Oh my goodness, someone pointed this out on Tumblr years ago, but it desperately needs repeating:

Dear English Language Fanfic Writers,

• Wanton: an unrestrained desire, usually of a sexual nature.

• Wonton: a type of dumpling found in Chinese and East Asian cuisine.

I ~~could~~ couldn't care less

Hold ~~down~~ the fort

The proof ~~is in the pudding~~ of the pudding is in the eating

~~elon musk~~ Twat

In the USA and other English-speaking countries: weary =/= wary.

For example, I'll see someone write something like: "I am weary of the campfire because it is so hot"

You aren't tired of the campfire! You are wary of it!

I don't generally correct people's spelling or pronunciation but something I've noticed occurring more and more lately is people using "loose" when they mean "lose" and it gets under my skin for unknown reasons

In American English:

I left them know

I'm just leaving you know

No, no, a thousand times no!

You LET them know. You're just LETTING me know.

Also, they were driving and hit the breaks. Their car needed new break pads.

Just letting y'all know, it's BRAKES that stop a vehicle.

If the vehicle breaks, it'll stop, but that's not the system built into the car that makes it stop on purpose at the press of a pedal.

People capitalizing Random Words for emphasis, as if they're Proper Nouns.

Also getting 'a' vs 'an' wrong. It follows pronunciation, not spelling; so it's "a European" and "an honor".

i feel like we should be able to beat the living shit out of people intentionally spreading political misinformation.

Like im sorry, this may not meet instance rules, or whatever, but like, holy fuck, the amount of shit you can just lie about, without people asking question, kneecaps should've happened years ago, what the fuck are we doing bro.

Idk if this counts as a phrase, but on the internet, people talk about their pets crossing the rainbow bridge when they die. That's not how the rainbow bridge poem goes. Pets go to a magnificent field when they die. They are healed of all injury and illness. When you die, they find you in the field and you cross the bridge together. It's much sweeter the way it was written than the way people use it.

"per say" vs "per se"

This thread peaks my interest.

I hope my words piqued someone else’s interests more.

About 1 in 3 posters here say “loose” when they mean “lose”

Americans saying "I could care less" instead of "I couldn't care less".

I don't do it that much anymore as I learned to enjoy the freedom of using language, but I recently watched a miniminuteman video where he says pause for concern. which kinda makes sense so it's an eggcorn: something that would cause concern would hopefully also make one pause for a moment.

apparently this is a commonly misheard phrase though this was the first time I heard someone say it.

"Seen".
Holy fuck, "seen".

I honestly think that using this word incorrectly has gotten worse over the last few years. Hearing someone say, "yeah, I seen her yesterday" just makes me want to punch the wall.

English/US - seeing “would of” instead of “would’ve”or “would have”. This one bugs me the most.

Can someone explain DEI and Affirmative action? 99% sure the right is using it wrong, but I live in a red state.

"Could of..."

It's "could have"!

Edit: I'm referring to text based things, like text and email. I can pretty much ignore the mispronouncing.

Niche is pronounced neesh and not nitch

“Toe the party line” To align with the interests of a political party; to get in line with the agenda of the leader of a political party

“Tow the party line” Something to do with tugboats

You don't feel "nauseous" you feel "nauseated".

EDIT: TIL "nauseous" can be used in place of "nauseated". This usage has been common since the 20th century.

Online in general: using "reductio ad absurdum" as a fallacy.

It's a longstanding logical tool. Here's an example of how it works: let's assume you can use infinity as a number. In that case, we can do:

∞ + 1 = ∞

And:

∞ - ∞ = 0

Agreed? If so, then:

∞ - ∞ + 1 = ∞ - ∞

And therefore:

1 = 0

Which is absurd. If we agree that all the logical steps to get there are correct, then the original premise (that we can use infinity as a number) must be wrong.

It's a great tool for teasing out incorrect assumptions. It has never been on any academic list of fallacies, and the Internet needs to stop saying otherwise. It's possible some other fallacy is being invoked while going through an argument, but it's not reductio ad absurdum.

Using "racking" instead of the correct "wracking" in "wracking my brain". Not very common, but it annoys me... But not as much as "could of"... That is the worst, just stop it!

This is online and in person in Canada.