Living language

Yeah, I lucked out with my push to get people to use "lucked out" properly.

Lucked out means you were unlucky ffs, but no half of America is so brain dead it's now acceptable to use it in reverse.

Fascist

Descriptive language >> prescriptive language

Cool

Totalitarian newspeak propaganda.

Literally!

I imagine you're using "everyone" wrong.
Not necessarily so. Use your imagination.

And I'm still gonna bitch about it if they've reduced the usefulness of a word due to habitual misuse!

For all intensive purposes, the meaning of words matters less than how we use it. Irregardless of how we decimate it's meaning, so long as we get the point across there is no need to nip it in the butt. Most people could care less.

For all intensive purposes, the meaning of words matters less than how we use it.
I think you mean fewer than how we use it lol.
::glares:: Well done. 😆
YeS, YoUrE rIgHt. aS lOnG aS tHe mEaNiNg iS uNdErStOod, iT dOeS NoT mAtTeR.

I don't see the backside of Morpheus' head.
Should look like that:
- i think he is looking at the meme which you are inside

Well. Sort of.

Some terminology is better defined by how the relevant experts use it. It's singular and precise definition is required for any useful dialogue. If 99% of people call a kidney a liver but doctors call it a kidney its a kidney.

Some terminology evolves and is used differently by different groups. Sometimes the more illiterate group flattens the language by removing nuance or even entirely removing a concept from a language with no replacement. Arguably both definitions may be common usage but one is worse and using it means you are.

I feel like people forget that words can have multiple definitions. You can have a technical definition and a popular definition
- And homonyms.
Some word usage just becomes so common everyone, even generational gaps understand it. If you talk to an 18 or a 65 year old and say the word blowjob, they both know what you mean, yet they aren't out there blowing on dicks or trying to force air up urethras... Hopefully...
- yet they aren’t out there blowing on dicks or trying to force air up urethras… Hopefully…
  I see you don't regularly read the sex forums and questions on reddit.
- Hopes dashed. It's not common, but there are some people who have the right combination of circumstances to make them think blowjobs involve the movement of air.

LITERALLY everyone!

I remember when that word meant something.
- "Literally" meant "something".
  Huh. I missed that synonym from everybody misusing literally [for literally forever].
  Literally's now literally I'll be using in place of something from now on.
  Literally I'm looking forward to when I'm looking for literally.

I've allready to rite we'll, but than my conscious sad, “For get the rules,” so I let my lose ideals led me. I’m two stubborn to accept that I should of staid in school.

I think I had a stroke reading this.
- My arms were too short to reach.
- Yes, but you understood it eventually, so you can't criticize it.

What if I told you that if everyone uses a word the “wrong” way, in slightly different ways, it’s wrong?

even worse, everyone spells that word wrong

"Everyone" meaning the social media someone and their social set get their info and cues from, not the rest of the people around them.

"Everyone" meaning folks off-line who you feel the urge to keep correcting because you got hounded by grammar nazis on the internet and now the "correct" meaning is branded into your skull.
- Off line? Who is being a grammar Nazi IRL?

What if I told you memes were supposed to be funny rather than excusing ignorance?

ok here’s three examples of exactly what the meme is referring to:
“Awful” originally meant “awe-inspiring” or “full of awe,” but frequent use to mean “very bad” eventually became the standard modern meaning.
“Peruse” traditionally meant “to read carefully,” but common casual use to mean “to skim or browse” has become widespread enough that dictionaries now record both senses.
“Nimrod” started as the name of a skilled biblical hunter, but repeated ironic use as an insult (for example, in cartoons... “Bugs Bunny”) led to its accepted modern sense of “fool” or “idiot.”
Language changes. Words mean what we say they mean since its all made up anyway.
- The word that always comes to mind is 'literally' which has come to mean 'figuratively, but with emphasis' and it drives me nuts - because it removes the word we have to say 'this is a thing that you might assume is figurative, but it's not, it actually happened'.
- These are your examples, not OPs. Your examples have no bearing on what OP may or may not have meant.
  The content implies to me that OP have themselves been criticized and since your examples are all relatively antiquated I'm going to assume OP didn't mean them. Because who alive is out there saying "nimrod was actually pretty skilled" on lemmy?
  The other alternative which is even worse is that OP literally just means language changes and this isn't in response to anything at all, it's just a pointless generic post restating a truism. But I choose not to believe that one either, although it seems to be the interpretation you've espoused.
Ignorance of what? It seems that if you're using a word the same way your sub culture uses a word, it's correct. Or rather that words can only be used correctly within a context.
- That's the beauty of this terrible, terrible post: by not being remotely specific we can all imagine what word OP might be thinking of and imagine for ourselves whether it's justified.
  So perhaps a better phrasing would be "memes are supposed to be funny, not generic rage bait"
¿ Por Que No Los Dos ?
- Dos is fine but I really just want it to be funny

But do you mean literally everyone or literally everyone?

If it is not literally everyone, it still might be correct in the way that using a word for (one of) its jargon meaning(s) is correct. So, correct in context.
When using words to convey information to an audience to whom you might not be able to clarify, it is useful to use words for the meanings listed in common dictionar(y/ies) ("correctly") so that the audience can resolve confusions through those dictionaries.
- I think they were joking about the fact that the meaning of 'literally' has changed in the common vernacular to mean 'figuratively'
I mean this i show it literally works, right?

Languages are living things. And living things always change. Note the Great English Vowel Change. Even the Norwegian my Grandfather spoke and that I learned from him was virtually a dead language that modern Norwegians stopped using in the 1850s. And the English spoken in the UK is different than the American English I speak. Spanish spoken in Spain isn't the same as someone from Mexico speaks.

And when conversing with someone, (in the language of your choice), the words you choose to use are defined by the context you use them in. Words can have multiple meanings, but it's the context and tone clarifies those meanings. Consider all the meanings of the single word 'fuck'.

But problems start with written words. And many people have poor written communication skills. It can be hard to parse meaning from poorly written words because there is little context and tone that comes through with a typed sentence.

We are all just baying at the moon like any pack. And hoping some understands us.

Written word is a facsimile of a facsimile of what we're actually communicating. We go from nebulous thoughts, concepts not bound by language, to sounds that roughly convey those concepts, and then to squiggly lines that roughly convey those sounds, and then back up the chain in the other person. Really, it's a miracle we understand each other at all.

As somebody who still insists that emo means Rites of Spring and not Paramore, no.

"Can't have your cake and eat it too"

vs.

"Can't eat your cake and have it too"

Only one of these makes sense, but the other one is what's been used for a long time now. If I have a cake, then I can definitely eat it, but if I eat it, then I can no longer have it.

Edit: I don't mean to disagree with the simple fact that languages evolve over time. But having a majority dictate the meanings of words isn't something I like. The example of "antisemitism" (a bunch of people are using the word to describe valid criticism of the state of israel) raised in an other comment here is also very relevant.

Can also contort it back into still kinda working the wrong way around by interpreting "have" as in consuming it, like synonym for eat.
Have you had your cake yet?
No?
Have it now.
Have your cake.
Had it?
Good.
Now eat it...
Cant?
Already had it.
... Cleverly unwrongs it.
Would be simpler if just said "cant eat your cake and have it".
Or was.
Before I just brought up "have"'s ability to be a synonym for eat.
If I have a cake, then I can definitely eat it, but if I eat it, then I can no longer have it.
If you change "have" to "keep" it is clearer in both instances. The second interpretation is clearer because it puts the consumption verb first, which implies this action precedes the subsequent verb. But the underlying statement holds true in either instance.
The example of “antisemitism” (a bunch of people are using the word to describe valid criticism of the state of israel) raised in an other comment here is also very relevant.
The joke of "antisemitism" is that Semitic People include Arabs and modern day Ethiopians/Somalians, two groups who are very explicitly and unapologetically persecuted by the Israeli state government. They do not include Eastern European expats who came to the Levant by way of Philadelphia.
Modern Western media describes an antisemite as a kind of anti-white racist critical of other western Jewish people in elite social circles. But the actual historical antisemitism - the one Henry Ford railed against in The International Jew and spammed across post-WW1 Europe after getting his brain cooked by Protocols of the Elders of Zion - is rooted in Christian Nationalism and anti-Immigration conspiracy theories that fit far more neatly with post-9/11 anti-Muslim racism and Cold War hostility towards the Third World.
The manipulation of language in this instance is a very deliberate effort to judo-flip the very idea of bigotry. You turn social energy aimed at pursuing an equitable and egalitarian society into an excuse to segregate the population and persecute poor immigrants and minorities.
- judo-flip

Justifiying ignorance is just ignorance. You are stupid.

Would you mind providing us a few more pixels? Only if it is no trouble o'course.
/j
Can I have some more pixels please
- May I have more pixels please

Singular "you" is grammatically incorrect. "You" is plural, "thee" and "thou" are singular.

What are you on about, "Y'all" is the plural of "you"
- Yinz… youse guys

How many is everyone? Are we talking majority rules? Would you like to pit dialects against each other?

It makes little sense to think of language outside of communities, so if a speech community uses a word in a certain way then it's correct in that context.
Of course, most states find it useful to establish an official variant. It is usually based on whatever the ruling class speaks, and is claimed to be 'correct', but there are no objective linguistic criteria which make it possible to say that Parisian French is more correct than e.g. Haitian French.

Would've

Wouldn't've
- Wootnoofcootnoofshootnoof

Your right

English is confusing enough. For the sake of future generation I'll correct you for using litterally like figuratively even if I'm the last person on earth that uses it correctly.

Were they using literally like figuratively or were they using literally figuratively?
But using figuratively wouldn't really ever be correct either. "Literally" is usually used as a hyperbole, so if you would replace it with figuratively it wouldn't work as a hyperbole anymore. So it would change the meaning. Just because something is meant figuratively doesn't mean people would use the word figuratively to describe it.
- Emphasis and meaning through context are key in the English language. "Correct" Grammar and "proper" RP English can get fucked.

No because I’m not a proud antisemite despite some people’s use of the word

Ok I won't search that one. Explain please
- Antisemitism has be co-opted and applied to any and all criticism of Israel, as opposed to it's previous meaning, hatred of Jews/Judaism. This isn't strictly because the meaning of the word is being used differently as much as it is that proponents of Israel like to conflate Israel with all of Judaism, or even more broadly with all Jews (as an ethnic group as opposed to a religious one). Since Israel takes any criticism to be hatred, the inevitable consequence is that criticism of Israel becomes antisemitism. I'm splitting hairs here and probably making things more complicated than they need to be... But hopefully you understand what I'm getting at.
  Incidentally, even in its more broadly accepted definition "antisemitism" itself is a bit of an etymological oddity, because "Semites", or the Semitic people, are both Jews, Arabs and others... Judaeophobia is an alternative that is unquestionably specific to Jews/Judaism.

To that, I would say "six, seven"

See how shitty this take is?

And "6 7" is a shibboleth, a linguistic phenomenon that's been going on for as long as we have written history, essentially, it's just now that it's the youngins doing the thing, it's bad. Yeah, you right, pretty shitty take.
- ah.. fr fr, my bad. no cap, I was dead ass when I lit this thread up. no homo.
Well six, seven to you too.
Together we have now changed the English language to accept six, seven as part of it. Welcome to the wonderful world of linguistics.
- skibidi toilet or some shit

Not for philosophical or scientific terminology.

It just shows how little society is anchored in reason. And people wonder why politicians don't take them serious. People who can't maintain structure and are easily swayed by group think can be made to believe anything.

Honestly, I could care less about this shit.

Do you care a lot or only a little?
- I told you, I could care less! It's a moot point!
I can't tell if you're using this idiomatic expression in the wrong way on purpose for a great joke, or in an annoying, unaware way. 😅
- Its obviously a joke.
  But maybe you understood that and your comment is sarcastic as well. So now I am the one being woooshed.
I literally don't give a shit
- And I don't want any of your shit.
  I grew up on dairy farm and it was one of my chores to shove the shit and then spread that shit nearly everyday. So I've had enough shit. I'm so done with that shit and the assholes it came out of. And I don't need anyone giving me shit anymore either.
  So you just keep your shit to yourself.

Irrigardless

Ok ok... I'll be the one...

"Wrongly"

Incidentally, I really hate that the UK expression for when someone is feeling sick is "poorly".
It's got the "ly" ending which is one of the clear signs of an adverb, and in other contexts it is used as an adverb. But, for some reason the British have turned it into an adjective meaning sick. Sometimes they use it in a way where it can be seen as an adverb: "He's feeling poorly", in which case it seems to be modifying "feeling". In the North American dialect you could substitute the adjective "sick": "He's feeling sick". But, other times they say "She won't be coming in today, she's poorly". What is the adverb modifying there, "is"?
no worries I'll use it the wrongliest
- You can always go wrongliester!
He wrongly assumed he was using the word wrongly.
- Very bigly, indeed!
Think different
- Some flat adverbs sound perfectly natural to most speakers, like "play nice" or "drive safe". Others have less acceptability among people in general, like "That tastes real good."
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_adverb

I'm gonna get the shit downvoted out of me for this, but the problem with this idea is that insular communities tend to redefine words and then expect everyone outside their bubble to know their new definition. Doing so also robs the language of a word that served a specific purpose, such as in the case of the word "literally."

And then the speakers from insular communities get told to fuck off with their special definitions, or they're so persistent that the new definition catches on. Either way, problem solved.
The word "literally" still serves its old purpose just fine, along with the new one.
- My issue with "literally" is that it's become an actual part of the dictionary definition rather than being recognized as merely a hyperbolic use of the word.
Didn't english literally develop in an insular community (britain)?
- There were a lot more langauges on those isles long before and during the [still ongoing] development of english, and during the empire connecting to more of the world more than any other in history... so, not so insular during its development.
- English is what you get when a community can't defend its borders and keeps being taken over by new rulers with a different language, which then works its way partly into common usage. Also, random word borrowing, because fuck you it's ours now.
- Not insular enough to be isolated, hence that saying about it being three languages in a trenchcoat.

I would of made this post myself but I like literally don't care enough.

should of would of could of

My two are Literally, and Crescendo. I really hate it when they are used wrong, and now the wrong answers are considered acceptable. That means Literally actually holds no meaning at all, and by changing the definition of Crescendo, the last 500 years of Western Music Theory have been changed by people who have no understanding of music at all.

That evolution has happened SO many times. Why does "literally" give you fits when "awful" or "terrific" do not? Perhaps because it's the shift you happen to be living through?
- Or maybe those other things shouldn't have happened, but it's too late for them. Now we have to save the words that are in danger now.
  If a boat is sinking, and I'm saying we have to save those people, would the proper response be "Well, where were you when the Titanic was going down? Why aren't you all worried about them?"
I was not aware of the crescendo one and looked it up. Imagine my surprise learning this dates back at least 100 years ago with the Great Gatsby (have not read it). I am now irrationaly angry that I'm learning about this way too late to complain about it.
Literally holds meaning, two meanings principally. They just happen to be opposite. "Literally" could mean either "actually" or "not actually, but similar in a way", but wouldn't ever mean "duck".
- "Literally" only holds the opposite meaning when used as a hyperbole.
- You should literally literally when a literally flies straight for your face because those feathered fowl can be as aggressive as gooses.
- Joke's on you, I'm having roasted literally for dinner
How does someone use crescendo wrong?
- Apparently, to mean the climax rather than the increase leading to it.
How do you feel about other words with their own opposite meanings, like dust or sanction? If the meaning isn't clear it's almost always because the speaker constructed a sentence poorly, which of course can lead to misunderstandings even when not using contronyms.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contronym
- Interesting! TIL

Literally.

That's dumb (which originally meant "mute" or "unable to speak")
I literally love and hate this comment.
Lol, I came here to make this exact comment

This is real and actually quite interesting to look at the history of. For example, the word "Decimate" IIRC was originally defined as killing one for every ten people of a group of people. Now, its used as a term for high impact destruction.

My usual example is manufacture — to make by hand, but it's more commonly used now to mean machine manufactured and made by hand is called handmade.
- Mine is electrocuted which means to die or get executed by electricity but people say "the person got electrocuted and is recovering in the hospital".
- That's a good one. In school they had me memorize a novel of Latin root words, which is where things can get frustrating. You take a word and piece together the meaning, only to find out the definition has changed so drastically over the years that the root words are now nonsense. Both of our examples fit this description.
I mean, I’d still call 1 out of 10 people dying “high impact.”
- You are technically correct, the best kind of correct.
It was originally killing 1 in every 10 by lot. In other words, not in battle, but as a collective punishment of a unit 1 in 10 soldiers would be randomly selected and killed.
1 in 10 soldiers dying in a battle doesn't sound all that bad. But, 1 in 10 soldiers being selected to be killed as a form of punishment for the unit sounds a lot worse.
- IIRC the other nine had to kill them, by beating with sticks? which makes it so much worse. Rarely used in extremis I believe.

We should probably resist hyper simplifying language, but whatever, I guess.

I can't help but think about 1984's newspeak whenever I see something like the abominable "unalive". I know the reasons are different for this particular one, but I agree that we seem to be moving into that kind of direction.
- "We need a new, more powerful, word for things that are bad and wrong. Badong."
For me it's adjective/superlative escalation. Hey, this bagel is awesome. It fills me with awe. It's much better than this soda which is terrible, it strikes me with terror how bad it is. It results in having to throw in intensifiers, which we're exhausting as well. Wow this movie is so fucking good. It was worth leaving the house for.
I've also been both a second language teacher and second language learner. It is really hard to teach a language where 50% of the words are culture dependent and old texts are completely irrelevant. It's very hard to learn simple language and be told it's wrong now.
People talk about descriptivist drift like it's 100% inevitable or even good, ignoring that we have finally reached an era of long term preservation of text and speech, and of global communication. We could be the first generation to be understood plainly for millenia. And what we are deciding to do instead is to make language from 100 years ago sound like Chaucer.
- The printing press was invented in 1440, the era of theoretical long-term-preservation has been here and languages keep changing despite it. We aren't going to hit the brakes on the specific period and culture that you happened to have been born into either.
Agree++

What if it isn't everyone who uses a word "wrong"? What if it's say 25% of people who use it incorrectly? Should you encourage them to use it correctly?

If there are two different ways of using the word and they could be mistaken for each-other that's bad. Once the use of a word has flipped and means something very different from the original (idiot, gay, etc.) then there's no reason to try to return to the original usage. If the usage is still in dispute and the majority of people use the word in the original meaning, I think it's good to discourage people from using the word incorrectly so that people are still able to understand each-other.

Then both groups are correct and the word gets multiple meanings.
Only one individual can use a word incorrectly.
I thnik Subcultures and sub-cultural contexts will always exist.
There's always some cases where people have - and prefer- a small or specialist audience.
If you try to discourage it too hard you'll probably end up with more slangs/ patois / creoles emerging. Try to clamp down of business consultant jargon and see what happens, a million worse terms will probably emerge.
But the disputes occur because people use the newer, less common meaning until it becomes more common. If you discourage people from using the word "incorrectly" but it eventually evolves in meaning through usage because people ignore your encouragement to return to the original meaning, then you'd just be on the losing side of the battle historically.
I feel like it should be much more nuanced as to whether you encourage or discourage change. People reclaiming or usurping derogatory terms as a big FU to bigotry? Awesome. People twisting words for the purposes of oppressive, deceptive, or marketing purposes? Nope.
The reason behind the change should be preferably be intentional, backed by goodwill, and done in order to increase ease of communication because the old meaning/usage wasn't sufficient.
But language is a shared medium and a lot of intention falls by the wayside because of random quirks as much by intentional campaigns.
- people use the newer, less common meaning until it becomes more common
  And we can work to stop it from becoming more common by nipping it in the bud.
  then you'd just be on the losing side of the battle historically
  At least you turned up to the fight.
  But language is a shared medium
  Which is why change should be gradual and limited, otherwise two people who use that language are unable to clearly communicate.

Like aks instead of ask? The Internet tried hard to convince me, but I'm still not convinced, sorry!

It's called "metathesis". We did it over hundreds of years with 'bird' which was originally 'brid' or 'bridd', and 'wasp' which was originally 'waps', apparently.
- In German it's also Wespe, but in my local Austrian dialect it's pronounced Wepsn. Very interesting, I didn't know that shift had happened (or I guess not happened) elsewhere.
- I thought "wasp" came from the Norman word "wespe" (French word guespe then later guêpe), but is that not true? Or do we just not know and these are possible explanations but there is no consensus?
- I will be using bird and wasps, thank you very much
Looks like aks was the original pronunciation
https://youtu.be/dzmmx_v_4fM?t=429
It's incorrect for Academic English but not AAVE, there's more than one version of the language.

I did a college paper circa 2000 on what a meme was before memes became memes. Which rather ironically, the concept of a meme originally was an idea that spreads and becomes an actual thing through person to person social transference, like what the word meme means currently. It’s like describing the back to the future plot lines.

Good luck explaining this to l'Académie Française !

Les Québécois sont entrés dans la conversation.
- Tabernac!
My first reaction… “not in fucking French…”

I just think skibidibi just sounds neat!

C'mon biologists, name a newly discovered spider species A. skibidius

Calling a Markov Chain Generator "Artificial Intelligence" is STILL WRONG.

This is where marketing creates special kinds of linguistic nightmares. Effectively, marketing is bullshit that becomes standard usage because it's so pervasive and people unfamiliar with the field don't know any better.
Hence LLMs are called AI. Two wheeled electric fire hazards are called hoverboards. 3G, 4G, 4G LTE, 5G, cell services usually aren't up to the standards they claim.
- Worth pasting the whole bit... This saved my life:
  By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing…kill yourself. It’s just a little thought; I’m just trying to plant seeds. Maybe one day they’ll take root – I don’t know. You try, you do what you can.
  (Kill yourself.)
  Seriously though, if you are, do.
  Aaah, no really. There’s no rationalisation for what you do and you are Satan’s little helpers. Okay – kill yourself.
  Seriously. You are the ruiner of all things good.
  Seriously.
  No this is not a joke. You’re [going], “There’s going to be a joke coming.” There’s no fucking joke coming. You are Satan’s spawn filling the world with bile and garbage. You are fucked and you are fucking us. Kill yourself. It’s the only way to save your fucking soul. Kill yourself
  Planting seeds.
  I know all the marketing people are going, “He’s doing a joke…” There’s no joke here whatsoever. Suck a tail-pipe, fucking hang yourself, borrow a gun from a Yank friend – I don’t care how you do it. Rid the world of your evil fucking machinations. (Machi…) Whatever, you know what I mean.
  I know what all the marketing people are thinking right now too: “Oh, you know what Bill’s doing? He’s going for that anti-marketing dollar. That’s a good market. He’s very smart.”
  Oh man, I am not doing that, you fucking, evil scumbags!
  “Ooh, you know what Bill’s doing now? He’s going for the righteous indignation dollar. That’s a big dollar. A lot of people are feeling that indignation. We’ve done research – huge market. He’s doing a good thing.”
  Godammit, I’m not doing that, you scum-bags! Quit putting a goddamn dollar sign on every fucking thing on this planet. “Ooh, the anger dollar. Huge. Huge in times of recession. Giant market. Bill’s very bright to do that.”
  God, I’m just caught in a fucking web.
  “Ooh, the trapped dollar, big dollar, huge dollar. Good market – look at our research. We see that many people feel trapped. If we play to that and then separate them into the trapped dollar…”
  How do you live like that? And I bet you sleep like fucking babies at night, don’t you?
  “What didya do today, honey?”
  “Oh, we made ah, we made ah arsenic a childhood food now, goodnight.” [snores] “Yeah we just said, you know, is your baby really too loud? You know?” [snores] “Yeah, you know the mums will love it.” [snores]
  Sleep like fucking children, don’t ya. This is your world, isn’t it?
  -- Bill Hicks

I will fight lexicon for the most petty of reasons. Idgaf

I am just Decimated by this argument!

Really begs the question of what language even means
- It is a social construct
- I have a theory

Not in programming languages.

Yeah, that only happens after an update.
Unlike humans, the entities who process those aren't capable of mentally compensating on the fly for deviations from the standard so "wrong words" are immediately punished and can't proliferate.
Those just invent new frameworks every six months which everyone should totally use this new framework, for reasons. Though, maybe that's just JavaScript.
- Any where they they let you define your own function are asking for trouble.
  def add(a,b){ return(a-b) }
  I think you need to use assembly code to stop this b.s.
- Definitely not just JavaScript.

That is literally unbelievable.

I have such a kneejerk reaction to say “lectern” when people say “podium” that when they really do mean “podium” I have to correct myself. 😅

Seems like a variant of hypercorrection.

3rd world. Anyone that uses the old definiton is being intentionally obtuse. And annoying.

Why would you use that term at all then? If you mean a developing or under-developed country why not say that?

Flammable & inflammable
Biannual & semiannual
Literally & literally

I thought it's gallonally in the US.. what's a liter?
- A quart that travelled to Europe to ‘find itself’.
- Oh, that's easy. A liter is what you buy bottled water by and you buy soda pop in 2 liter bottles. Wine and whisk(e)y is 750ml bottles. It's also the displacement of your car's engine. Though we use cc's for chainsaws and motorcycles, weird I know.
  So Americans are well familiar with a liter.

Ain't that the truth!

That's so yeet

Guess I'm out of a job.

Who guesses? You? Me? Everyone?
- I'm not guessing, I know, they're fired!

What if I told you that punctuation goes inside the quotation marks except in rare circumstances?

Don't care. If the "quotation" is inside the sentence, it also doesn't have punctuation.
So I am not going to "follow your rules about punctuation in quotation marks".
American spotted. 🎯

I thought that certain languages (I want to say French?) do not work this way.

They all work the same way. Some institution saying otherwise doesn't chance that.
- Well that rather shuts down that potentially interesting conversation thread.
This is not the first time I hear someone singling out French for this and I kind of wonder why.
Yes, there is a prescriptive institution "Académie Française" and yes it has had an influence on the normalisation of French in the past (like, 400 years ago).
No, linguistically, it does not work that simply (French is not prescriptivist), and it's been a while since anyone gave a damn what this institution says. French marches on, and the Académie is largely regarded as an illegitimate group of old men who try to force a classicist and artificial version of the language of their own making. They also have other missions which aren't about prescribing usage, but that's not what you usually hear about.
Also no, this institution no longer dictates what "proper" French is, and by that I mean it does not dictate it "legally" anymore. It never did, linguistically speaking.
And finally, I don't know why it is that French is the language always used when it comes to descriptivism vs prescriptivism. From my admittedly limited knowledge, it looks to me like at least in western Europe, English is the exception rather the rule regarding this. Other countries and languages have had prescriptivist institutions propped up in the past to try and dictate usage of the language.
In all cases, whatever they say does not automatically become gospel. You can make a point that such institutions can suggest usages, but they can't force them. Like the other commenter said, this is not how languages work. Ultimately, whatever the institutions say, if the people don't use it this way, then the institution is wrong.
- Lots of French creoles and patois across the ex-French-empire. The French authorities can define it as not "French" if they don't like it, but I doubt the speakers care.

It really depends on the context - like it's hilarious in my culture when people ask what team I'm rooting for