Stupider vs. More Stupid

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Gina from Dallas, Texas.

Well, hi, Gina. How are you doing?

I’m great. How are you?

All righty.

We’re good. What’s up?

Yeah, thank you for having me.

I’m calling because I’m a student, and when I went home a few weeks ago,

I was playing Scrabble with my family,

And my sister, who’s really wonderful and an English teacher,

Made a joke about me coming home from school stupider.

And I said, no, stupid. It’s more stupid.

And so then just a big debate started, and we decided that you were the only reliable authority.

We’re the authorities on stupid. I love this.

We’re the most stupid authorities you’ll ever know.

Oh, dear. So the debate was whether you should say stupider or more stupid?

Well, yes. So my sister is an English teacher, and so she said, well, there’s this rule,

And if you have an adjective, the comparative and superlative forms are made by adding or ESP.

And I said, well, you would never say stupidest.

And so then, you know, we had to look it up in the Scrabble Dictionary and then other dictionaries,

And then we were wondering what was more correct.

Or what was less stupid.

Exactly.

What did the Scrabble Dictionary say?

Well, in the Scrabble Dictionary, it’s a word.

But we decided there are lots of things in the Scrabble Dictionary that, you know, you wouldn’t necessarily say.

So then we went to Merriam-Webster’s, and we looked in Oxford, and we just got lots of conflicting information.

Okay, so you’re voting for more stupid.

Absolutely.

Okay, and what’s wrong with stupider, in your opinion?

I think, to me, it just sounds strange.

It’d be great in a limerick about the biggest planet, wouldn’t it?

Yeah, isn’t there a schoolyard rhyme like that?

I don’t know. Is there? Candy is dandy.

Girls go to college to get more knowledge. Boys go to Jupiter to get more stupider.

You haven’t ever heard that one?

Oh, that’s right. You tweeted about that.

Yeah.

Yeah, well, more stupider we can rule out right away.

Okay, good.

But in terms of stupid, the comparative there, the usage guides that I’ve seen have said that you can go either way with it.

Generally, if you have a word that’s more than two syllables, like, say, interesting or fascinating, you wouldn’t say this is interestinger than any other radio show you’ve heard or fascinatinger.

But with words that are two syllable, it’s kind of on the fence sometimes.

And stupid is specifically a word that I see used as an example in one of my favorite usage guides, Brian Garner’s modern American usage.

You can say stupider or more stupid.

And just to kind of give a reference there, Garner is very conservative when it comes to language issues.

He’s the guy who’s always going to refrain from himself or encourage you not to do the thing that is innovative or exceptional.

Or stupider.

Or stupider.

So if he says stupider and stupidest are okay, then you know that even the most conservative authorities in the country agree that stupider and stupidest are okay.

Well, there you go.

I guess we both have to be right.

Yeah.

Yeah, and it’s not a bad place to be, right?

No, it’s not.

Well, thank you very much.

Okay.

Our pleasure.

Thanks for calling.

Thanks, Gina.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

Bye.

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