Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Moron]

This is a genuine question: Why do people on the Internet more often than not misspell "ridiculous" as "rediculous?"

Is it just laziness/ignorance, or is there some kind of meme that I'm missing because I'm too old or something?

I'm not generally particularly pedantic about minor spelling/grammar mistakes etc, but this one is so widespread that it's got me wondering if there's something interesting behind it...

[MaximumZero]

People suck at English, particularly at spelling long ir complicated words. Some people just sound out everything, which is why they spell everything wrong, because English carries a ton of loan words that aren't phonetically spelled.

In short, people are too lazy to spell check, and English is a convoluted mess.

[Moron]

Possibly true, but I've never seen anyone write "rideculous" or "ridiculuss" or any other possible misspelling similar to the sound of the word, so was wondering if anything made that particular mistake so common.

[Sirus]

People suck at English, particularly at spelling long ir complicated words. Some people just sound out everything, which is why they spell everything wrong, because English carries a ton of loan words that aren't phonetically spelled.

In short, people are too lazy to spell check, and English is a convoluted mess.

And sometimes they fail at words that aren't long or complicated!
and I know that was probably just a typo :p

[MaximumZero]

I blame my phone's terrible keyboard.

[Bauglir]

I blame Muphry's Law.

[MaximumZero]

The more I look at that mistake, the more I'm starting to think that seppuku is warranted.

[GlyphGryph]

People suck at English, particularly at spelling long ir complicated words. Some people just sound out everything, which is why they spell everything wrong, because English carries a ton of loan words that aren't phonetically spelled.
In short, people are too lazy to spell check, and English is a convoluted mess.

Okay, so, it's okay that you don't understand English. But considering

The more I look at that mistake, the more I'm starting to think that seppuku is warranted.

I have some really bad news for you.

These people are having an active impact on the language, such that if the frequency of their spelling raises highly enough it ceases to be wrong and, instead, the other way to spell it becomes wrong.

Rediculous is just going through a fairly standard spelling shift, happens all the time, it's really just best to accept it as soon as possible and tear the bandage off early.

[Steelmagic]

I don't know and, quite frankly, it's rediculous.

[GlyphGryph]

I cannot believe that this diculousness is happening AGAIN. It really is re-diculous.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

People suck at English, particularly at spelling long ir complicated words. Some people just sound out everything, which is why they spell everything wrong, because English carries a ton of loan words that aren't phonetically spelled.
In short, people are too lazy to spell check, and English is a convoluted mess.

Okay, so, it's okay that you don't understand English. But considering

The more I look at that mistake, the more I'm starting to think that seppuku is warranted.

I have some really bad news for you.

These people are having an active impact on the language, such that if the frequency of their spelling raises highly enough it ceases to be wrong and, instead, the other way to spell it becomes wrong.

Rediculous is just going through a fairly standard spelling shift, happens all the time, it's really just best to accept it as soon as possible and tear the bandage off early.

We just need to lower the population of ignorant people. Either by educating them, or casting them into the wine-dark sea. Their choice! Besides, it's not going to matter to me, because I grew up archaic, and hopefully the worst of the devastation of English won't happen until after I'm being ignored by the young people anyway.

[Toaster]

I'm okay with that spelling as long as they spell it "redonkulous" and pronounce it as such.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

I think it's just a bummer that they clearly ignore the root word, which gives hints on how to spell it:

Ridicule is pronounced differently from ridiculous, but I think ridicule is a less-frequently-used word.

[Mephansteras]

It's because, at least in the US, most people pronounce it as 'red-iculous" rather than 'rid-iculous', and so they spell it accordingly.

[GlyphGryph]

We just need to lower the population of ignorant people. Either by educating them, or casting them into the wine-dark sea. Their choice! Besides, it's not going to matter to me, because I grew up archaic, and hopefully the worst of the devastation of English won't happen until after I'm being ignored by the young people anyway.

No, you see, the things is - by supporting them, we make YOU the ignorant one! Mwahaha! Then we can all redicule you endlessly!