them as I assumed it was a typo, or is that a way of emphasizing something?

By the way, what does 'smh' stand for? Seriously.

Fauxia wrote:Is this actually a national issue? It just seems pretty easy to fix.

In RL, not right now, but it's about the way the standard is heading in the future. There are kids these days who don't see the problem with writing academic papers in a texting style. Does the nation want to go this way or not?

Fauxia wrote:Is “Phileas Ogaria” perhaps a particular one of our esteemed overlords editors?

Jutsa wrote:Option 3's pretty nifty but maybe making @@LEADER@@ use emojis would be a more go-to option.

Hasn't using emojis as a written text already been done? Besides, emojis would please the younger generations, but infuriate the older ones. So it's not the (crazy) 'one size fits all' solution.

Second draft is up.

by **Noahs Second Country** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 7:15 pm

By the way, what does 'smh' stand for? Seriously.

Shake my head/shaking my head depending on context.

by **Baggieland** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 7:28 pm

Noahs Second Country wrote:
By the way, what does 'smh' stand for? Seriously.

Shake my head/shaking my head depending on context.

Oh... I see. Thanks Noah.

by **SherpDaWerp** » Tue Nov 10, 2020 9:34 pm

Baggieland wrote:
SherpDaWerp wrote:smh, your messages are all so Formal And Proper..." texts your niece, despite the fact that she's only just across the room. "were basically having a conversation rn, so you should write like youre actually speaking out loud. add some *emphasis* and cut out those full stops - i mean, have you heard anyone speak every sentence with a flat inflection? oh, and while youre at it, you should def add texting literacy to the curriculum, yall gotta learn somehow"

That's roughly how I would write that option. It's difficult to satirise from an external perspective when you're trying to satirise something you do

Thanks, Sherp, I've gone ahead and used your suggestion as it is, because as I alluded to earlier, I have no knowledge of the above. You had "speaking" twice in there, I deleted one of them as I assumed it was a typo, or is that a way of emphasizing something?

Oh, that was a typo. I don't think people duplicate words for emphasis, anyway...

Noahs Second Country wrote:
By the way, what does 'smh' stand for? Seriously.

Shake my head/shaking my head depending on context.

Or "[I'm] shaking my head", as it would be interpreted in the context of its use here.

by **Trotterdam** » Wed Nov 11, 2020 5:16 am

SherpDaWerp wrote:Oh, that was a typo. I don't think people duplicate words for emphasis, anyway...

Well, people do (see #921 It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad @@NAME@@), but I don't think it's specifically associated with text-speak.

by **Candlewhisper Archive** » Wed Nov 11, 2020 5:11 pm

Why would a young person feel that textspeak needs to be added to the curriculum? School-age folk already KNOW this stuff.

Surely she should be suggesting that older people should be educated in this?

by **Baggieland** » Wed Nov 11, 2020 7:18 pm

Candlewhisper Archive wrote:Why would a young person feel that textspeak needs to be added to the curriculum? School-age folk already KNOW this stuff.

Surely she should be suggesting that older people should be educated in this?

Yeah, good point.

Baggieland wrote:oh, and while youre at it, you should def add texting literacy to the curriculum, yall gotta learn somehow

This is the offending sentence.

I would change it to:
Oh, and while you're at it, make evening classes compulsory for everyone over the age of 30 to learn texting literacy. Ya'll gotta learn somehow.

If Sherp, Noah, anyone else could help me make this sentence sound more like someone much younger than myself, and to punctuate it accordingly, that would be great thanks!

by **Honeydewistania** » Wed Nov 11, 2020 7:41 pm

"while your at it, you should fr make everyone over 30 attend texting literary class, yall gotta learn somehow"

Also after 'loud' in the first sentence there's a full stop. Intentional?

by **SherpDaWerp** » Wed Nov 11, 2020 8:01 pm

Honeydewistania wrote:"while your at it, you should fr make everyone over 30 attend texting literary class, yall gotta learn somehow"

Also after 'loud' in the first sentence there's a full stop. Intentional?

That was intentional on my behalf. I do find myself using full stops in the middle of messages, though not often at the end. It's tied to the reading/inflection thing - that's a point where ending the sentence on a downturn sounds like normal speech.

That said, if you've got a better idea, my justification isn't incredibly strong, and it would probably make the option better if there was alternative punctuation there instead. Maybe move the hyphen there and replace its current location with a comma: "...speaking out loud - add some *emphasis* and cut out those full stops, i mean, have..." ?

Also, for the final sentence, consider "...make all you boomers attend texting literacy class...", though that's not really something I would say.

by **Baggieland** » Thu Nov 12, 2020 6:36 pm

Honeydewistania wrote:while your at it, you should fr make everyone over 30 attend texting literary class, yall gotta learn somehow

SherpDaWerp wrote:Maybe move the hyphen there and replace its current location with a comma: "...speaking out loud - add some *emphasis* and cut out those full stops, i mean, have

Done and done. Thanks a lot.

SherpDaWerp wrote:make all you boomers attend texting literacy class

Personally I'm not keen on the term 'boomer' and I find all these nicknames for each generation to be pointless.

Third draft is up.

by **Baggieland** » Mon Nov 16, 2020 7:35 pm

2nd page bump. Any final comments?

by **Baggieland** » Tue Nov 17, 2020 6:53 pm

I've gone ahead and submitted this. Thanks everyone for your help.

[SUBMITTED] The End of the End

[SUBMITTED] The End of the End

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