you've GOT to be kidding me
Jun. 4th, 2010 09:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hollybrookeIn DC, even the Spelling Bee draws protesters.
By LAUREN SAUSSER, Associated Press Writer Lauren Sausser, Associated Press Writer – Thu Jun 3, 3:55 pm ET
WASHINGTON – The nation's capital always draws its share of protesters, picketing for causes ranging from health care reform to immigration policy.
But spelling bee protesters? They're out here, too.
Four peaceful protesters, some dressed in full-length black and yellow bee costumes, represented the American Literacy Council and the London-based Spelling Society and stood outside the Grand Hyatt on Thursday, where the Scripps National Spelling Bee is being held. Their message was short: Simplify the way we spell words.
Roberta Mahoney, 81, a former Fairfax County, Va. elementary school principal, said the current language obstructs 40 percent of the population from learning how to read, write and spell.
"Our alphabet has 425-plus ways of putting words together in illogical ways," Mahoney said.
The protesting cohort distributed pins to willing passers-by with their logo, "Enuf is enuf. Enough is too much."
According to literature distributed by the group, it makes more sense for "fruit" to be spelled as "froot," "slow" should be "slo," and "heifer" — a word spelled correctly during the first oral round of the bee Thursday by Texas competitor Ramesh Ghanta — should be "hefer."
Meanwhile, inside the hotel's Independence Ballroom, 273 spellers celebrated the complexity of the language in all its glory, correctly spelling words like zaibatsu, vibrissae and biauriculate.
While the protesters could make headway with cell phone texters who routinely swap "u" for "you" and "gr8" for "great," their message may be a harder sell for the Scripps crowd.
Mahoney had trouble gaining traction with at least one bee attendee. New Mexico resident Matthew Evans, 15, a former speller whose sister is participating in the bee this year, reasoned with her that if English spellings were changed, spelling bees would cease to exist.
"If a dictionary lists 'enough' as 'enuf,' the spelling bee goes by the dictionary, therefore all the spelling words are easier to spell, so the spelling bee is gone," Evans said.
"Well," Mahoney replied, "they could pick their own dictionary."
___
Online: http://www.americanliteracy.com
http://www.spellingsociety.org
********************
I.....I just.....I can't even put into words how outraged this makes me. I can understand if you legitimately have a learning disorder which makes it hard to spell, but come on. This just sounds like a bunch of lazy dipshits who didn't apply themselves in school that are pissed off and need something to protest. And not only that, but have the Internet and the use of text messaging seriously dumbed people down that much? It's kind of sad, really
The simple fact of the matter is that when you go to college, professors expect you to be on a higher level of knowledge. If you so much as have one spelling error on an assignment or term paper, they take points off for that sort of thing. They expect a certain degree of professionalism from their students.
By LAUREN SAUSSER, Associated Press Writer Lauren Sausser, Associated Press Writer – Thu Jun 3, 3:55 pm ET
WASHINGTON – The nation's capital always draws its share of protesters, picketing for causes ranging from health care reform to immigration policy.
But spelling bee protesters? They're out here, too.
Four peaceful protesters, some dressed in full-length black and yellow bee costumes, represented the American Literacy Council and the London-based Spelling Society and stood outside the Grand Hyatt on Thursday, where the Scripps National Spelling Bee is being held. Their message was short: Simplify the way we spell words.
Roberta Mahoney, 81, a former Fairfax County, Va. elementary school principal, said the current language obstructs 40 percent of the population from learning how to read, write and spell.
"Our alphabet has 425-plus ways of putting words together in illogical ways," Mahoney said.
The protesting cohort distributed pins to willing passers-by with their logo, "Enuf is enuf. Enough is too much."
According to literature distributed by the group, it makes more sense for "fruit" to be spelled as "froot," "slow" should be "slo," and "heifer" — a word spelled correctly during the first oral round of the bee Thursday by Texas competitor Ramesh Ghanta — should be "hefer."
Meanwhile, inside the hotel's Independence Ballroom, 273 spellers celebrated the complexity of the language in all its glory, correctly spelling words like zaibatsu, vibrissae and biauriculate.
While the protesters could make headway with cell phone texters who routinely swap "u" for "you" and "gr8" for "great," their message may be a harder sell for the Scripps crowd.
Mahoney had trouble gaining traction with at least one bee attendee. New Mexico resident Matthew Evans, 15, a former speller whose sister is participating in the bee this year, reasoned with her that if English spellings were changed, spelling bees would cease to exist.
"If a dictionary lists 'enough' as 'enuf,' the spelling bee goes by the dictionary, therefore all the spelling words are easier to spell, so the spelling bee is gone," Evans said.
"Well," Mahoney replied, "they could pick their own dictionary."
___
Online: http://www.americanliteracy.com
http://www.spellingsociety.org
********************
I.....I just.....I can't even put into words how outraged this makes me. I can understand if you legitimately have a learning disorder which makes it hard to spell, but come on. This just sounds like a bunch of lazy dipshits who didn't apply themselves in school that are pissed off and need something to protest. And not only that, but have the Internet and the use of text messaging seriously dumbed people down that much? It's kind of sad, really
The simple fact of the matter is that when you go to college, professors expect you to be on a higher level of knowledge. If you so much as have one spelling error on an assignment or term paper, they take points off for that sort of thing. They expect a certain degree of professionalism from their students.
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Date: 2010-06-04 06:50 pm (UTC)Also, I've marked university level assignments, I only deduct marks if the spelling errors are rampant. One mistake doesn't necessarily indicate a failure to spell as much as it might indicate a lack of careful proofreading. It's usually when I have to start having to decipher someone's spelling in order to understand their point that they start losing marks. But then I'm marking science courses.
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Date: 2010-06-04 10:09 pm (UTC)