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Shows I've Been Watching
Merlin: Watched "The Last Dragonlord", the last ep of Season 2!
( Cut for spoilers )

White Collar: Watched ep. 2, "Threads". Fun and charming, again. And inspiring! (No, I don't feel like writing fanfiction in any TV-based fandoms. But this show makes me want to write original stories about classy bandits.)

Current Mood: nostalgic

Hey!

Bet this is a surprise!
I'm sorry, I've been meaning to say hi for ages, but meaning to ain't as good as doing.
I'm finally here, though, and thought you might like a bit of blather just to prove it.

( cut for a piccy and some tommy-rot )

Current Mood: chipper

Diversity is the Spice of Life
There have been many debates on racism and gender discrimination lately, and I've been silent because both subjects are complex and delicate.

But there's something that I'd like to say.

The Internet is a multicultural, multi-ethnic, multi-faith, multi-racial, multi-gendered space. In this fascinating prism of often contrasting worlds, perhaps the most serious danger to diversity is the limited perception that there is only one primary distinction, only a single border, and that one is always on one side of it or the other. Things are more complicated than that.

Current Mood: quixotic

Shows I've Been Watching
House: Yay! I caught up with you all. I watched the latest ep, "Wilson". Awww! My House/Wilson shipper heart is beating madly!

Merlin: I'm nervously waiting for the last ep of Season 2.

As all the shows I've been watching have gone/are going into hiatus, I can choose another show to watch. I'll give a go to

White Collar: I watched the pilot, and liked it. It's fun, and charming.

Oh, and
Heroes: The fourth season will start in Brazil in January.

Current Mood: sleepy

Copenhagen: fail!
So many countries spent so much money to send delegates to Copenhagen, and what's the result? Massive failure.

The Brazilian government fought the good fight this time; I'm proud. But there are major economic interests at stake. Who will pay the price of failure? The poorer countries, at first. But everybody will suffer the consequences, sooner or later.

I'm laughing not to cry, said Lula.

Current Mood: sick

Punctuation: the Hiatus
I have already covered all the cases where the use of comma in English differs from that in Portuguese. Well, there are some cases where everything is different, like the way you English speakers write dates. It's so different that there's no way to compare or mix up.

Because we're approaching the holidays, I'm going to discontinue the posts on punctuation until next year, when I plan to discuss semicolons, dashes, ellipses, and so on.

Thanks for all your comments! I've been learning a lot. I wish I could have concentrated the discussion in one journal, instead of splitting it among four journals, but alas, it's hard to please everyone. (Some people don't like being redirected to other journals.)

[ETA: No, I'm not leaving! I'm just discontinuing this specific thread for now.]

Current Mood: busy

LJ's reply
Here's the reply I received from LJ:

Thank you for taking the time to contact us with your concerns. We understand that gender is not binary, and intend to respect that understanding for our users.

At this time, the code you reference is not live on the site, and will not become so in the future. We know that you, and many other users, have serious concerns about any requirement to specify gender, so we'd like to take a moment to explain events and our position further.

The intention of this code was to change the sign-up process to include a field for the selection of gender; that the code would completely disable the "Unspecified" option at the same time was deemed unacceptable. While the code in question had gone to our beta (testing) server, it had not gone to our production server, and will not do so due to this problem. Furthermore, we'd like to clarify that code posted to the changelog community is not always final, as such code must then go through the beta testing process and can often be changed before actual implementation.

Additionally, some erroneous information has been spread regarding the potential public display of the gender field. We would like to clarify that gender is not currently publicly displayed on the profile, nor anywhere else on the site, and there are no plans to change this behavior.

Regards,
LiveJournal Community Care Team

Current Mood: okay

Gender is not a binary option, LJ!
Argh. LJ's

changelog reveals that LJ is planning to make gender a mandatory field at account creation and remove the Unspecified option for the gender field. You can read more about the subject here. As I deeply dislike this plan, I changed my gender option to Unspecified here and left a polite comment here expressing my displeasure.

Current Mood: annoyed

Gender is not a binary option, LJ!
Argh. LJ's

Punctuation 4
3. Use a comma when two independent clauses are joined by a coordinating conjunction: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so.

• She says she loves him, yet she continues to treat him like crap.

So far, it’s just like in Portuguese.

You can omit the comma if the clauses are both short.

• He smokes and she drinks.

I’m not sure, but I don’t think this would be correct in Portuguese. When we have two different subjects, the comma is always necessary. However, what the English Grammar rule says is that you can omit the comma. It’s optional.

However, there is another exception:
If the subject does not appear in front of the second verb, do not use a comma.

• She used to study in Boston but now lives in São Paulo.

Well, this is impossible in Portuguese. And although I desperately feel the need for a comma before “but”, I’d respect this English Grammar rule, if I hadn’t found another rule that said:

Use commas to set off phrases that express contrast:

• The puppies were cute, but very messy.
• They agreed to release one hostage, but not the other.

I found these examples on the internet. The rule is not very clear to me, because “but” (and "yet") typically introduces phrases that express contrast. So... when is it okay to omit the comma?

And then I found dozens of examples of good authors, both American and British, who use a comma before a coordinating conjunction even when the subject does not appear in front of the second verb. I’m going to post just a few examples.

( cut for length )

What’s happening here? Am I missing something? Are they using commas to indicate a significant pause (or a contrast?) even when the more specific rule says not to use it? Am I allowed to do the same thing? I hope so.

Current Mood: curious

Punctuation 3
The plot thickens... This post may be polemical.

I told you I was going to comment on a few differences between the English and the Portuguese punctuation rules, but the following rule is the same for both languages:

2. Use commas after introductory clauses, phrases, or words that come before the main clause.

( cut for length )

Now, this is all and well. As I said, it works the same way in Portuguese. But!

Traditionally, formal written English requires writers to use a comma after introductory elements, that is, after clauses or phrases that are at the beginning of a sentence. However, the trend among contemporary writers — even well-educated, professional writers — is to punctuate more lightly, using fewer marks of punctuation. Readers too seem to prefer this contemporary style, feeling that the traditional punctuation practices create text that looks over-punctuated and "heavy."

It’s not that I didn’t notice the trend. I did. But this trend goes against my “instict” as a writer. We don't have a similar trend in Brazil. If the phrase has fewer than three words, I'm okay with omitting the comma. But with a longer phrase? It’s too... violent for me. You may think I’m exaggerating, but your native language is a part of you. Some authors whose first language is not English but who write in English decide to keep their "foreign accent", and some of them are successful.

Besides, I don’t write only for English speaking readers. I know that I have readers whose first language is Dutch, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and who knows which other languages!

There is more than one question involved here:

1) The contemporary writers are not following this specific Grammar rule. Is that a correct assumption? If it’s a correct assumption, is it a good or a bad thing? Some people may like it, other people may not.

2) An author whose first language is not English but who writes in English cannot become a native writer of English. Should s/he even try?

There is no simple, unique answer to these questions. For me, it’s a difficult decision. For now, I’m following the English Grammar rules, and not the contemporary trend. But this may change in the future.

Current Mood: contemplative

Shows I've Been Watching
House: I've just watched the 6.08 ep, "Ignorance is Bliss". Loved it! Chase has become a younger version of House!

Merlin: I haven't watched the latest ep yet. The previous one, 2.11 (The Witch's Quickening), was a bit dark. It was to be expected. But I'm curious as to how the season will end.

Current Mood: pleased