this post was submitted on 09 Oct 2026
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Programmer Humor
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I refuse to give 'em up
I never used an em dash in my life before AI made them a thing. I enjoy the jokes about AI can have my em dashes when it pries them from my cold dead... but I cannot relate. Ive only ever used the hyphen or en dash. I cannot figure out for the life of me if I have been missing anything.
I was a pretty avid reader growing up and I think I just kinda noticed them. And I used to get a little confused when my teachers kept knocking me for "run-on" sentences, when the books I read often had long-structured sentences.
Commas, semicolons, ellipses, em dashes, colons, parentheses — sprinkle them about and you can have a paragraph of a sentence (with side thoughts), and kinda do whatever you want... it's all about using "voice" through written word. (Period)
I've been told that en dashes are for numbers, and em dashes are for words. I have a vague understanding of the usage, which (to my understanding) is splicing phrases/ sentences together. it maybe that you would want to use an em dash when you use a hyphen?
I use them almost like a semicolon — a longer pause to break up the sentence, where a comma just wouldn't cut it. Idk how correct I am either, it's more about trying to convey my voice and how I would like the sentence to be read. I'm not a much of a grammar nazi, more like a grammar anarchist