“Two spaces is wrong.” — Farhad Manjoo... →
“Two spaces is wrong.”
— Farhad Manjoo explains why putting two spaces after a period at the end of a sentence is wrongwrongwrong.
I hear what he’s saying - that the two spaces is a holdover from using typewriters. But here’s the thing - I think it looks…
I can’t not do it. I learned to type on my own, and then took formal classes in ‘95. No one has ever said a word to me about it until I starting writing for the newspaper. The editor never told me he was silently removing the extra space. It wasn’t until another copyeditor got hold of my word something was said, and I was mortified. Now, if I do something for the paper I consciously take them out.
However, the official stance by the MLA is: At your professor’s or publication’s discretion. I’ve never had a grad professor say anything to me about it.
I’m on the other side of this argument …I can’t make myself type with two spaces…I haven’t used two spaces since middle school…
Oh. My. Flying. Spaghetti. Monster. There is almost no bigger pet peeve for me than people who put two goddamn spaces after a motherfucking period. This isn’t fourth grade. Are you planning to double-space your goddamn lines too? Trust me, friends, as a copy editor, all respect for what you’re writing will be shattered if an editor has to remove your motherfucking double spaces every goddamn sentence.
Oh, here’s another one that confounds me and I never saw it until I got into publishing. For some reason there are people who think a space exists before a comma or a period. Before.
So , for example , they write like this .
In a professional setting, this will cause me to speak to you like you’re in diapers and you still have a soft spot on your skull. And you fucking better if you write like that. GRRRRRRRRRR…..
