wilam safire's on language 19 sept 2008

Note Lincoln’s traditional spelling of the article the in “the Union.” A youthy movement is now afoot to secede from the Orthographical Union by changing the spelling of the most common word in the English language from the to teh. It is a signal to pronounce it tay or else teh to rhyme with feh!

This rebellion is not innocent initialese like LOL, “laugh out loud”; it is a form of Internet slang based on mistake-worship. Most of us have had the experience of typing (or keying) t-h-e and seeing t-e-h appear on the screen. We fix our digital slip; we don’t see it as a message from the soul of the machine, or even as a great new way to intensify that common word by pronouncing it thee rather than thuh.

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