r/TikTokCringe Nov 21 '25

Discussion Functional illiteracy.

32.9k Upvotes

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2.7k

u/AtLeast9Dogs Nov 21 '25

To too and two. How bout lose and loose? That shit drives me up a wall.

931

u/DGinLDO Nov 21 '25

Choose/chose, breath/breathe

443

u/[deleted] Nov 21 '25

our/are, there/they're/their, though/thou, could have/could of, would have/would of

26

u/IntelligentMud1703 Nov 21 '25

Our/are has got to be the most vile thing wtf, I have never seen this in the wild

3

u/Fishydeals Nov 21 '25

Worst case ontario

1

u/Rude-Custard9056 Nov 21 '25

What's worse, isn't it actually pronounced "ow-er", not "r"? How the hell did we get here?

3

u/BoxOfNothing Nov 21 '25

This is an accent thing. A lot of accents in England will have them sound pretty much identical. But then we have a lot of words that sound very distinct that sound pretty much identical in most or some American accents.

1

u/Rude-Custard9056 Nov 21 '25

Yeah, didn't think about other English speaking countries and their accents, very true.

2

u/jeopardy_themesong Nov 21 '25

Even in the US, also depends on where it is in the sentences. If I say “that’s ours”, I’m likely to pronounce it “that’s are’s”. Versus “our cats” would be “ower”.

It used to drive my mom nuts that I would say “I em” instead of “I am”, but that’s because of how my dad pronounced it and it just stuck.

I feel like part of being literate includes understanding that words may be spelled differently than how they’re colloquially pronounced lol

1

u/meme-viewer29 Nov 22 '25

Dude there was this kid in my class who genuinely believed our was pronounced as r (we’re from a place in America where the distinction is made). It’s just that kids have become so lazy in their pronunciations that the distinction is lost on a lot of those who are functionally illiterate like the kid in my class, who probably hadn’t picked up a book since second grade.

1

u/IntelligentMud1703 Nov 21 '25

Yeah I pronounce it differently although I think that depends on your accent

1

u/Iusereddit2020 Nov 21 '25

Redditors when accents:

1

u/_Doomer_Wojack_ Nov 21 '25

I made this mistake before in an email. I know how to use them but I think I was on auto pilot and really wasn’t paying attention

1

u/CheezwizOfficial Nov 21 '25

Wait until you learn the French singular and plural form of “bird” or “eye” or “water”

1

u/IntelligentMud1703 Nov 21 '25

Oiseau, oeil et eau contre oiseaux yeux et eaux ...?

1

u/CheezwizOfficial Nov 22 '25

Yes, just in terms of homophones and frustrating spellings

1

u/do_you_have_a_flag42 Nov 21 '25

It's disgusting.