its the internet. get over it

The sentence is buried in about a zillion comments to the latest post on the clever blog Stuff White People Like, a recent stop on my lunchtime reading on the Internet, when the Seattle Times, delivered daily, seems just too earnest.

The comments had veered away from the topic at hand--socialized medicine--and into a bizarre world of name-calling and personal attacks that strike me as truly ridiculous, even embarrassing. It's all so awful, but I don't tear myself away, as I probably should have. I wonder, as I read, how old are the posters, especially since I believe only a narrow demographic of age, education and geographic and ethnic background would find this blog funny enough--but not too offensive--to read. The comments spiral into juvenile assaults, until at last someone tells a string of personal anecdotes vaguely relating back to medicine (something about tanning). The stories, though mercifully more on topic, are all written in a manner free from the boundaries of spelling, punctuation, and usage, and I scan them mildly. I've seen worse, after all.

The next comment, however, is from an irate and less hardened Standard English defender, coolly criticizing the previous poster's lack of skill. This merits the above response: "its the internet. get over it"

That's all. And though the technique is not noticeably different than any of the other posts or than much of the writing that I read daily, it made me think. Is this true? Has the Internet become a zone of international language anarchy? Am I so backwards to still read these comments as if they were written by junior high kids who don't know any better? Or are these comments written by tech-savvy graduate students, accountants, and business owners who simply can't be bothered to write whole words anymore?

I recently had the kids write essays about whether or not spelling matters in contemporary communication. I reminded them of spellcheck and advertizing's cavalier ways with words. I made them consider what areas really required proper spelling these days. I asked, "If I were a first grade teacher, should I even bother to teach spelling to the next generation." 90% said I should, which impressed me. Apparently, my urban, mostly poor students can find the holes in this technological web, along with the reputation gained by shoddy spelling. But still, as I read thousands of "ur"s instead of "you are" (or even "you're"!), and hundreds of students who answer questions with "IDK" ("I don't know") and call it good, I wonder if laziness, not innovation, is winning over our kids.