We Hit Peak 2019

[Dill]

(12-19-2019, 07:10 PM)fredtoast Wrote: I am saying that we have universal rules for our language.  Rules of proper grammar are not subjective moral judgements.  They are rules of proper grammar.

When a judge askes me about my client's criminal history I'm not going to say "I reckon he ain't got none." and then cry about how everyone is "insulting my culture" when they laugh at me.

We do not have universal rules for our language, unless by "universal" you mean protocols agreed upon in US schools and universities and other institutions, and which change and are otherwise "updated" over the years. True linguistic universals could neither be specific to one nation at one moment in history nor updated

And this is not an either/or--universal rules or "subjective moral judgments."

Your example is of a clash between a US dialect called "standard English" and one of the many non-standard dialects. 

When you treat the standard dialect as somehow "natural" by universalizing it, then you hide one way in which power is exercised in the US.
You also illustrate one way in which power is exercised and maintained, e.g., the internalization of dominant values/norms that comes with the dominant dialect and the self-policing which follows.