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A couple of years ago I helped someone with an animal rescue website update her site and tweak some (or, ummm, much of) the writing.
She was totally enamored of seemingly random capitalization and quotation marks, as are many people. As expected, she assumed that capitalizing words or enclosing them in quotation marks emphasized them. It was a bit of a struggle convincing her otherwise because she was sure that when she typed "money" or Money it would magically persuade people to hit the Donate button.
There oughta be a law when it comes to the use of quotation marks. OK, not a law, but some good, concise rules on when they can and can't be used.
One thing I see all the time in the politics forum is that people make up some imaginary conversation, attribute it to some imaginary interlocutor, and put it in quotation marks as if someone, somewhere actually uttered it. If no one said it, it does not belong in quotation marks, (save for dialogue in works of fiction).
There oughta be a law when it comes to the use of quotation marks. OK, not a law, but some good, concise rules on when they can and can't be used.
One thing I see all the time in the politics forum is that people make up some imaginary conversation, attribute it to some imaginary interlocutor, and put it in quotation marks as if someone, somewhere actually uttered it. If no one said it, it does not belong in quotation marks, (save for dialogue in works of fiction).
Well, from your description, that's exactly what it is!
I know what you mean. Or there is the ever-popular tactic of taking a portion of a real quote so it appears to mean something else.
Effect/Affect is another one that people can't seem to grasp. I correct someone I "knew" pretty well on another internet message board where we had a small community of sorts. She kept using "effect" when she should have used "affect". She tried to tell me that the rule was that you used "effect" when what you were writing about has an emotional context.
This woman is an elementary school teacher.
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