On Tue, Sep 01, 2009 at 02:02:31PM -0700, Jessi Berkelhammer wrote: > As a monolingual North American, I am also very uncomfortable with this > thread. > > A rant about abbreviations/IRC jargon is an appropriate discussion for > list, but criticizing how non-native English speakers write English is > not. This thread began with a mention of the "attitude" that non-native > English speakers have, as if non-native English speakers are a unified > group that are are more likely to have a bad attitude than native > English speakers. Of course such a generalization could make people > uncomfortable. I would argue that it's perfectly acceptable to criticize how non-native English speakers write English. But that's neither here nor there. You've clearly misread or misunderstood the original post, so let's parse it: "I'm sorry, but is anyone else annoyed by people who attempt to use IRC jargon on mailing lists?" Just a question, aimed at no one in particular, but expressing annoyance. "For example, substituting 'u' for 'you'." Just a statement to clarify the original proposition. "Oddly enough, I'm seeing this primarily in foreign language posters, not in native English speakers." Again, an observation. It does not say *all* foreign language posters are doing this. It only says that I've observed this *primarily* in foreign language posters. It doesn't say foreign language posters are bad or inferior, or even that they're part of al Qaeda. Just that I've noticed this trend in foreign language posters mostly. "It's often accompanied by English so broken I don't even bother trying to decypher it," Another observation. It points out that where I've seen IRC-like idioms in foreign language posters, I've also *often* observed very poor English. Not *always*, but *often*. Again, I'm not disparaging all foreign language posters. "and sometimes an *attitude* (after which, I blacklist the poster)." Another observation. So we have the set of IRC-idiom posters. Of those (according to my post) *primarily* they are foreign language posters. So foreign language posters who post IRC-idioms are a large subset of IRC-idiom posters. Of *that* subset, I *often* see very broken English (a subset of the subset). And *sometimes* I see an "attitude" accompanying the posts (a subset of the subset of the subset). Okay? If your native language is English, the above should have been clear in the first place. And if it's not English, then I've just done you the favor of parsing it for you. (You can send cash to thank me. ;-) Paul -- Paul M. Foster -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
