We need punctuation, capital usages, proper grammar, and everything else that goes with writing well. If we don’t use it then we get the meme about Uncle Jack and his horse and end up looking like the horse’s backend.
I’m sure you’ve seen that meme, it’s straight-up correct and still fits in with some toilet humour. I’ll leave it to you to search up.
With all this said, I still dislike commas…to the point of hating them. They are the bane of my writing. I’m a diehard Oxford comma person. I’m a diehard comma after the word, but. I’m a diehard use of it after the word…however, just like you use a semi-colon before it. Thank my teachers for pushing those rules into my head.
All other rules, well, they flew the coup. I swear there are times I use way more commas than I should. And, yes, then I worry I don’t use enough.
Place them where you would a pause in breath, a pause in thought…whose breath and whose thought? I’ve read some long sentences that I needed a breath before the author told me to with their comma use.
And, I’m not a grammar cop, but there are a few that have pulled me from the story. A few that just struck me as wrong…yes, I’ve gone and looked them up on various grammar sites. And if it’s my writing there are times I triple check and times I just go with my gut and what flows right to me.
What’s that other saying…know the rules in order to break them? At least, to break them well enough that no one clues in that you did.
Whether you’re a comma lover or despiser, you’ve used the little darlings at some point, read them at some point, and there’s someone who will say any and all of those times the comma was used wrong…wrongly…great, thinking too much and have lost the natural flow of conversing.
Be kind, I know there are goofs within this posting, let’s call them creative licence.