Many of us have had days of trying harder to write English correctly without the help (and sometimes hassle) of AutoCorrect. Without the intervention of technology to pamper us these days, we were more grounded, and perhaps even wiser, when it came to the English language.

We’ve had our days of writing letters, scribbling thoughts on greeting cards, even endless handwritten exams. But technology came, and all that underwent a drastic change. Unfortunately, our good sense of the English language has also largely dissipated.

The culture of texting has taken its toll on us. In this age of the Internet and social media, the quality of what would otherwise have been a continuous process of improving the English language has become a matter of concern. Especially, if you are among those who care deeply about the correct use of grammar and spelling, then this era has turned out to be quite disappointing when it comes to the English language.

Imagine, even special occasions like birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, etc. they are contaminated with so-called ‘chat jargon’. Phrases like HBD for happy birthday, GBU for God bless you, l8r for later, don’t know for don’t know, pls for please by the way, or just K for Okay are common nowadays. They are everywhere on social networks, which unfortunately are not limited to those spaces only, but have also become professionally visible.

How would you like someone to wish you on your birthday with an HBD or GBU? They make no sense to me and I would rather not be wanted at all than have someone write to me that way. Nowadays, we also have children who have their names written in such a strange way. Sometimes they come with random apostrophes in the middle. Then there are those who treat their name like a commodity, without capitalizing the first letter of their name. Worse yet, official letters that lean into chat lingo.

What initially began as short text messaging, which “is the act of composing and sending a short electronic message between two or more mobile phones, landlines, or handheld devices over a telephone network,” has today become much more larger, encompassing much more than telephone networks alone.

The question is, has texting made our lives easier or is it ruining everything we’ve learned correctly about the English language? True, there is always the good and the bad of everything. The point is that the bad emerges when we cross the limitations. In this totally overrun age of technology, it would certainly do us good to get a new grip on ourselves and start making an effort to get back to using the proper English language, unless of course you’re texting in the true meaning. In that way, we would also be able to revive the personal touch of humanity, which we have largely lost with text messages.