I can vividly recall a few occasions, and only because of how I've felt afterward, where I've typed a quick message, trusting my phone to keep me on point, and then autocorrect has swooped in, eager to turn my sentence into something embarrassing.
The silent saboteur of modern communication, as I call it, doesn't discriminate. Whether it's a professional email or a casual text or a blog post, it can turn a friendly message into something awkward... or even an unintended insult.
Here are two of my cringe-worthy experiences with autocorrect:
1)
I used to work for a tutoring company for about a decade. I would meet students who needed tutoring within a twenty-mile radius of my place, each at their local library. A coordinator arranged all this, and I always communicated my students' results with her so that she could keep all the records updated. One day, I had to test a student of mine, a Mexican kid named Jesus. He didn't pass his test. It was just before 5 pm, so I decided to use my phone to send a quick email to the coordinator and let her know right away. I typed "Jesus failed his test"... and pressed send, feeling really good about myself, too, because I knew the coordinator would get on it immediately and extend the student's tutoring hours. About a minute later, I got three laughing emojis in a row as a reply. Confused, I opened the entire email and felt mortified. I hadn't even realized that the overzealous editor had transformed my message into: "Jesus Christ My Lord and Savior failed his test." I immediately apologized for the email I had sent and explained that autocorrect must have done that.
2)
A couple of years ago, I used to post an open letter of appreciation every Wednesday to someone I felt grateful for, as Gratitude Girl, on gratigi.blogspot.com. One Wednesday, I wrote my post while waiting for my clothes to dry at the laundromat, on my phone, and autocorrect, insisting on knowing better than I do, changed the person's last name, so instead of Henry Winkler, I had Henry Wrinkler. Of course, I didn't notice it then and proudly published the blog post and even tweeted about it. A week later, when I went to publish a new letter of gratitude, I noticed what had happened. Did I mention I had tagged Henry Winkler when I had tweeted about my blog post?
In addition to digital embarrassments, I've also had a different kind of unpleasant experience:
Once I missed out on seeing a dear friend of mine, Shahram, because our mutual friend texted me "I'm at the park, enjoying my time with Shahram"... but what I received said "I'm at the park, enjoying my time with sunbeams." Had I known my friend Shahram had been at the park, I would have immediately joined the party, but I thought my friend / colleague was sharing that he was enjoying the weather. I did think the wording sounded strange, but I assumed he was drunk, so I didn't try to clarify... until the next day when I saw him at work — and he was so surprised when he realized how his text had been corrected.
This is, I believe, something everyone has experienced — some people more than others. Now, I consider autocorrect an uninvited companion always ready to turn serious moments into laughable or cringe-inducing ones.
