Cclaire, I don't buy the idea that people are too tired and busy to learn proper English. Nobody was more overworked and more busy than the generation that immigrated to this country at the turn of the century, and yet they taught themselves English without the assistance of ESL programs. No one was more exhausted than my father, who struggled to work, go to school, and take care of his elderly parents in the 1930s. He left school at 16, but though he was not a native English speaker, he honed his knowledge of the uses of English until he became a literate and skilled writer.
Similarly, if you read the letters written by ordinary soldiers during the War Between the States, you will find that they wrote with a simple grace and power not often found among the writings of today's college graduates. Please don't tell me that our ancestors of 140 years ago, those plain country boys, had more opportunities than today's ignorant millions, when they had no access to public libraries or the Internet or student aid or public universities.
No, if someone speaks in a crude manner today, that is very much a matter of his or her choice. People choose to speak and write like their peers instead of trying to better themselves.
Correct. Being crude is one thing; ignorance another.
If I came to you today and asked that you pardon ten F-yous, then, indeed, my ill behaviour.
That’s not the argument I’m after, however. I’m after the argument stating that people choose to be at their means or beneath.
That, itself, makes no sense if you take in mind nothing above it ever having been established.