[Niall]

Originally Posted by Omah

The problem with your statement is that people DON'T "learn grammar eventually" and "the standard of grammar IS getting worse" - ask any employer .....

Once the rules are on the way out then what used to be a common language becomes, as it used to be, a myriad of dialects .....

Yes because once people no longer have the collective understanding of the semi-colon, English will of course unravel and die out.

This happens all the time, people worry about the language crumbling and tearing apart at the seems when it well.. isn't it. It's just change, not decay. Change does not mean standards are getting worse, they're just shifting.

300 years ago, there were two different types of 's' that had to be written depending on the word. Do you suppose that the loss of that grammatical rule is a sign of grammar standards worsening too?