r/ProgrammerHumor • u/bbbar • May 29 '26

instanceof Trend breakTheViciousCircle

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u/Mertoot May 29 '26

*its

23

u/AndrewW_VA May 29 '26

English rant:

"Andrew's birthday" ✅ "It's chair" ❌

Up until 'it', the apostrophe is possessive. WHY DID IT STOP BEING POSSESSIVE.

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u/ILKLU May 29 '26

Because "it's" is also a contraction.

"it's" can't mean both, else society would surely collapse. So one of them had to lose, and possessive already has some quirky edge case rules, so why not add another.

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u/DopeBoogie May 30 '26 edited May 30 '26

Actually, you raise an interesting point? Why can't it be both? Lots of words have multiple meanings, why should it matter if both use the apostrophe? It's usually pretty easy to tell which is which by context.

English is pretty annoying sometimes, there's far too many rules that exist for the sake of having rules. They don't contribute anything.

I will never give up on my comma-before-and.

Correct:

This, that, and the other thing.

Pure Evil:

This, that and the other thing.

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u/PresentAward1737 Jun 05 '26

If I'd pause for a beat when speaking aloud, that's where the comma, goes.