Her and that other dude shrunk the kids

I reached a "PLEEEEEEEEEESE!" point this morning. I reach those quite often but seldom write about them. It's difficult for a single individual to resurrect the grammar that once united us all----yes, when all the grammas learned their grammar as well as they learned their multiplication tables.

I think both have taken mortal hits over the past couple of generations. Is that an understatement? I just don't know.

What I do know, however, is that within an hour's time I read about a tennis player and an economy involved in compromising grammatical scenarios.

The fault lay in neither aforementioned party. The fault lay in the "professional" writer who penned a cutline and the "professional" writer who penned the Yahoo headline.

How much do these people get paid to tell us that "Her and doubles partner" Jane Doe are peaking? It's nice to learn they're peaking while we also learn that basic grammar----which guides us to know that "Her" is objective case and used only in objective case situations---well, that basic grammar is going down the tubes while those players are peaking.

Even if a person doesn't know basic grammar, wouldn't that person know that removing the doubles partner (second half of the compound subject) from the sentence would make a pretty stupid sounding sentence: Her is peaking at the right time.

Heck, even when my English students couldn't grasp the nominative, objective and possessive case, I could throw out the possibility of eliminating the second subject, and they'd understand.

And, people are getting paid for this usage!

The "shrunk" thing makes me really mad a lot of times. This morning the Yahoo headline US economy shrunk at steeper-than-expected pace during 1Q. Did that person watch the movie Honey, I shrunk the Kids too many times?

Or, has that person listened and read all the abominations of "shrunk" over the past few years often enough to become a believer that no such word as "shrank," using no helping verb, ever existed?

When ARE we going to use "shrank" ever again if this continues? If we're not going to use it where it belongs, get rid of the word. We've got enough to worry about with this language anyway.

I don't believe in correcting emails, casual conversation, or casual writing belonging to anyone unless they ask me for advice. I think that's downright rude, but when people still have jobs in the journalism business and they are getting paid for using the language correctly and we keep seeing flagrant violations of basic rules once taught to sixth graders, we must speak up.

So, that's what I'm doing today. Where are the editors who let this stuff get past them? In these cases, two people bear the burden---the writer and the editor who is supposed to review everything that goes in print. Is this another symptom of the lack of importance placed on truth and accuracy in reporting?

There's plenty more where that griping about grammatical irreverence came from, but I'll save my rants for another day.

As long as "her goes to state as a tennis player" and if the economy will just stop that shrunking, I guess good grammar doesn't matter all that much.

Besides, from what I read in this morning's paper, coming out of an Idaho legislator's mouth, we teachers need to quit our griping and go play golf.

Maybe I'll do that. I wonder if you have to follow the rules in golf.