WRITERS easy guide for "I" or "me" / "Bad" or "badly"?

[Fuggiless]

First - don't beat yourself up even a little bit. Novelists and screenwriters frequently fuck this up, sometimes to the degree that they have character A "correct" character B's language - incorrectly!
Anyway, it's easy. Couple simple tricks and we're there.

"I" or "me"
Almost always happens when it's a group, *insert person we'll call him Jim* and *either I or me*.
Jim and I or Jim and me?
Simple...
Step one: Kill Jim.
There is no step two.

Example of how it's fucked up way too often:
They sent flowers to Jim and *I or me*.
KILL JIM! *Jim dies horrifically*
They sent flowers to I.
They sent flowers to me. (bingo - obviously)

Easy Example:
Jim and *I or me* went to the store.
KILL JIM! *Jim dies horrifically*
Me went to the store.
I went to the store. (bingo - obviously)

When in doubt - kill Jim. Did this thread arise because I was reading a visual novel and the father corrected his daughter to say "badly" when "BAD" was the actual correct word to use? Yes. And that brings us to "BAD or BADLY".

Okay - cards on the table, everyone gets this wrong, you get this wrong, I get this wrong, movies get this wrong all the time (with the exception of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.) So it's not on you. The multitudes of posh Brits I was once forced to mingle with for too long - most of them got this wrong and these are the same ass(arse)holes who dare criticize the superior American vernacular.
On the bright side - once you know the correct way to employ it, the mistakes are HILARIOUS!
And me would say to I that there's a simple trick to this one too but also an exception:

BADLY examples.
Jim badly has to piss. = Jim is about to piss all over your living room.
Jim has to piss, bad. = Technically incorrect, but we'll let it slide since the narrator would never "*morgan freeman voice* Jim had to piss, bad."
Jim has to piss badly. = Jim is somehow obligated to do a terrible job at urinating and we fear the consequences. (note: killing Jim also fixes this.)

EXCEPTION: FEEL.
Ignore Merriam-Webster. (That's actually good advice on the whole, btw. Oxford English or American Heritage for definitions. Purdue online for grammar - this is a HUGE resource to have in your pocket when you're in college, btw.) MW presents this question as though the jury is out, or that any English nerd is a dork for snickering at people who use "feel badly". (As though an English nerd in full dork-mode gives a shit about Webster social-shaming them.)
The jury's been in on this one since I was a young boy in the mid-1800s, and it's:
I feel strongly. = I am strongly feeling my emotions.
I feel badly = I am not very good at feeling my emotions.
I feel bad = I feel like shit.
And if you're curious about how dorky the nerds can get with this - actual full-on dork snickers when a supposedly intelligent character says "I feel badly about that." (*dork-mode* haha, what so he's not very good at feeling anything about that?! lmao *dorks off into the sunset*)
Yes, this source is literally a binary choice between "trust me, dude" and "find a Purdue.edu article that proves me wrong, without the 21st century flavor of 'it's literally impossible to do anything incorrectly.'"

Example that led me here (straw, camel's back, that whole thing)
Arya: "Surely you're not drowning in work so bad that asdfghjkl."
Ned: "Badly."
Me: I am now on Joffrey's side. Getting it wrong is a small thing, correcting someone incorrectly is a capital offense. Ned just told Arya she should have implied he wasn't very good at drowning? WTF does that even mean, NED?! Get chopped.

LITERARY LICENSE:
It is, of course, perfectly normal to have characters who use these things incorrectly. It really doesn't matter. BUTT (heh), if your character is a genius/space marine/captain/mad scientist or all of the above (make that game please), THEY would not get it wrong. When a WH40K primarch says "They're sending a message to I," (I killed Jim) - this destroys immersion.

And if anyone's still reading:
Fewer/fewer than: used when things are quantified. "Are there 5 or fewer than 5?"
Less/less than: used when things are not quantified. "Is it a shitload or less than a shitload?"

Shoutout and RIP to Mrs. Peters.

Edit
On the bad/badly front - yes, it's the opposite of superman.
Superman does good. Superman does good well. But when he's in bad mood, Superman feels bad.
The bad/badly conundrum is fairly recent as English goes. Until fairly recently, "bad" just meant "not good" and "badly" was rarely used in any context but someone doing a bad job. Often, but certainly not always, if "badly" is being used in any fashion other than someone fucking something up, it's being used incorrectly.
But there's the FEEL exception.
We don't feel badly.
Psychopaths feel badly.
We feel bad.
Yes I know "bad for nouns badly for verbs" - if English were that simple, Purdue wouldn't have essays like "Understanding the seventeen different forms of irony."

(Did I finish my edits? I certainly didn't save but I'm tired and not going to re-read this. Good night.)

 

[peterppp]

caveat: i'm not a native english speaker.

on the first part, I or me when in a group, i agree. it annoys me when people get it wrong.

but on the rest i think it's still not as easy as you make it out to be.

"Jim has to piss BADLY."
but "jim badly has to piss" is correct. and using a comma, "jim has to piss, badly" i think also is correct, since "badly" is then pointing at "has to" instead of "piss".

so in this case, it could be a matter of mistaken use of punctuation - in writing. in speech, however, you may not "hear the punctuation" as well. this could be the reason for this mistake being so common. people growing up hearing adults saying "jim has to piss, badly" but don't realize the badly points to "has to" not to "piss". you can hear this comma in speech if the speaker uses a slight pause, but if they don't, there is no way to tell if they don't know their grammar or simply used "lazy language", slang.

Arya: "Surely you're not drowning in work so bad that asdfghjkl."
this example is tricky. perhaps it would help if you finished the statement (or gave the context) because it is not obvious to me what arya wants the "so bad" to point to - the drowning or the work. i think anya means to point to the drowning, but it sounds to me like "work so bad" seems to go together, and then ned, like me, thinks arya means the drowning, so he corrects her to "badly". but is he wrong?

if you just change bad to badly in the given text, maybe, but if you change the words around to "Surely you're not so badly drowning in work that..." i think that is correct, and what ned thinks anya wants to express, something along those lines. ned doesn't give the complete new sentence, but he reacts to the fact that it sounds like anya points to the work being bad when she probably isn't.

sometimes language is tricky and there is no easy way to get it right or wrong. there may be no obvious right and wrong and people may disagree. in the case of bad/badly, i say we see the imperfections of the language allowing this uncertainty of what is correct and what it pointing to what in what way. because we have a word couple, bad/badly, with two meanings. usually, you can tell from the context the meaning of such words, but in the case of bad/badly, the words are used in contexts where this can be hard to determine, or hard to express it in a way to get it right without it sounding wrong or ambigious. like with the arya example.

 

[Saint Blackmoor]

Fuggiless & peterppp

I know now that I didn't pay enough attention in school after reading your comments.

I've been doing proofreading here for about a year now and have learned a lot about grammar.
I like to help non-English speakers get a decent start with their game, mainly because we all know how harsh some members can be
here.

What I see in the poorly translated games is the he, her, she pronoun issue. Also, "This" versus "That"
(It) instead of her or him.

Thanks for the info.

 

[Fuggiless]

Thanks for the feedback. I've made a couple edits for clarification.

"Jim has to piss badly"
This is incorrect. If we want "badly" to apply to the linking verb "has", then the sentence would be "Jim badly has to piss."
"Jim has to piss badly" = "Jim is, somehow, obligated to do a poor job at urinating."

"Surely you are not drowning in work so badly."
You said "if we switch it to 'surely you're not so badly drowning.'" That IS more sensible, but that's not how it's written.
If you want to change something to expose adverb correction, substitute individual words without changing sentence structure.
e.g.
"Surely you are not baking cookies so badly." - This is talking about what a poor job the person is doing at baking, not the large amount of cookies they're baking.
HOWEVER - it's a shit sentence either way. The phrases "badly drowning" and "drowning badly" are silly enough, considering drowning is not an activity in which someone's skill is typically taken into account.

My advice, and this goes out for all writers, chuck "bad" and "badly" in the wastebin. That's how a 4-year-old describes a tummyache. Treat them like "very".

In Dead Poet's Society, Robin Williams' character says "Avoid the word "very" because it's lazy. A man isn't very tired, he's exhausted. Don't say very sad, say morose. Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women. In that endavor, laziness will not do."

 

[anne O'nymous]

Arya: "Surely you're not drowning in work so bad that asdfghjkl."
Ned: "Badly."
Me: I am now on Joffrey's side. Getting it wrong is a small thing, correcting someone incorrectly is a capital offense. Ned just told Arya she should have implied he wasn't very good at drowning?

No he hasn't implied that, else there would be an exclamation mark, and not a period at the end of his line.
It would still be incorrect, but here it looks more like Ned answered that Arya is wrong, he isn't really drowning in work.

LITERARY LICENSE:
It is, of course, perfectly normal to have characters who use these things incorrectly. It really doesn't matter. BUTT (heh), if your character is a genius/space marine/captain/mad scientist or all of the above (make that game please), THEY would not get it wrong. When a WH40K primarch says "They're sending a message to I," (I killed Jim) - this destroys immersion.

This is forgetting how people learn a language, especially their native one.
In your example I agree, but for "bad" Vs "badly", by example, and of course all other words, it's perfectly possible and it happen in real life.
Even the most literate have few words that they systematically misuse, because it's how they understood their meaning when they heard them during their youth. And it happen that circumstance made it that they never where corrected.

Arya: "Surely you're not drowning in work so bad that asdfghjkl."
this example is tricky.

Is it ?

I mean, whatever "asdfghjkl" can be, for me it's just look incorrect. Here, "much" would be way better than "bad".
Then, Arya is, by example, blaming you because you forgot something too important for it to be forgot just because you've a lot of works. Other possibilities wouldn't be expressed through "so much that" (nor "so bad that"), but through "as much that" or "as much as".


But in the end, what is to notice, from my point of view at least, is that both "bad" and "badly" shouldn't be used in the context they are presented in this thread. In all case there's better words, both more precise and less ambiguous regarding the intent. It's them that should have been used.
Especially since it's to expect that at least half the readers will not be native speakers, and most not even fluent enough.

By example:
Jim want to piss -> But well, it can wait, he'll do it when it will be possible.
Jim need to piss -> He can still refrain himself the time to get home, but not really longer.
Jim has to piss -> Thanks god he's at home, look at him rushing to the restroom.

 

[peterppp]

Thanks for the feedback. I've made a couple edits for clarification.

"Jim has to piss badly"
This is incorrect. If we want "badly" to apply to the linking verb "has", then the sentence would be "Jim badly has to piss."
"Jim has to piss badly" = "Jim is, somehow, obligated to do a poor job at urinating."

"Surely you are not drowning in work so badly."
You said "if we switch it to 'surely you're not so badly drowning.'" That IS more sensible, but that's not how it's written.
If you want to change something to expose adverb correction, substitute individual words without changing sentence structure.
e.g.
"Surely you are not baking cookies so badly." - This is talking about what a poor job the person is doing at baking, not the large amount of cookies they're baking.
HOWEVER - it's a shit sentence either way. The phrases "badly drowning" and "drowning badly" are silly enough, considering drowning is not an activity in which someone's skill is typically taken into account.

My advice, and this goes out for all writers, chuck "bad" and "badly" in the wastebin. That's how a 4-year-old describes a tummyache. Treat them like "very".

In Dead Poet's Society, Robin Williams' character says "Avoid the word "very" because it's lazy. A man isn't very tired, he's exhausted. Don't say very sad, say morose. Language was invented for one reason, boys - to woo women. In that endavor, laziness will not do."

using your suggestion to use american heritage, it says you're wrong about bad. bad is considered slang and badly is considered standard:
Usage Note: Bad is often used as an adverb in sentences such as His tooth ached so bad he could not sleep. This usage is common in informal speech but is widely regarded as unacceptable in formal writing. In our 2009 survey, 72 percent of the Usage Panel rejected the sentence just quoted. · The use of badly with want and need was once considered incorrect, since in these cases it means "very much" rather than "in an inferior manner or condition" or "immorally." But this use is widespread, even in formal contexts, and is now considered standard. · The adverb badly is often used after verbs such as feel, as in I felt badly about the whole affair. This usage bears analogy to the use of other adverbs with feel, such as strongly in We feel strongly about this issue. Some people prefer to maintain a distinction between feel badly and feel bad, restricting the former to emotional distress and using the latter to cover physical ailments; however, this distinction is not universally observed, so feel badly should be used in a context that makes its meaning clear. · Badly is used in some regions to mean "unwell," as in He was looking badly after the accident. Poorly is also used in this way. · Note that badly is required following look when it modifies another word or phrase in the predicate, as in The motorcycle looked badly in need of repair.

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and my example was to write it "jim has to piss, badly", not "jim has to piss, bad"

 

[Fuggiless]

American Heritage has gone popular. Truly a dark day.
Badly can be used to mean to a great amount.
Literally can be used and automatically we should assume it's hyperbole.
Decimate can be used and it just means damaged or destroyed.

When the fundamentals of art are homogenized to cater to the lowest common denominator, it's the death knell of that art's great works.
19th century masterpiece - The Starry Night - makes your brain swirl.
21st century masterpiece - 100 Years ago - your 5-year-old makes better finger paintings.

"But everything can be art! Language doesn't have any RULES!" Okay. Enjoy your homogenized garbage. Laugh your guts out at the latest Marvel movie abortion. Those quips ARE pretty damn funny, eh? Who needs a carefully crafted narrative with meaningful dialogue spoken by people whose sheer wordsmithing belies a powerful inner character? Just have rando A explain to rando B that *insert hero/heroine* is the strongest, bestest, badliest, amazingest person ever!

Alternatively: demand more from your artists, because the alternative is the literary equivalent of a shit smear on blue paper being classified a "masterpiece".

edit
I may have been hangry when writing that since, post-snack, it seems a tad aggressive. In the spirit of In Hangriness Veritas, I'll leave it up.
The lowered skill ceiling - it's not doing anyone any favors in the long run.
You don't want singers who are constantly off key, paintings that are nothing but the gradient of dark brown to light brown, etc. Why accept the idea that it doesn't matter if things are done correctly or not? "Ahh, but we've been told it's okay if we do it the stupid way." Well, eff whoever told you that. Whoever told you that probably enjoyed watching Rings of Power and will argue until they're blue in the face that every decision that show made was right.
Have we ever seen overall improvement from endeavors that have been infected with the ideology of "making it dumb for the sake of inclusiveness"?
Ad populum arguments should never convince an intelligent person to accept ignorance or stupidity.
A: That's wrong. It sounds stupid.
B: Nuh uh. They said we can do it that way now.
A: Then they're wrong.
B: Pfft. They decide what's right!
A: Why did they deicde that was right?
B: So we wouldn't feel stupid for doing it wrong!

 

[Affogado]

"But everything can be art! Language doesn't have any RULES!" Okay. Enjoy your homogenized garbage. Laugh your guts out at the latest Marvel movie abortion.

Sir, this is a Wendy's porn game piracy forum.

Alternatively: demand more from your artists, because the alternative is the literary equivalent of a shit smear on blue paper being classified a "masterpiece".

What's good and useful here - in this context - is what feels good to the "ear" of the reader. What feels natural given the voice chosen for a given character or narrative style. This will seldom be proscriptive linguistics unless you're writing in the voice of an unpleasant turbo-nerd. Which you can absolutely do! It's just seldom appropriate in jerk-off material.

Unless pedantry is your kink, in which case make those Chicago Manual of Style pages as sticky as you want.

 

[Affogado]

On reflection rigid diction (heh) is also appropriate in games where you're fucking (or being fucked by) a robot. So two, two use-cases.

 

[peterppp]

American Heritage has gone popular. Truly a dark day.
Badly can be used to mean to a great amount.
Literally can be used and automatically we should assume it's hyperbole.
Decimate can be used and it just means damaged or destroyed.

When the fundamentals of art are homogenized to cater to the lowest common denominator, it's the death knell of that art's great works.
19th century masterpiece - The Starry Night - makes your brain swirl.
21st century masterpiece - 100 Years ago - your 5-year-old makes better finger paintings.

"But everything can be art! Language doesn't have any RULES!"

hey let's leave art out of this and stick to language and grammar. and the truth is that languages evolve over time with usage. we don't have to like it, but that's how it is. many words we use today used to mean something else originally. you're foolish if you think your interpretation of words is anything else than the result of your time and place in the history of the language.

i wouldn't respect any writer who wrote "my heart

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exploded with rage", to use the example from american heritate, and i don't have to even though i accept that language changes over time. regardless, i would argue that that use of literally is still considered informal. to be fair to american heritage, in this case i don't see them saying it is the preferred interpretation of literally, just that it is sometimes used that way to exaggerate.