Its not really ironic.. Im typing a forum post here, not writing a professional letter, plus the fact, my witterings aren't being broadcast to millions of people each day.. I dont need to be a grammer nazi over what I type here
It's that lazy attitude that has lead to the dumbing down of the English language, in just the same way text speak has. All of it to do with laziness, although in the beginning text speak was because of the limits on characters in SMS messages and the cost of texts. No excuses for it now.
When people see that kind of thing in forums, in text messages or elsewhere, they are being exposed to an environment where laziness makes poor grammar and spelling acceptable.
Not only that but words like "Reem" & "Vajazzle" which came from shit british reality shows - those shows only exist because the americans have had success with their shit shows....
Seriously, you're blaming the fact we have reality shows on American TV, and then blaming that for the fact people create words like vajazzle. Do me a favour. People have been making up words for years. Authors have done it, TV presenters, DJs and many others. If someone or something is popular, words or phrases catch on and eventually end up in the dictionary. You can't blame American TV for that. It happens regardless of TV shows.
You are a by-product of the environment you choose to expose yourself too, if you choose to watch shit-loads of american reality tv - then theres probably not a lot up there in the first place.. unfortunately our television has gone to shit in the last decade or two, so theres no real way to escape the american influence now.. and yes our language is changing to be more like theirs... I was disgusted the other day to learn that the new correct spelling of "Sulphur" is now "Sulfur"
It's not just a case of being a product of the environment you are exposed to. You don't always choose the environment, such as a school system which fails to correct errors. Also, human beings have brains, they know something is wrong, yet they still make the same mistakes time and time again, even choosing to use text talk. They aren't products of a system if they choose to embrace a system knowing it's wrong. I know about text talk, but still choose to type out messages fully when I send texts. I'm exposed to the same influences as many others but don't choose to use them (other than the odd abbreviation for an emoticon, such as lol or lmfao when it's desirable to convey an emotion). I never use things like "R U going to" etc.
Also interesting that you should choose Sulfur as an example. It's not a good example. We have not adopted the Americanism for aluminium. You know why? Because the British didn't choose to accept it. It was a decision made in 1990 by the IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) the international body that controls chemical naming systems. It was adopted by the Royal Society of Chemistry for international standardisation. It's taken some time to become the standard spelling.
Also, sulphur, or sulfur, got its name from the Latin word for brimstone "sulpur". We used to call it brimstone many years ago and it was called brimstone in the bible. So we'd bloody well changed it in the first place and our spelling of it isn't any closer to the original than the American way.
Sulfur became a recognized chemical element in 1789 when Antoine Lavoisier (hmm, a good British name) included it in his list of the elements. He "discovered" it (though its existence and use was know to ancient civilisations) in 1777 and named it Sulphur.
There are also some other explanations for why it may have had its name changed to Sulphur and Sulfur, having been derived from the Arabic word for yellow, sufra. The ancient Latin name name possibly came from the word Sulvere in Sanskrit or shulbari’ meaning enemy (ari) of copper (shulba) (because of the reaction of copper to sulfur).
So you see how words evolve over time? It's not down to an American influence on the world. We change things too and so do the international community.
Capiche? (damned Italians, I blame those mafia immigrants into America).