Spelling Test Oppression

Thanks to my email subscription to “A Word a Day”, I know what heterography is. It is a spelling different from the one in current use. For example, if I spelled “ghost” without the “h” as “gost”, I would be practicing heterography. A good friend of mine recently sent me an email in which he referred to the reality-altering disease schizophrenia, which he spelled “schictso frenya”. While he may claim to be a heterographer, most people would say he is just a terrible speller.

But is my friend really wrong? Who said we have to spell our words in a particular manner in the first place? Those elitist bastards at Merriam-Webster, that’s who. The invention of the dictionary is simply another example of corporate control choking the life out of society. Granted, dictionaries do serve a noble purpose. By having one clear, well-known set of spellings, a written language is much more accessible to a wider population and makes communicating more understandable. But at what cost? I understood what was meant by schictso frenya, and I even had a good chuckle at it. Assigning yet another set of rules and regulations to society is just another nail in the coffin of one of humanity’s greatest gifts, its creative expression. Even William Shakespeare spelled his own name in various ways (Shakespear, Shaxspear, etc.). If I had to choose as to whether he was practicing creative heterography or was too stupid to spell his own surname, I know where I would put my money.

If you like capitalizing all “proper nouns” and crossing every “T”, by all means go for it, just realize the control that is being exerted over you by outside forces. Conformity, even in the seemingly mundane aspects of life, is just what they want. Once they have us all spelling the same, then they’ll want us to start thinking the same, acting the same, buying the same. . . a regular brave new world. But if you rather desire to explore your individuality a little, throw out a “shew bocks” every once in a while or opt not to capitalize “george washington”; after all, what makes him any better than an all-lowercase “bucket of nails”? Or if you are simply a shitty speller, at least now you have a big word for an excuse, you’re a heterographer. Just don’t forget how to spell it.