Save the Oxford Commas

Friends, I come to you today with a great sense of urgency.

The Oxford commas are dying. If we don’t take action, they may soon become extinct forever.

Signs of their demise have been appearing for years. We all know it. Yet, we turned our backs and pretended not to see. We turned our backs and said, “Someone else will take care of this. Someone else will save the commas.”

“Someone else” never showed up, my friends — someone else never shows up. The only question left is what we should do now.

Morally deformed writers have been avoiding the Oxford comma for centuries. Even worse, many have taken to actively calling for the extermination of this essential grammatical species. Go to any library, any bookstore, and you’ll find literature’s white pages stained red with the blood of their misdeeds.

At least two national governments have taken to officially endorsing the wholesale slaughter of the Oxford comma, with both Canadian and Australian style guides declaring the little curly mark to be “unnecessary.” May their national sins be writ forever in the annals of history, and shame cast upon their memories and the memories of their children and the memories of their children’s children.

The fact is that we cannot rely on politics to solve this issue. If the Oxford comma is to be saved, we must take that mission on as our own.

I urge all of you to grab hold of this chance to be heroes. Use your Oxford commas. Embrace them…