Only Endless Memory

Sunday, July 20, 2008

On Lolcats

Taking a break from creative writing for a day to talk about a subject that came to me. Yes, as the subject suggests, it is about lolcats. Now, while on one hand, I do find that there is some humor value in some of the pictures and captions on pages like icanhascheezburgher.com what bothers me is the fact that people actually write in "lol" in their comments and so forth. This really bothers me.

Illiteracy in the US is incredibly high. In 2003, it was found that at least one third of the population in the United State did not have enough literacy to be able determine the dosages of medications written on a prescription bottle. Now, we have whole subcultures that are purposely spelling words wrong and dumbing down language.

I enjoy computer gaming. When I play online games, there are some times that I use some common used phrases to shorten that I am typing: afk for away from keyboard, brb for be right back, or lol for laughs out loud. I may even use wb for welcome back. Also, place names in games get shortened in games most times, cause who really wants to spell out something like Eiglophian Mountains, much less remembers the correct spelling of it (so you know, I had to look up the correct spelling to add it here).

I can accept a certain amount of shortening of words in sentences and such, as it is hard to type and do many other things at once. It does bother me that many people will end up typing sentences that begin to look more like this "gz on yr nw swrd itz rly swt cnt wait til im ur lvl" which would translate into written english as "Congratalations on your new sword, it's really sweet, I can't wait until I am your level." I would like to think that I was making up that people actually write like that, but some of them do. I, thankfully, can usually avoid them and hang out with people who type moderately understandable sentences, even with a typo or two. I can even deal with misspellings here and there, even if it is not a typo, not everyone is a vocabulary nerd.

It makes me fear for our future when I see people who cannot or worse choose to ignore their literacy and write in barely coherent sentences. I also see the same behavior in many American made comedies. I do not find them at all humorous, I just find them moronic and banal. We have movies that make icons out of idiots. This makes me question the integrity of this country.

This country needs more people that actually are willing to apply their intelligence and are willing to do what it takes to change things for the better. We need more integrity, wisdom, acceptance, and we need to worry about taking care of our own problems before we worry about what other countries are doing. We can not fight against terrorism. There is not a way to make everything safe. We take care of our environment, our education, our homeless people, our veterans, our domestic violence, our abused children, our prejudices and equal rites for every person in this country, and our fiscal responsibilities. After we do all that, then we spread, not our war, but our kindness and love to others. Then I will be happy.

Labels: , , , , ,


Posted by Badger :: 6:18 PM :: 0 Comments:

Post / Read Comments

---------------oOo---------------