There is nothing ungrammatical about singular they, just as we use "you are" with singular meaning, and it is the natural follow-on to impersonal pronouns such as "anybody, everybody" etc - "If anybody calls when I'm out, ask them to leave a message". This is absolutely standard in British English when the sex of the person is unknown, and is used for example in passport application forms. It is also pretty common in American English too; even AP have now dropped their objection to it.

What's more, singular they has a long and illustrious history in English, going back at least to Chaucer (and long before political correctness, before you bring that one up) :

"And whoso fyndeth hym out of swich blame, they wol come up ..."

and including:

Jane Austen - "I would have everybody marry if they can do it properly"
Thackery - "A person can't help their birth"
Orwell - "We can only know an actual person by observing their behaviour"

And it's even sometimes used when the person's sex is known:

"There's not a man I meet but doth salute me as if I were their well-acquainted friend" (Shakespeare)
"No man goes to battle to be killed. But they do get killed" (George Bernard Shaw)

I'm sorry that natural idiomatic English should sound so terrible to you.

One thing, I bet that those who say "conversate" don't make fatuous and snobbish remarks like these about other people's language the way you do. I'm afraid you say more about yourself than about them.

Furthermore, you already have two contrasting ideas in the first section - "Despite many years of ..." and "the US didn't intervene". So your first idea is not so much about the US's non-intervention, but about the contrast. Your next part, about their reasoning, may be related to the non-intervention,but not really to this contrast. Personally, I feel that "officially ended" cries out for a natural break, and a full stop (period) would be much more appropriate here.

Now for the colon; its position is fine, but I'm concerned about what comes after it. I feel if you use "include" here we expect a list of things, i.e. noun phrases, but you have standard sentences. Secondly "reasoning" is uncountable, so no "s" at the end. I would suggest something like: "Their reasoning behind not interfering was based on several factors: the US was in a time of ... etc".

(By the way, who cares about a missed call, if the caller's number remains unknown? Why would we want to know that a mysterious stranger called at all?)

Some have said that expressions such as "you lot sat there in the corner" (describing where you lot are, not to what you did) sound plain wrong and the users of such ugly expressions are diminished in the opinion of the audience who may be job interviewers, or potential donors to worthy causes, who will be put off. So there may be serious consequences to using such terms.

Some say they are ungrammatical, because the wrong parts of the verb are being used, so causing confusion as to what is meant.

Others say it doesn't matter as long as the drift of what is being said is clear enough so let it all hang out and don't bother to get it right because folk'll probably know what you mean, hey?

Is 'Pain in the English' the right forum for arguing that it doesn't matter whether it is correct? We all know that hardly anyone uses correct English in informal situations, but we should look to to ensure that people have a chance to know what is correct so that when it matters, especially in formal situations, we may use it.

Although I think a theoretical grammatical explanation can be put forward for it, which I tried to do in an earlier comment, what it really boils down to is this is an idiomatic expression which is becoming increasingly popular among speakers of Standard British English. Many authorities, Fowler for one, believe(d) that established idiomatic use supersedes theoretical grammar. I grant you that "was sat" is still borderline, but it is very evident listening to BBC Radio 4 (the most "Standard" of British radio stations) that its use is becoming increasingly common among non-dialect speakers.My bet is that in twenty years or so, few people will remember what all the fuss was about.

I say 'sit' has a past participle active "sitting" and passive "seated". Active when he chose to sit, passive when it was forced upon him, so to speak, and he was made to sit.

"Sat" is the past, or perfect, tense of sit. As in the cat sat on the mat. If you say the cat was sat on the mat it means it was told to do it (but it wouldn't, of course, because it was a cat). If you say the cat was sitting on the mat it means it was already there, in that position, having sat down there earlier.

Warsaw Will quoted with approval Sue Perkins "When nobody's looking, I like to watch Graham [Norton] sat at a stool, braddle out ...", then eight months later Tessa asserted, without giving any grammatical argument or reason whatever, "both of these are completely correct ... " which I took to be a reference to the argument so far. She then suggested "was sat" and "sat" and "was sat sitting" as being just fine. The colon at the end of her first paragraph shows that she was in fact referring to what was to come, and to what had gone before. It's a very small colon, but it is there and I missed it. mea culpa.

Despite many years of complete massacre and annihilation of Jews and other religions, the United States didn’t intervene in the Holocaust until 1944- 11 years into the mass-killing, and 1 year before it officially ended (“United States Policy Toward”); a few of their reasoning’s behind not interfering sooner include: the US was in a time of economic depression, xenophobia & anti-Semitic feelings, and the US army’s aircraft didn’t have the capacity to bomb Auschwitz accurately (“United States Policy Toward”).

The word "sit" has a number of definitions with subtle differences. It can mean "to be in a sitting position", or "to assume a sitting position", but it can also mean "to place someone (or oneself) into a sitting position". If one were to use "was sat" as the passive voice, meaning "to be placed into a sitting position", then exactly how would that be ungrammatical? Something like "I was sat in the third row by that usher over there".

Yes, yes, you could say "I was seated by that usher...", but that's a different verb entirely. Synonymous, yes, but so what? "To sit" means "to place in a seated position", just like "to seat" does. So again, just because there's another more common way to say something doesn't make another version wrong no matter how unusual or awkward it may sound. So, if someone said "I was sat in the front row. It was great!" and they meant that they were sitting in the front row, then yes, their statement might be considered wrong or at least idiomatic, but still not ungrammatical. You see, they might have meant that that they were placed in their seats, perhaps by an usher, or even under their own locomotion. This construction would be correct, which validates the grammar regardless of its potential misuse.

By the way, if you really think about it, "was sat" has definite advantages over "was seated". "Was seated" is ambiguous. It can mean "was sitting" or "was placed in one's seat". But, "was sat" can only mean "was placed in one's seat". So, if you want to clearly and unambiguously indicate that you were brought to your seat and placed in it, then "was sat" should really be preferred, yes?

It isn't.

And Will, while your explanation certainly makes sense, I can't help but think of "baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool?..." :)

The "...sat at a stool..."comment was from Warsaw Will's post of September 4, 2012, 12:03pm, not Tessa's post. Tessa's post does follow, but has nothing to do with Will's previous post. Hers is just a continuing discussion of the relevant topic.

Look closely again at Tessa's post. Here's a shortened version:

"Both of these are ... correct...:"
"He was sat at the table".
"He was sitting at the table".

See the colon? The "Both" in Tessa's post is clearly referring to the two examples in Tessa's own post. She was comparing "...was sat at the table" to "...was sitting at the table" and nothing more. If she were replying specifically to Will's comment, why would she use the word "both"? Will didn't offer two examples to be compared. Why would she follow up with a colon and then list two examples that only make sense in the context of her previous sentence? Her post stands on its own. In fact, it only makes sense when viewed this way.

Do note, I'm not addressing whether or not "was sat" is OK; I'm merely clarifying Tessa's comments.

If you object to the dorky sounding nature of Preconscious (and fair enough), and wanted to simplify it for the general public, I'd have this:
Conscious - as discussed
Basic everyday working memory
Unconscious - as discussed, however, note this the dreaming part in all of this

To substitute for Preconscious with simply "your basic memory" (or something similar) would have no conflict with psych, and be just as useful. Let the Freudians say Preconscious if they really have to, and in the meantime, it'd still be conscious and unconscious, which would make the psychologists very happy.

Why I do NOT run with Freud on this one and why I have Hollywood behind me (haha) is simply that we (not psychologists who want to make things seem very difficult) know there are simply 3-layers of the mind to be dealt with.

I. CONSCIOUS: Me writing this right now and you reading this right now.

II. SUBCONSCIOUS/PRECONSCIOUS: You already knowing you're going to thumb up this article without even having thought about it.

III. UNCONSCIOUS: When you were five, someone dropped a large psychology book on your head which caused the need for 17-stitches on the top of your head and so your mind repressed that memory to never be brought back up again.

Now, what's the problem? We have a "workbench" that the mind uses that is IN BETWEEN those two layers. This level of consciousness is tapped into from Layer I and also accessed from Layer III. Now, in the English language, what is the proper term to describe "UNDER" a layer? What is a good term to describe "BETWEEN" two layers? Well, for me, in English, the term "SUB" is way more descriptive than the term "PRE" which conjures more of a "BEFORE" than a "BELOW" or "INBETWEEN". So, I will not be utilizing what that mother-loving psycho Freud said (said laughingly with love) but will instead be using the much more sensical "SUBCONSCIOUS" to mean the workbench the mind uses to access UNCONSCIOUS thoughts when they surface as well as remembering temporary data like phone numbers etc.

And while there's an 1859 book "Memorials of the Montgomeries, earls of Eglinton" the Wikipedia entry on Clan Montgomery shows the coat of arms of the Montgomerys, Earls of Eglinton.

There is a further complication in that, according to the Clan Montgomery website, some people have the surname Montgomerie, which would boost the IE figures. Incidentally, that website seems to use exclusively "Montgomerys" when talking of various Montgomery families.

http://www.clanmontgomery.org/links.html

This Ngram graph suggests that the Y version overtook the IE version around 1910, and that the Y version is much more common nowadays.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=the+Montgomeries%2Cthe+Montgomerys&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=

Small point. If you're writing a historical novel, shouldn't you have been doing this sort of research already?

If it's the afternoon or later however, past simple would be more appropriate - "Ali didn't have breakfast this morning".

If by any chance you're translating from Spanish, the rules for using pretérito perfecto with present time periods, and pretérito indefinido with and past time periods, are exactly the same as in English.

Where it gets a bit more complicated is with expressions like today, which can be divided up into parts:

Salesman to his colleague at 4pm - I've opened four new accounts today.
Same man to his wife at 8pm - I opened four new accounts today.

You might think that "today" was the current time period in both cases, so both should have present perfect. But in the second case he is really thinking of his working day, which is now finished, and so a past time period.

What John actually said was "Who makes the rules of English grammar, if not the users of English?". He neither said "makes up" nor "an English speaker". And nor did anyone else, as far as I can see. What they talked about was "common usage", something very different from your interpretation.

And of course he is (they are) perfectly correct; the rules of any language come from what generations of speakers of that language (or specific dialect, for example Standard English) have decided is acceptable: that's where grammar comes from. It's only later that it gets codified in grammar books. The earliest English grammar books recognised this, as do most modern grammars. Unfortunately, in between we had the prescriptivists, who tried to carve certain rules into stone, and even more unfortunately, some people still take the same attitude.

Before advising people to "get a grip" and accusing others of making "idiotic submissions", perhaps you should try engaging your own brain, or at least learn how to read.

I would suggest that is exactly what is happening in Britain with "he was sat". It is now often used by people who speak otherwise totally standard British English, and for many (probably most) of us poses absolutely no problem, however much some people cry "incorrect". We've heard it all before: for "ten items or less", for "that" instead of "which"etc. If we are sensible we simply ignore it; the more inquisitive of us try to find an explanation, as I tried to do in my last comment.

Grammar doesn't come from books or immutable laws; it has been formed by generations of native speakers arriving at a consensus as to what is acceptable. I don't hear much outcry in Britain at the increasing use of this (to me rather attractive) idiom. And so what if it is dialect? (After all Standard English is also only a dialect, linguistically speaking). Some of us would welcome a little more dialect in realms where Standard English has traditionally held sway: on the BBC, for example.

And "sat" and "sat sitting" in place of "sitting" and "seated" just aren't correct. When these terms are used they do not pretend to be standard English.

2) "Calls are answered in the order received" is correct English, but to appear personal, companies want to tell you about "your" call, not just calls in general.

3) "We answer calls in the order received" is also correct English. This option not only has the same problem as (2) above, but is even worse because the company becomes the subject of the sentence by the use of active voice. So this makes the sentence primarily about the company, rather than your call.

4) "Your call will be answered in turn" is, I think, this is the best solution.

No man can forget this Personal Unconscious Memory for Life.

It could also help ONE to transfer Memory to Personal UNconscious Genetic Archival...by Practice...whereby One can instantly Recall the Memory without Subconscious memory too holding the same Data in different Zone of Brain.
Good Luck to those who DARE to Practice this ART of Memory Recall,

http://data.grammarbook.com/blog/apostrophes/tips-on-apostrophes-with-names/

a) Chicago doesn't have a governor (although Illinois does)
b) Obama has never been elected the governor of anywhere (or mayor for that matter), but was a state senator for Illinois and then a US senator
c) this is a site about English, which can be contentious enough without bringing politics into it, so can we keep politics out of it, please?

I've no doubt that somebody somewhere thinks you speak "funny" too. Most of us do to some other people. In Britain, every city has its own accent, but most of us don't criticise each other for that; we just see it as part of life's rich tapestry. How about a bit of "live and let live"?

Heaven apparently comes from Old English "heofon" - "home of God," earlier "sky, firmament," probably from Proto-Germanic

Hell comes from Old English "hel, helle" - "nether world, abode of the dead, infernal regions," from Proto-Germanic *haljo "the underworld"

(Online Etymology Dictionary)

Checking with Google Ngram, in the expressions: "go to heaven", "down from heaven" and "heaven-sent", lowercase predominates in published books, but something quite interesting happens: the gap between the instances of lowercase and uppercase versions was much higher in the nineteenth century than it is today.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=to+heaven%2Cto+Heaven%2Cfrom+heaven%2Cfrom+Heaven&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=

Seriously though, I'm glad you accept "Who wants to go? Not me!" and "She is taller than me."

I like your point about a disjunctive pronoun, but I'm not sure you can really say "me" is the equivalent of "moi", as we don't have a disjunctive pronoun in English. But "It's me" certainly sounds more natural in English.

Back to demotic credentials. Isn't it more to do with register than social status. To my friends at work, I might well say "Me and Dave are going to the pub", but to someone I want to impress or be more formal with, I'd say "David and I are going to the pub". But you might have a bit of a point in that in Britain, at least, language is "democratising". The use of the word "Mate" as a greeting, for example, which used to be exclusively working class, is pretty classless nowadays. What I do find fascinating is that it's almost always "Me and Dave" or "David and I", but hardly ever "Dave and me" or "I and David".

As I've probably said before, pronouns are the last area of English to have inflections, so it's hardly surprising if their use is still in a bit of a flux. We only have to look at "who/whom".

"The house is situated between two large oak trees"
"There were two vases of flowers placed in the middle of the table"
"She's a bit run down at the moment"
"I'm done with the photocopier if you need it" (colloquial but standard - done is an adjective here)

Better still, just treat it as an idiom, or a colloquialism, which is perfectly OK to use in informal (normal) contexts. And one that is increasing in use amongst speakers of otherwise absolutely standard British English, and not only Northerners. According to Ngram its use has tripled in British books in the last two decades or so. A few more years and I don't suppose anyone will bat an eyelid. Actually, in Britain, I think that's pretty well true already, apart from a few pedants.

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=he+was+sat%2Che+was+stood&year_start=1990&year_end=2008&corpus=18&smoothing=3&share=

@Tessa Avon - while I sympathise with your main drift (and it probably does sound better coming from someone like Lee Mack), I'm not sure about your last point - "He was sat sitting at the table". Doesn't sound quite right to me.