Discussion Groups / British English / January 2004

I propose that a newsgroup be established whose primary
purpose will be to share examples of awkward, unnatural
phrasing that has resulted from efforts to conform to
useless principles of English usage.  The name of this new
newsgroup will be "alt.like.is.a.conjunction" ("ALIAC").

I suspect that most of us have been puzzled by unnatural
phrasing and have eventually realized that it resulted from
the writer's effort to avoid a "split infinitive", to avoid
using "like" as a conjunction, or to conform to some other
artificial interference with plain English usage.

To be a welcome member of this new newsgroup, one must agree
to accept the following tenets:

1. "Like" is to be accepted as a valid conjunction, and the
unidiomatic substitution of "as" for its natural uses must
be eschewed.

2. The term "split infinitive" must be eliminated -- except
to condemn it - from all discussions of acceptable English.
Usage guides now tell us to go ahead and split infinitives
whenever greater clarity, more natural expression, or less
ambiguity results.  It's sufficient to say that one's choice
of wording should always be such as to further those ends.
The concept of "split infinitive" adds nothing to that
principle.

3. "You-all" must be accepted as the standard plural of the
pronoun "you", and the latter must be restricted to singular
use only.

4. "Ain't" must be accepted as fully standard English -- but
only in the first person -- since it's the only suitable
choice to remedy the lack of an acceptable abbreviation for
"am not".  The ludicrously ungrammatical phrase "Aren't I?"
must be recognized as the abomination that it is.

5. The spelling distinction "its" versus "it's" for the
possessive must be recognized to be useless, the context
normally making the meaning obvious.  "It's" and "its" must
be accepted as optional for the possessive, but the
contraction of "it is" will continue to be only "it's".

6. Knee-jerk rejection of noun-verb conversions is to be
deplored and abjured.  Nearly all of the conversions that
are too often derided provide a usefully more explicit
meaning than that of any suggested substitute.

7. The pronoun "he" and its relatives "him" and "his" are to
be returned to their rightful genderless status.  For the
time being the lack of pronouns to refer unambiguously to
the male gender must be accepted, but it is to be hoped that
eventually pronouns will evolve to be used in that way.  In
the interim, by analogy to presently used "he or she", "him
or her", and "his or hers", writers and speakers may resort
to using the terms "he and not she", "him and not her", and
"his and not hers".

8. In cases where "fewer" is now prescribed to the exclusion
of "less", the choice of "less" or "fewer" will be optional,
left to the user's judgement to decide which sounds more
natural.  People who insist that retailers must say "ten
items or fewer" will be hounded from the newsgroup with
howls of derision.

Readers are invited to suggest other useless -- sometimes
harmful -- Thistlebottomian hobgoblins to add to the above
list before the charter for the new newsgroup is put in
final form.