Grammar is important. Its very helpful.

Problem? For whatever reason, criticizing grammar has become a legitimate argumentative strategy.

It’s ridiculous.

Let’s take the most salient, and for some the most grating, example: its vs. it’s.

The distinction is simple, the grammarian says. “It’s” is a contraction of “it is.” Therefore, “it” requires an apostrophe. Everyone who thinks otherwise should be burned in a fire.

But wait! To form the possessive in English, we add ‘s to the end of the noun. Thus, we might expect “it’s” to be possessive, and “its” to be plural.

What we have is two word formation rules that are in conflict: The rule for possessive formation leads us to believe that “it’s” is a possessive, while the rule for contraction formation leads us to believe that it’s a contraction. Which rule, then, gets precedence? There is no straightforward way to resolve this. We just have to pick one, accept the resulting inconsistency, and go with it.

To top it all, it doesn’t really matter. The distinction between “its” and “it’s” only is without force. You are never going to be in a position where you could be confused between the two.

There are many more examples: “there” vs. “their,” “lose” vs. “loose,” etc. Each is a clear violation of grammar, but that’s it. There is no confusion in meaning or intent. No argument will be led astray because of a resulting misunderstanding. But still, it’s continually made a point of argument. The contention is usually that poor grammar and spelling is an indication of stupidity, which means arguments from grammar are a particularly anemic ad hominem.

There are fights worth having. Improperly used words limit our expressive capacity, and misplaced commas can lead to interesting miscommunications. If you feel the need to call someone out, ask, “Does this affect my understanding?”

Think of grammar like the rules of a game. The rules are important; the game is defined in part by the rules, and in a sense it wouldn’t exist without them. But there are rules, and then there are rules — like how to reset play if the ball goes out of bounds. These exist only to make it easier to play. But, if you are constantly stopping play to make trivial little points of rule, you’re stopping yourself from actually playing the game.

And just like in a game, the people that most often fight over the rules are those who can’t win otherwise. They don’t have anything else to bring to the game or to the discussion, so the only way they can participate is to dispute fouls and points of grammar. Players really committed to the game move past their opponent’s misconduct and win without recourse to technicalities.

Take modern soccer. Everyone is familiar with china doll soccer players who fall and shatter at the lightest touch, and miraculously repair themselves just in time to take the free kick. Penalty fouls exist to make sure the game doesn’t get too rough, but players abuse them, and as a result the game suffers.

Grammar and punctuation exist primarily to facilitate clear and unambiguous communication; whenever you call someone else out on a grammar mishap, especially one that doesn’t really matter, you’re working against that.

Nathan is a senior in LAS.