Anonymous
06/10/2026 10:00
Subject: PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Also group of people with the same last name does not have an apostrophe.
“The Joneses and Smiths are coming for dinner.”
Your holiday card will also not have an apostrophe.
“Merry Christmas! Love, the Wiltons”
You’re absolutely right, and I unashamedly share your pedantry.
Here’s one for you.
What about a sign saying “The Smith’s”
posted outside a house?
If the Smiths are identifying themselves as the family living there, it’s clearly incorrect.
However, what if the Smith family is actually identifying the house as theirs? The “house” is implied and unwritten, much like the Understood You in an imperative sentence, i.e., The Smith’s (House).
Do we let them slide??
It would be The Smiths' House. Duh.
Anonymous
06/10/2026 09:51
Subject: PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
People ignorant of history and the breadth of the world think that whatever someone told them when they were young is a universal rule. The ignorant pedant marks themself as someone whose words are not deserving of consideration.
Anonymous
06/10/2026 09:48
Subject: PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Dates are not an exception. Using an apostrophe makes a date possessive, not plural or an abbreviation.
"I went to college in the 1980s."
"I listen to 80's music."
Shouldn't it be '80s music?
Yes. PP is wrong.
Anonymous
06/10/2026 09:09
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:I'm now wondering when and how the possessive apostrophe got started to begin with. I know that 250 years ago there was much less consistency in how people wrote things, even those who were well educated.
Most other languages have helper words or suffixes for possession. The English system is somewhat unusual. According to Wikipedia, it mirrors the French elison which is used to prevent an awkward double vowel sound. English writers copied the form, but used it for plural and possessive.
From the pack of lies:
By the 18th century, an apostrophe with the addition of an ⟨s⟩ was regularly used for all possessive singular forms, even when the letter ⟨e⟩ was not omitted (as in "the gate's height"). This was regarded as representing not the elision of the ⟨e⟩ in the "-e" or "-es" ending of the word being pluralized, but the elision of the ⟨e⟩ from the Old English genitive singular inflection "-es".
Anonymous
06/10/2026 08:57
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Why does autocorrect get it wrong so many times?
Yes! It's often changing "its" to "it's," and I have to change it back.
What's the difference? And who cares except the OP?
How old are you? This is embarrassing.
Anonymous
06/10/2026 00:57
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
I'm now wondering when and how the possessive apostrophe got started to begin with. I know that 250 years ago there was much less consistency in how people wrote things, even those who were well educated.
Anonymous
06/10/2026 00:27
Subject: PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Also group of people with the same last name does not have an apostrophe.
“The Joneses and Smiths are coming for dinner.”
Your holiday card will also not have an apostrophe.
“Merry Christmas! Love, the Wiltons”
You’re absolutely right, and I unashamedly share your pedantry.
Here’s one for you.
What about a sign saying “The Smith’s”
posted outside a house?
If the Smiths are identifying themselves as the family living there, it’s clearly incorrect.
However, what if the Smith family is actually identifying the house as theirs? The “house” is implied and unwritten, much like the Understood You in an imperative sentence, i.e., The Smith’s (House).
Do we let them slide??
Anonymous
06/09/2026 21:49
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Why does autocorrect get it wrong so many times?
Yes! It's often changing "its" to "it's," and I have to change it back.
What's the difference? And who cares except the OP?
Its is a possessive pronoun. It's is a contraction for it is.
+1. People confuse "whose" with "who's" often as well.
The lion injured its paw.
It's time for dinner.
Whose slipper is this?
Who's calling me at this hour?
All you have to do is write out it’s to “it is”. “The lion injured it is paw”. Doesn’t make sense so it has to be its.
Same with “who’s” which an abbreviation for “who is”. “ Who is slipper is this” doesn’t make sense.
Same with you’re and your, were and we”re and other words that are contractions. Contractions are just two words merged
Anonymous
06/09/2026 21:01
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Gramatik Macht Frei.
Grammatik macht frei.
Anonymous
06/09/2026 20:12
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Gramatik Macht Frei.
Anonymous
06/09/2026 19:57
Subject: PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
r u ok?
touch grass
or maybe grass's
touch grass
or maybe grass's
Anonymous
06/09/2026 19:08
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Why does autocorrect get it wrong so many times?
Yes! It's often changing "its" to "it's," and I have to change it back.
You actually care to proofread your writing. That value and skill is dying.
no one cares.
Anonymous
06/09/2026 17:52
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Why does autocorrect get it wrong so many times?
Funny you should mention this. I've been convinced for a long that the apostrophe plague on society was brought on by the invention of the iphone. Ever since the first one I had back in 2008, I noticed it didn't know words like a PP's example of nannies vs nanny's. I truly believe the accumulation of decades of the iphone "teaching" this incorrectly has brought us to the apostrophe overuse crisis we're in today.
It was trained by the corpus of the user's.
Anonymous
06/09/2026 17:50
Subject: Re:PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:Why does autocorrect get it wrong so many times?
Funny you should mention this. I've been convinced for a long that the apostrophe plague on society was brought on by the invention of the iphone. Ever since the first one I had back in 2008, I noticed it didn't know words like a PP's example of nannies vs nanny's. I truly believe the accumulation of decades of the iphone "teaching" this incorrectly has brought us to the apostrophe overuse crisis we're in today.
Anonymous
06/09/2026 17:38
Subject: PSA: plural words don’t have apostrophes
Anonymous wrote:These types of thread’s are so annoying.
I agree. This is a casual public message board. Write to get your point across and ignore the minor autocorrect errors that happen.