History Main / YouMakeMeSic

* One episode of ''TheSimpsons'' revealed that Otto, Bart's Bus driver, couldn't even spell the word "Bus" on his license application. (For the record, he spelled it with a 6.)

* ''{{Doug}}'': When Mrs. Wingo reads her farewell card in "Doug Graduates", she informs [[TheBully Roger]] that "sayonara, suckers" is two words.

* In ''Canadian Bacon'', the protagonists are pulled over by an OPP officer after they'd sprayed "Canada sucks!" (and various other anti-Canadian insults) on the side of their truck... and forces them to spray it on in French.

* [[http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nydailynews.com%2Fny_local%2F2010%2F10%2F22%2F2010-10-22_andrew_buck_is_the_dumbest_principal_in_city_says_hes_against_text_books_in_idio.html&h=f64d4 Principal writes memo full of typos - parents & teachers give him an 'F']]

--> I told her 'affection' has two 'f's
--> Especially when you're dealing with me

* In ''Up the Down Staircase'', a student gives a teacher a love letter. Unsure how to act, he treats it as an assignment -- proofreading and correcting it. [[spoiler: The girl is [[DrivenToSuicide Driven To (attempt) Suicide]]]].

Just say, "I'm afraid you've made a grammatical error. It's not 'To ''who'' I give my heart',
it's 'To ''whom'' I give my heart.' -- You see, with the use of the preposition 'to,' 'who' becomes the indirect object, making the use of 'whom' imperative; which I can easily show you by drawing a simple chart."\\

'''Mike:''' Okay, first of all, it's "creetin". If you're going to threaten me, do it properly. [[hottip:*:]]Good thing Randall's not [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cretin British]] or [[http://www.thefreedictionary.com/cretin French]], or Mike would look like an idiot.]]

--> "Domus?? Nominative???"

* In Isabel Allende's ''HouseOfTheSpirits'', Nicolas sends love poems to his girlfriend Amanda.... and she sends them back, with corrections.

* In ''BeingHuman'', George gets a job teaching English to foreign migrants. On a trip to the bathroom, he notices they've written some insulting graffiti about him, so he corrects it. Then his boss walks in and tells him to stop defacing property. In an earlier episode, after Mitchell is mistaken for a pedophile, George looks at a graffiti on their door that says 'peedo' and promptly yells at the neighbors that 'it's spelled ''pedo'!'

* A brilliant use of CompletelyMissingThePoint in a ''Not The Nine O'Clock News'' skit usually referred to as "Not The Parrot Sketch": A headmaster reminds a schoolboy that he was accepted to the school on the basis of an essay he wrote about a parrot belonging to "My aunt, who I live with". Readings from his exam papers reveal that he has been answering every question in every subject by finding some tenuous way to re-tell the same anecdote in the same words. After several examples, the angry headmaster can stand it no more:

* ''ABitOfFryAndLaurie'' had a sketch about a too-nice, ExtremeDoormat teacher whose class ignores him. When he comes in, the blackboard has "YOU BARSTAD" written on it. He tells one of the students that it's spelled "bastard": "Otherwise, good."

-->You've found your perfect mate and it's been love from the start,\\
He whispers, "You're the one to who I give my heart."\\
Don't say, "I love you, too, my dear, let's never, never, part,"\\
Just say, "I'm afraid you've made a grammatical error. It's not 'To ''who'' I give my heart', it's 'To ''whom'' I give my heart.' -- You see, with the use of the preposition 'to,' 'who' becomes the indirect object, making the use of 'whom' imperative; which I can easily show you by drawing a simple chart."\\
That's a fine way to lose a man.

-->'''[[PrivateDetective Lewton]]''': Can I see the Count?\\
'''[[TheJeeves Butler]]''': I am not in a position to ascertain the effectiveness of sir's eyesight. However, sir ''may'' see the Count, which is what I believe sir was attempting in sir's uneducated way to ask.

* [[http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20070528 This strip]] of ''GirlGenius'' during CaffeineBulletTime.

* ''SomethingPositive'' does this every now and then. One of the best was a meta-example [[http://somethingpositive.net/sp04032006.shtml here:]] "The [[{{Jerkass}} fifth reader]] who sent an email starting off, "You [[StrawmanPolitical Liberal Faggot]]," please remember "suck" has a "c" in it."

* On ''{{The Order of the Stick}}'', Xykon allegedly killed an executioner for spelling "guillotine" wrong in his daily reports. He will also ''kill'' anyone who misspells his name in their speech balloons.
** In one Dragon Magazine strip, Vaarsuvius chastises two hostile undead for constantly ending their sentences with prepositions... while trying to evade the same opponents with a Hide From Undead spell cast by Durkon. Obviously, this breaks the spell prematurely.

* The website ''ActsOfGord'' claims that "The Gord" does this whenever someone gives him a CV. [[http://www.actsofgord.com/Annoy/chapter11.php An example (about halfway down)]].

* [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4vf8N6GpdM This]] CollegeHumor sketch features a Nazi who is also a Grammar Nazi.

* From ''AvatarTheLastAirbender'', during the escape from the Boiling Rock:
-->'''Zuko''': Hey! You watch who you're shoving!
-->'''Chit Sang''': I think you mean ''whom'' I'm shoving!

* When [[{{Doug}} Mrs. Wingo]] reads her farewell card in ''Doug Graduates'', she informs [[TheBully Roger]] that "sayonara, suckers" is two words.

* A German joke similar to the example above:
--> '''Child:''' "Mama, Papa hat mir geschlagen!" (roughly: "Mom, Dad hit to me!")
--> '''Mother:''' "Nicht "mir", sondern "mich"!" ("Not "to me", but "me"!")
--> '''Child:''' "Was denn, Mama, dir auch?" ("What, Mom, he's hit to you too?")
* Another joke:
--> '''A:''' "I just eaten seven sausages."
--> '''B:''' "I think you mean 'ate'."
--> '''A:''' "Oh, OK, I just eaten eight sausages. I wasn't keeping count!"

** An American PSA had something sort of similar, only with a guy who changes who to who''m'' on some spray-painted wall graffiti.

'''Mike:''' Okay, first of all, it's "creetin". If you're going to threaten me, do it properly.
** Good thing Randall's not [[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cretin British]] or [[http://www.thefreedictionary.com/cretin French]], or Mike would look like an idiot.

* In ''MontyPython's {{Life of Brian}}'' a Roman soldier, catching Brian in an act of writing anti-Roman graffiti, makes him [[CrowningMomentOfFunny correct his Latin grammar at sword point]].
** "Domus?? Nominative???"
** After eventually terrorizing Brian into working out the correct way of writing "Romans go home", the soldier makes Brian write it out 100 times -- ''all over the walls of the palace!''
*** And yet in the end he still gets it wrong. "Domus" is still in the wrong case, it's closer to being right but still not quite there

* In ''Take the Money and Run'', WoodyAllen's character attempts to rob a bank, and he fails because the tellers have difficulty reading past the spelling errors in his hold-up note, which says to "abt natural" because he has a "gub".
** The bank tellers even debate on whether he actually misspelled gun or if they just don't notice that the b is actually a c or n, and ask other people what they think, including a ''police officer''.

* Horribly subverted in ''{{A Series of Unfortunate Events}}'': Josephine has just barely managed to convince the ax-crazy villain to let her live. What does she do five seconds later? Well, correcting him on his grammar, of course! He then promptly throws her in a lake full of carnivorous leeches.
The writer makes a huge point about Josephine's obsession with grammar and spelling. In fact, the way the kids realise her suicide note isn't sincere is by the lage amount of spelling and grammar mistakes in it.

* On ''HowIMetYourMother'', Lily ruins a romantic moment by pointing out that Marshall confused your/you're. (Or Marshall ruined the moment for Lily by confusing your/you're in the first place.)
** And of course, the difference between "effect" and "affect" is one of the only two things Marshall himself is really serious about.
* In an episode of ''AmericanDreams'', [[TheSpock Patty]] got to go on ''AmericanBandstand'' and was asked on-air about the song that had just been performed. She responded by criticizing it for its poor grammar. The song was "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" by TheRollingStones.
** This was actually kind of a CrowningMomentOfAwesome for her. The plot of that episode was that Patty had gotten tired of the other kids picking on her being such a nerd and decided to make a go at being cool like her big sister Meg, so she let Meg and Roxanne give her an UnnecessaryMakeover and bring her on the show. That scene demonstrated that even though she was wearing pretty clothes now, she was still the unhip know-it-all she had always been, thus setting up her PygmalionSnapBack.

* In ''{{Bones}}'', Hodgins singed for Zack's package, and flirts with the delivery girl.

** ... you mean "signed".
* In ''BeingHuman'', George gets a job teaching English to foreign migrants. On a trip to the bathroom, he notices they've written some insulting graffiti about him, so he corrects it. Then his boss walks in and tells him to stop defacing property.
** Not to mention an earlier episode where, after Mitchell is mistaken for a pedophile, George looks at a graffiti on their door that says 'peedo' and promptly yells at the neighbors that 'it's spelled ''pedo'!'

* Strong Bad from ''HomestarRunner'' usually pronounces the misspelled words the way they're spelled, though occasionally he will tab up into the message and edit the errors. Among other things.
** The character Homsar was actually born this way... it was originally a misspelling of Homestar in an early sbemail.

* ''SomethingPositive'' does this every now and then.
** One of the best was a meta-example [[http://somethingpositive.net/sp04032006.shtml here:]] "The [[{{Jerkass}} fifth reader]] who sent an email starting off, "You [[StrawmanPolitical Liberal Faggot]]," please remember "suck" has a "c" in it."

** In one Dragon Magazine strip, Vaarsuvius chastises two hostile undead for constantly ending their sentences with prepositions... when he and Durkon are trying to evade the same opponents with a Hide From Undead spell cast by Durkon. Obviously, this breaks the spell prematurely.
*** Shouldn't that be [[AmbiguousGender s/he, or she/he/it?]]

* The website ''ActsOfGord'' claims that "The Gord" does this whenever someone gives him a CV.
** [[http://www.actsofgord.com/Annoy/chapter11.php An example (about halfway down)]].

** [[DontExplainTheJoke Because the series has two artificial alphabets (despite it being shown that English is the only existent language).]]
** To be fair, it's the concept of (which they don't understand stands for Love) that confuses and infuriates them, not the spelling.

* One episode of ''TheSimpsons'' revealed that Otto, Bart's Bus driver, couldn't even spell the word "Bus" on his license application.
** For the record, he spelled it with a 6.

* On ''{{The Order of the Stick}}'', Xykon allegedly killed an executioner for spelling "guillotine" wrong in his daily reports.

* In ''Things Can Only Get Better'' by John O'Farrell, the author describes how, as a young Socialist, he went round the walls of his home town spraying "Coal, not Dole!" on the walls. Next day he is mocked by his comrades for taking so much time to get the punctuation right.

* The website ''[[http://www.actsofgord.com/ Acts of Gord]]'' claims that "The Gord" does this whenever someone gives him a CV.

* [[ThatGuyWithTheGlasses Nostalgia Critic's]] Top 11 F* ck Ups had the fans constant pointing out of little spelling mistakes he made in the list, including one where he spells Nostalgia wrong.

--> '''Child:''' "Mama, Papa hat mir geschlagen!" (roughly: "Mum, Dad hit to me!")

--> '''Child:''' "Was denn, Mama, dir auch?" ("What, Mum, he's hit to you too?")

* [[TheDresdenFiles Harry Dresden]] corrects a bad guy's latin (despite bemoaning his own correspondence course) -- "It's ''thine'' heart!" -- when said bad guy threatens (amongst other things) to tear Harry's heart out.
**Thine is old english, not latin. In fact it's a word with a german root, not latin or greek. Also, this line is a great example of the trope.