Text messaging… while it made communication even more convenient for everyone, it also gave birth to a new kind of short-hand writing which then led to a new kind of language: The text language

Now, I can only speak of how SMS is used (and abused?) here in the Philippines. I think (I hope?) everyone would agree with me that our text habit has gone from acceptable to idiotic.

When text messaging was just starting to be popular, sending quotes and chain messages were the “in” thing. Back in high school, I used to write my favorite quotes in a notebook. I wasted 2-3 notebooks for my quote collection! Then came the shortening of words. I think this started when cellphone networks started to  charge for each text message you send, hence, wrong spellings became the norm in text world. Numbers were given their word counterparts. In SMS, the sentence ” Good morning!  Don’t forget to eat breakfast. I will try to pick you up later at 4” can be written as “Gud m0rnin! dnt 4gt 2 eat ur brkfast. I wl 3y 2 pik u up l8r @ 4“. How you construct your text message all depends on how well you can shorten words.

I wish it ended there, but no. Complete sentences turned to incomprehensible babbles as people try to make their messages shorter. Linking verbs became unnecessary words and (as Pinoys are language shifters) shifting languages within a sentence became an easier way to compose messages. “Wr u?“, “Hr na me“, “u dr?” are some examples.

Now I really wish people stopped at that point, but still, no. The trend of using unnecessary letters, omitting necessary characters and alternating between capital and small letters to make words look “cute” started and that was just enough to make me wonder if the world has gone mad. What is so cute and fascinating with these words?

eL0w P0

müztAh?

Awtz!

d3dz

ampf!

sOwi.

ingatz!

Oh.. and here’s one complete message that made me scratch my head and say “What the f*ck?!”

,,elOw pOe,, Tnx fue vIewng mAh peg!

I understand the need for shortening words. Misspellings and wrong grammars are fine, but babbles like the examples above are just way over the line. Our text messaging habit has gone totally moronic!

and just because I want to make my headache even worse, I’m going to try writing that way.

I rEd a BlOg Sayng dAt LaNgUagE eVoLves. wOrDz LyK Diz r Nt 4mal, bT 0lrdY Axeptd bcz dY r beIn UseD By Majrty Of r PpL. iT aLsO  seD dAt It’z nOrmL 2 hv nw xpresnz n woRdz Bcz it’S pArt Of  r CultR. I agri dt lAnguaGe eVolVes. It Hs 2; nIdz 2 bCz datz Hw CuLtR dvLpz/ PrgReses.. bUt dz(?!!!) iznT wt u col PrOgrEss, iz it?

There’s not an inch of cuteness with what I just did. Heck! It took me longer to type that stupid paragraph than the first half of this blog!


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