Im goin to da park l8r fr sum ice creem OMG

We all know that grammar and spelling are going down the tubes for the generations of kids 18 and younger right now. Without trying to be too much of a rant, I would like to point out a few things and simply ask: WHY?

1. Why is it that most any girl under 16 has to end every sentence with three or more exclamation points?

• Examples: 
• I love shopping at Wal-mart!!!
• OMG he is soooooo cute!!!!!!!!

2. Why doesn't anyone know when to start and stop a sentence anymore? I read something one time that was an entire page and there were a grand total of two periods in the entire thing. TWO?! Had I not seen it myself, I would have never believed it.

• Example:
• We went to the mall where I met up with Kate and then we went in Forever 21 which is like my favorite store I bought a cool coat there and am totally excited to wear it when it gets colder but right now it's too hot for it so I guess I'm just gonna have to wait to wear it but right now we are at the apple store looking at ipods

3. Actually, I would say two rules were broken there: lack of punctuation AND run-on sentence.

4. Spelling. Need I say more? I must admit, though, I have a hard time telling if kids really can't  spell or just don't care enough to spell correctly. Thanks to text messaging and the consistent narcissistic posting we all do now, the internet lingo was born.

• Examples:
• what r u doin l8r?
• idk y he isnt talking 2u

5. Incorrect capitalization. Since when did this become difficult to figure out? First words of sentences, proper nouns (ie, names... of stuff, kiddos), and the letter "I."

6. And of course, our favorite part of internet lingo, abbreviations. TTYL, LOL, OMG, ROFL, LMFAO, IDK, BRB, GTG... all lovely things that have made their way into our everyday writing. For some people, at least.

But, in most cases with teens, all of these crimes of language are combined to give us something like the following:

• we went to the mall where i met Up with kate and den we went in forEver 21 which is like my favorite store I bought a c00l cote der n am totalley excited 2 ware it wen it get's colder but Right now its 2 hot 4 it so i guess i"m justt gonna haf 2 wait to ware it LOL. but rite now we are at the apple Store lookin at ipods and there is this sooooooo cute guy standing bi Kate but idk y he isnt talking 2u I guess hes like shy or sumthin!!!!!! 

What I would really like to know is if this is mostly an American thing (like most terrible habits that we develop) or if this trend is worldwide.

Lord, help us.