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English speakers, what's a not-fluency-related quirk/modification of the language that annoys you when you see it?

Yes yes, language changes over time. I've heard that mantra for decades and I know it. That doesn't mean there aren't language changes that aren't grating when they become fashionable (and hopefully temporary).

For me, "morals" being used as a crude catch-all application of "morality," "ethics," "integrity" or related concepts bothers me. Sentence example: "Maybe if society had morals there wouldn't be so many minorities in prison." lmayo us-foreign-policy

An even more annoying otherwise-fluent-speaker modification I see is when "conscious" is used to mean "consciousness" and "conscience" interchangeably. Sentence example: "Single mothers on welfare that steal baby formula have no conscious." It sounds like they're saying the shoplifter is not mentally aware of their own actions, not that they're lacking sufficient "morals" to let their baby starve for the sake of Rules-Based Order(tm).

There's others, but those two come up enough recently, with sufficient newness, for me to bring them up here. Some old classic language quirks are so established and entrenched that even though I hate them, bringing them up would likely invite some hatemail and maybe some mystery alt accounts also sending hatemail after that. You know, because they "could care less(sic)" about what I think. janet-wink

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  • Saying 'plastic' instead of 'plastics' is the tiniest bugbear for me. Your food tub is made of plastics, not plastic. Also the correct usage of 'whom' just plays in my mind all the time.

    I don't correct people on either, they just flag in my brain.

    • In Americanese "plastic" is a noun and an adjective. We'd only ever refer to "plastics" in an industrial context. "It's made of plastic" is perfectly acceptable and you'd sound weird putting an s on the end.

      • Plastic as an adjective is fine, it means it's shapeable (which most plastics products aren't without processing). And I'm aware of the common usage - you'd sound weird putting an 's' on the end in any English speaking country, but it's a corruption of the original language, and you'd be darn more correct with the s.

    • Also the correct usage of 'whom'

      is zero. Reject whom and all derivatives.

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