Technology is always transforming language and communication. After all, it's thanks to predictive text and autocorrect that a word as innocent as "duck" became synonymous with "fuck."
Online text for many of us is now our primary form of communication. So necessarily, web culture started breaking all the traditional rules of grammar to make it better fit the medium, with trends like the extra space before punctuation ... or idiosyncratic capitalization to Make A Point.
But one of the oldest online text trends says "fuck it" like no other, while simultaneously inspiring an unprecedented level of commitment from subscribers to it: It's the almighty lowercase bb!
The all lowercase crowd isn't just being grammatically incorrect to express themselves better through texting and social media, either. After DMing almost a dozen lowercase devotees (both personal friends and strangers), it became clear that it's almost more of a way of life than just a trend.
I only recently realized disabling autocaps on your phone was A Whole Thing when my boyfriend admitted that, when we first started texting, he turned his autocaps back on out of fear that I -- a fearsome Professional Writer -- would think he was stupid (lol). Now, he's happy to report reaching a level of comfort where he doesn't give a fuck what I think about his disregard for grammar.
Then I saw it everywhere: Twitter, Facebook, my own group chats. The anti-autocaps movement has been quietly on the rise for years now, and its unassuming members have a lot to say about it.
Though lowercase is meant to signify low investment, going out of your way to judiciously turn off autocaps on your phone and computer betrays an inconsistent level of devotion from anti-autocapers. And it's a sign that the popularity of this online language trend will only grow.
The rise of the lowercase stems from the fact that the rules for capitalization don't generally change the meaning of a sentence, says Lauren Fonteyn, a linguistics lecturer at the University of Manchester who studies language on the internet.
So we know we should use uppercase at the beginning of sentences, proper nouns, or with the "I" pronoun. But you can successfully communicate yourself while ignoring all that, too.
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"On the internet people have stopped caring about these non-functional rules of grammar, and started using caps for other reasons," says Fonteyn. Instead, caps are now used to "mark" words as special. "But to make the words more default, neutral, or ‘unmarked,’ lowercase is used."
Though most online trend followers may not know it, there's a long and radical history behind rejecting the subjugation of words to a capital-ist system of language. But there's also a host of other surprising reasons for why Extremely Online folks have made it part of their identity.
the chill factor
Despite being the online text trend arguably requiring the most effort (like googling how to turn off autocaps and then following instructions), the initial reason many people start to use all lowercase is laziness.
So how do we square that?
"Autocorrect is actually working against the ‘ease of effort’ that comes with all lowercase," says Fonteyn. "So using lowercase is about more than simply doing the easiest thing; it’s also about showing that you are a person who does all lowercase."
The far more ubiquitous reason people give for their use of all caps isn't mere functionality, but rather for the hip, casual, chill vibes and aesthetic. Simply put: Autocaps is tired, no caps is wired.
Simply put: Autocaps is tired, no caps is wired.
"its COOL its joyous millennial nihilist. its faster to read and write.., . its casual and friendly," says graphic design freelancer Ruby Levin. (Editor's Note: All written quotes have been reprinted here with the original grammar used by the source.)
But the aesthetic appeal goes deeper, expressing a fundamental difference in the user's demeanor.
"it’s so hard to convey nuance and tone in txt form. lowercase is an elegant whisper. lean in and get this content in your dome piece in a suave-like manner," explains Hector Sanchez, who works in the video game industry and committed to the lifestyle long ago like many other lowercasers. It was almost done in protest against those annoying types of people who policed the use of oxford commas online, or Twitter personalities that made exhausting all caps their brand.
All the lowercase devotees I spoke to felt the less imposing visual reflected their IRL personalities more. "mos def i am v chill. I get riled up about stuff but that’s when the caps come out," says Sanchez.
"It's become such a huge part of how I communicate online for the past eight years that it's become pretty ingrained in my person. I'm a pretty calm person in real life," says 21-one year old student Nikki Miller, who even turns off atuocaps on temporary flip phones while abroad (but sent her answers with accurate punctuation via email instead of DMs).
To her and many others, using all lowercase on social media and texts allows her to separate online communication that's for work versus pleasure.
"its all lowercase unless its a professional setting and i have to pretend to give a shit for a while," says Levin. "there's an extremely beautiful moment in a client/email relationship where i can start to type all lowercase + with affectations + non-smilie emojis which is v freeing."
Some, like Levin, are even pretty extreme in their opposition to autocaps, finding the use of correct capitalization in casual settings to be an affront.
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"someone who's still using uppercase letters is still in the like extremely sad and lonely mindset of me as a teen trying to use correct punctuation and grammar to prove my worth or boring personality or something," she says. "if ur still using uppercase by now what are you trying to prove ??? i get it if someone doesn't have autocaps turned off on their phone but damn if ur capitalizing peoples names in casual tweets ... who hurt you."
the origins of the anti capital-ist movement
As you've probably already surmised, there's a rebellious undertone to the lowercase. That dates all the way back to the radical politics of those who originally questioned the presumptions of capitalization and proper grammar.
In the '70s, famed feminist writer and thinker bell hooks chose a lowercase pen name that embodied the movement's turn away from the individual and toward ideas around the collective. Language is a construct of patriarchal society, these theories posit, and its elitist rules act as a gatekeeping method to uphold the racist and sexist system that created said language.
There's no reason to carry these arcane conventions into modern online speak.
Media scholar danah michele boyd (who legally changed her name to all lowercase) also questions the egotism of how English capitalizes the "I" pronoun rather than "you," "we," or "they." As she notes on her website, this rule came from a centuries-old tradition of putting "I" as the first word in a sentence -- then that capitalization just stuck after that stopped being the case.
But, boyd believes, there's no reason to carry these arcane conventions into modern online speak.
"[We're] in a digital age and the computer conveniently spaces the 'i' quite properly to make it recognizable, so i gave up on giving it such a special level of importance -- it is referring to me, right? I thought an attempt at minimizing the individualization could start at home," she writes.
Whether they know it or not, the rebellious nature of lowercasers also comes from a more recent niche of women, who influenced a lot of early web culture: "cool tumblr feminists," Levin says, pointing to kara jesella, who often lowercases her name online.
Miller and others also agreed that Tumblr (which, let's not forget, has a logo stylized with a lowercase "t") was at the heart of what made lowercase an online norm. But Levin goes further, tracing a lot of other popular internet speak to feminine affectations, like the multiple question marks (???) as uptalk or overuse of cute emoji.
stanning the anti-autocaps revolution
A quick search for "autocaps" on Twitter and Instagram reveals a whole host of other niche and often overlapping communities that have taken to lowercase as the preferred (if not flat-out required) aesthetic.
Namely, many stan (meaning fan accounts and their followers) and queer online communities have adopted "no autocaps" as a rule of engagement. But most of the people I talked to who identify with these groups have their own different, individual interpretations for why they think that is.
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K-pop culture writer Josh Calixto, while not a lowercase devotee himself, noticed its proliferation across the fandom. He attributes it, in part, to "an attempt at respectability." After gaining a reputation in the media as crazed weirdo fanatics who have zero chill and post all caps YouTube comments, the K-pop community has made several coordinated efforts to distance themselves from the stereotype.
"theres definitely a sexist element to it too. 'rabid fangirls' is still an extremely common stereotype from the media. like, you see that phrase even from national publications. 'screeching' 'screaming' all that shit," he says.
Lowercase is a way of communicating to the world that the people who love K-pop are just normal, sane internet folks like yourself.
What's interesting to note is that all these groups who've taken to the lowercase -- whether queer, K-pop, or lady bloggers -- are also coincidentally groups known for internet trendsetting. Though rarely given credit (remember the forgotten origins of "yas queen?"), these online communities are often ahead of the curve, influencing mainstream web culture that then unwittingly adopts their content, jokes, memes, and lingo.
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But above all, lowercase's biggest function in these contexts is as a way to signal to one another that you're a member of that community.
"i’ve never thought about it before, but it’s possible that it gives people a sense of belonging? you’re right, its like unintentionally signaling that someone is lgbt+ or run a fan account !" says Christina, who asked not to use her last name. The avid anti-autocaps Twitter user coincidentally started questioning her sexuality right around the time she joined stan communities and, after realizing it was the norm, switched to using all lowercase.
Many others also cited seeing others in their community disable autocaps as the reason for why they started doing it. This behavior isn't new or unique to internet communities. Assimilation into any culture requires new members conform to the implicit, unspoken, and often arbitrary idiosyncrasies of how that specific group chooses to communicate.
"Basically these ‘rules of conduct’ in language within communities are there for the same reason that all punks wore safety pins in everything and shaved their heads," says the linguistics lecturer, Fonteyn. "It’s about membership and exclusion. But unlike punks, on the internet participating in a community mainly involves written language, and is less about physical appearance."
a nue normal
That's the thing about breaking the rules of language as a protest against elitist language policing: Sometimes it backfires, and your rule-breaking becomes the new mechanism for gatekeepers.
Though undoubtedly done in good fun, maligning those who don't disable autocaps has become a new way to shame or assume things about people based on how they talk online. Most of the lowercase devotees I chatted with admitted that, far from going against the grain, lowercase is the prevailing norm now on their personal Twitter and Tumblr feeds. And those who don't disable autocaps stand out like sore thumbs, potentially even warranting an unfollow.
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"The more frequent something becomes, the more accustomed we grow to seeing it, and the more likely we are to accept it and copy it/start doing it ourselves," says Fonteyn. While there's no empirical data on it, Fonteyn does believe that the switch from lowercase being an act of laziness and into an intentional act of rebellion indicates that it'll only grow more common.
The lowercase's popularity also has a much more obvious answer, and it's youth culture. You'll be hard-pressed to find anyone over 40-years old in the lowercase tribe.
"it's happening because it just feels casual, like a conversation between friends, and that resonates more with younger people," says Miller.
Remember that millennials and Gen Z are the generations raised on heath class teachers scaring us into thinking publishing anything unprofessional online would ruin our lives forever. We've grown up on horror stories of this or that person losing their scholarship or job because of an "inappropriate" post on social media (which can happen, sure, but the scaremongering was a lot).
The lowercase is like a harmless, gentle way of fighting back against the antiquated mentality of policing the way one should act online. It's a return to the early, idealistic days of the internet when rules didn't apply, anonymity was guaranteed, and you could always find a community to accept you the way you were.
It may seem small, but the unassuming lowercase speaks volumes about who we want to be online.
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