This is something I first noticed about a year ago, give or take. Like, I’ll say “the sky is purple” and someone will respond with “it’s blue?” Why do people do that?
It’s such a strange thing for me, because I’m used to question marks being used for questions, not statements. It feels like at some point, I accidentally fell into an alternate dimension where this is considered a normal use of punctuation.
I know English is a continually-evolving language, so things like this shouldn’t be unexpected. Even still, this development feels bizarre to me.
At least from the example you gave, it is a question more than a statement. They’re not correcting you so much as questioning your answer and offering what they think it really is. Basically, skipping the filler in asking “Are you sure its purple, not blue?”
I see your logic. I still wonder how this became popular though. Is it just one of those things people have been doing for a long time that I didn’t notice, and then one day I noticed it and I started seeing it everywhere?
I think its always been around. It might be more common to see it without further qualification (IE, “It’s blue, isn’t it?”), possibly because of the popularity of short-form content, but I don’t think its a new thing.
Maybe it is short-form content that’s popularized it. I don’t use TikTok, and I don’t watch a lot of YouTube Shorts either.
On that note, don’t you think it’s funny how short videos used to be the norm on YouTube a long time ago? I kinda miss those days.
I think it’s just typical evolution of language, which happens pretty rapidly, since each generation likes to distance themselves a bit from their parent’s generation. It saves a bit of typing, and since typing is such a common activity, it makes sense, just like using ‘u’ instead of ‘you’.