Community Discussions
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What does ‘why’ mean in this context?
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I’ve read multiple instances of phrases like ‘why, hello’ or ‘why yes’. What is it supposed to mean?
Top Comment: It's just an interjection that doesn't mean anything. It could be replaced by well or even oh and nothing would change apart from slight nuances.
Why vs. The reason why
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Guys, I want to know the difference between sentences
"Tell me why you were late to school"
"Tell me the reason why you were late to school"
Are both grammatically correct? I also want to know if "the reason why" is redundant
Thank you in advance!
Top Comment: My editorial instinct tried to tell me "the reason why" is incorrect, so I poked around some good sources, and learned it's perfectly fine. Here are some interesting sources: https://www.arrantpedantry.com/2013/05/08/the-reason-why-this-is-correct/ https://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2012/09/reason-why.html
Why is porque sometimes because, and sometimes why, and why is por que sometimes because, and sometimes why?
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I am extremely confused. It started off with a person I was talking to who always kept using "por que" insteead of "porque" together to say "why". It was very frequent. Now, I am reading a book, and it quote "yo creo que hablan asi por envidia. porque dejas que te hablen asi? cierto que no parecen amigas."
My brain could comprehend that it meant "why", and when I put ut in translator the full sentence, it also spit out "why" instead of because. Why in this context is "porque" together why? Or in any context?
When I asked my friend why she used it the way she uses it, she sent me a voice note and I could not understand it still.
Top Comment: It's not - people don't know how to spell. Porque = always "because". Pronounced PORque - one word with no spaces, tanto escrita como hablada. Por qué = always "why". Pronounced por QUÉ? - dos palabras separadas
Why is there no "do" or "does" after "why" here? Can someone explain?
Main Post: Why is there no "do" or "does" after "why" here? Can someone explain?
Top Comment: Because he's not actually asking a question with "why" here. It's an embedded question.
Why do some people say “how come” instead of “why”?
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Where does this come from? I’ve noticed that I say this a lot and I think I learned it from my grandparents, but don’t notice a lot of other people using this phrase? Thanks!
Top Comment: How come? for "why?" is recorded from 1848 [Bartlett]. Emphatic phrase and how! is recorded from 1865. The formulation was common in book and article titles ("The National Debt, and How to Pay It"), but Pennsylvania writer Bayard Taylor, in whom it is first recorded, seems to have regarded it as a German or German-American expression. Source: Etymonline Edit in light of the fruitful discussions; I agree that English has likely had the “how come” construction for much longer than what is attested in written records (and what the common people say does not always make it into writing), as shown by the early modern English examples and the parallels in other Germanic languages.
What's the main reason you use reddit?
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Just out of curiosity I was wondering what people mainly use this app for, is it just to ask and get answers to questions, for inspiration, to generally talk to people, entertainment, a sence of community, all of the above?
Top Comment: Reddit is basically the only social media I use. It's the closest thing to an old school forum that also has a robust and active community. Over the years, I've fine tuned my list of subreddits to include mostly those that foster deeper, more thoughtful discussions, along with a smattering of niche hobby subs and slightly more casual conversations (oh look, I'm here!). I usually scroll through best/hot until I find a post that interests me, and use it as a writing prompt of sorts. It's difficult to organize my own thoughts without some kind of external stimulus, so any post that resonates with me is an opportunity to explore my own perspective while also helping others to the best of my ability. Sometimes I'm able to provide others with insight while also clarifying a thought that I hadn't even considered needed clarifying. It's a win-win.
Why Reddit is so successful?
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There are, or at least there were, many other comparable blog/website/social networks like reddit, focusing on writing, like Quora or Yahoo Answer. Of course reddit is not competing against Instagram or YouTube just to be extremely clear. What is the reason for his success? Networking effect? What are the key elements that differentiate reddit from the others comparable? It's just timing?
Top Comment:
If I had to guess, I'd say it's probably popular because it's a good place to talk about ... anything. When you just want someone to talk to, it's always here for ya. That's the way Reddit is.
Other platforms are ... different. Facebook, for example, has no conversation Moderators, so it's free-for-all, just too many bots and trolls everywhere, and seems oblivious to them. It has a lot of junk and overzealous groups and pages. Reddit seems so much better, not as chaotic.
I signed up for Reddit one day when a search result came up in Google, it was a post in here, and when I hit the page, Google asked me if I wanted to sign in, so I accidentally said yes. Months later, I decided to check it out. I like to try to help others, help them feel good about themselves, and maybe learn a thing or two in the process. Why? Because that's how I fly. So Reddit seems like a nice place for those things.
I use Facebook for networking, since most of my family and friends are there. It's great for private conversations, and has a nice plugin for video calls and such. I try to avoid the public areas, they're just too much of not the right things.
Why is reddit so popular, yet very few people I speak with in real life seem to use it/know about it
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Reddit generates over a billion pageviews a month and has 400 million+ accounts. It's one of the most popular websites/apps on the internet, up there with Facebook and Instagram. Yet it seems like a shockingly low amount of people I talk to in real life use it or even know what reddit is. Is this a matter of demographics? I figure the 18-25 American male is the most common group of users. Reddit's "secrecy" is even reflected in the "when does the narwhal bacon" culture you can see in the popular subs that have millions of subscribers, where people think they're part of a unique chosen few using this website, but fortunately this seems to be less common nowadays.
Top Comment: Once I overheard on the subway a guy explaining in great detail to another guy about a time when someone posted "Sauce, captain?" on 9gag. Another time I was eating lunch at Panera Bread, and the guy at the table next to me was holding a business meeting with a guy he wanted to hire to edit YouTube videos where he reviews hot sauces. It's always kind of weird to hear people talking about internet stuff out in the real world. I looked it up, and apparently Reddit has 26 million monthly users in the United States. Which is a lot of people, but also less than eight percent of the American population. I think that's just a function of our more divide media ecosystem, it's possible for something to be hugely popular yet also unfamiliar to most of the population at the same time. It's sort of like how tens of millions of people watched Two and a Half Men, but if anyone I knew did they never mentioned it.
How to explain why Reddit is different / better than other social media platforms?
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A lot of my friends aren't aware of Reddit and I struggle to explain what it is and why I much prefer it over Instagram, Facebook etc
Top Comment: Please help keep AskUK welcoming! Top-level comments to the OP must contain genuine efforts to answer the question. No jokes, judgements, etc. Don't be a dick to each other. If getting heated, just block and move on. This is a strictly no-politics subreddit! Please help us by reporting comments that break these rules. I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
Does anyone think reddit is better than other social media?
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I have been using Instagram for scrolling reels and YouTube for shorts I use what's app too frequently but reddit is the only platform I find most interesting does anyone else feel that way?
Top Comment: Very small, niche/hobby subreddits that feel like 2012 reddit or 2000’s era message boards (and where bots and astroturfers really have no incentive to go) are still the best form of social media. The larger subreddits or anything that can even remotely be looked at politically are as toxic as any social media that exists.
Why is Reddit so anti-social and full of takes and views you rarely see in real life? I feel like reddit being the "least bad" social media is not true at all
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This is something i have noticed about this place over time. Obviously i am generalising here, and there are decent communities, which tend to be small and focused on a goal or support related.
However, over many years on this site, i have seen it go down hill so much. around 15 years ago it wasn't such a bad place.
The "typical" person I see on here is male, introverted, likes video games, and is a bit anti-social(in the sense that they dont socialise enough, don't know how to, and are polarising for no reason).
A lot of the opinions i see on here would be a minority in real life, but you see it quite a lot, and they often end up highly upvoted, if not the top. things like general doom and gloom, saying how society is fucked and falling apart, the world is fucked.
Beyond the initial "typical" traits, i have noticed other common themes:
- Extremely pro work from home
- combative towards social situations for no reason(like neighbours or colleagues)
- very vocal with surface level knowledge
This leads to funny situations if not sad, because i read how people have an attitude of "why are my colleagues talking to me on my lunch break" - that they are only interested in working and getting paid and going home - while on the other hand whine about how hard it is to get a girlfriend.
The worst aspect i would have to say is just the general strong dislike of society in general i see on here and glorification of "doom" or something. it is just more antisocial behaviour imo, and really common on here. You just dont find these takes in real life and if you ever did you would feel that person may be depressed or something.
It's exactly what i'd expect from people who have no social skills at all, and just want the world to fall apart to feel better about themselves almost - while the same person is paralysed at the idea of making a phone call or greeting a neighbour.
God forbid you ever mention how video games are bad in any way at all(they can be, like anything). Video games are like one thing that is not divisive at all on here and i find that funny almost and very revealing. If you even hint that playing 8 hours a day after work or not, may not be the best choice in life - a typical swarm of responses will say things like "everything in life is a waste of time, you are on reddit right now" or similar.
Like yeah, Reddit is a waste of time and i feel like a loser the more time i spend on here. nobody is saying you cant engage in things that arent productive. it is just this weird extreme take on it.
Due to this, i really think Reddit is no better than other social media, and may even be worse. I dont want to offend, but i do have an opinion that has been forming for almost 2 decades on this site. It seems to attract a lot of losers, but very vocal ones who create a strong culture surrounding it but treat it as a great thing.
Top Comment: very vocal with surface level knowledge Lol yeah good way to put it. That's social media in general Yeah, I've seen the change, been on Reddit since around 2010. The world has changed quite a bit since then, and Reddit is now a mega echo chamber. Can give you a warped sense of reality of what's actual common opinion in real life. "Reddit is not real life" should be a reminder message every time one logs in/reads a comment. Idk. I'm looking to move away from Reddit since I feel like I've largely aged out and have beliefs that Reddit generally resents now, but it basically replaced forums so can be a challenge. Take me back to GameFAQs
Why has Reddit grown in popularity in the 2020s?
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I feel like nowadays I see Reddit more often in my Google search results than back in the 2010s. Reddit has been around a long time, but it wasn’t until the 2020s that I started to see people use it since it wasn’t on the top 10 most visited websites five or ten years ago. What happened?
Top Comment: It's just gone mainstream, used to be seen as quite a niche, almost nerdy forum based service that wasn't seen as a form of social media. Over time more and more subreddits have been created and as people join one they join many. It's become useful for news, memes, fandoms and is often more useful as a source of help than dedicated internet pages.