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Can you rel8 to this?

It’s bad enough our kids have a hard time spelling as it is. It seems the younger kids are being dipped into more advanced learning regiments than I can remember. I mean yeah…we were doing some pretty phenomenal things at Evangelical Day Care Center in New York, BUT…these kids are all but doing trigonometry in the 1st grade now. Slow it down. Okay! I digressed – acronyms…*SMH.*

I remember when I first saw the acronym LOL. I was thinking to myself ~ is that person really laughing out loud OR do they subconsciously have laughter inside and they’re just writing it to make me feel good about what I just said. I quickly adopted it, but rest assured, I AM NOT always laughing when I type it. Sometimes I’m simply smiling. So should I type CRB (Cheesing Real Big) in those instances. HA (that wasn’t an acronym, that was a chuckle)! And here’s the crazy thing. I’ve been in chats with people and they have responded with internet laughter as, “Hahahaha.” I remember thinking to myself, ‘Haha? Why, that doesn’t sound like genuine laughter. What happened to LOL?’ Oh…the English language – such a complex road.

I think you need a freakin’ dictionary to keep up with internet terminology. When I stumbled on *SMH,* I was almost too embarrassed to ask someone what it meant. It had become a sweeping conversation piece after a while and then someone else boldly asked, “What does that mean?” I waited on pins and needles for the person to “comment” on their post to answer the question. “Shaking My Head.” Hm! Shaking my head…that’s pretty apropos – because I know when I’m reading some of the posts that people put up, that is pretty much what I’m doing – shaking my head.

It’s so funny. If we didn’t express ourselves with these clever emotional acronyms, we wouldn’t know how the readers are actually responding. How do you describe some of these expressions without sounding like a complete babbler on someone elses post?

So recently I’ve seen this one – FML: (4 letter word) My life – a little questionable and a little sadistic. But in context, I get it.

I think it’s my civic duty to share what I have learned out there in cyber world. So here is a list of the most common acronyms used to communicate on the internet:

1. BRB – Be Right Back

2. LOL – Laugh Out Loud

3. LMAO – Laughing My Ass Off

4. ROTFL – Rolling on the Floor Laughing

5. ROTFLMAO – Rolling on the Floor Laughing My Ass Off (hilarious)

6. SMH – Shaking My Head (Tisk, Tisk)

7. FML – (4 letter word) My Life

8. JK – Just Kidding

9. WTF – What the (4 letter Word)

10. OMG – Oh My Gosh

11. WTH – What the hell

So here is the question? Is cyber language dumbing down our English? This is THE hardest language to learn and then to add the complex and ever evolving internetguage is another feat to accomplish. Here’s the funny thing, I have seen ADULTS have conversations face to face and in the midst of talking they shout, “LOLOLOLOL.” And for that, I WAS ROTFLMAO because that junk was funny. Grown ass people talking about some LOL in the midst of real talk – WTH. Get outta here. That’s a shame – SMH!