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I was asking someone "whom were you horrible to?" And thought, is it who or whom? I believe it's whom but when I typed the phrase into Google search It felt differently.

tchrist
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userX
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    How did you search? I got zero hits for whom were you horrible to and who were you horrible to. – anongoodnurse Apr 23 '14 at 21:57
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    If the difference between “Who shall I say is calling?” and “Whom shall I say you called?” doesn’t come automatically to you without even the very slightest hesitation, don’t do it. Far better to “mistakenly” use who when whom is formally called for than to do the reverse — as most people in fact are guilty of doing. – tchrist Apr 23 '14 at 22:03
  • No one uses 'whom' anymore. – Mitch Apr 23 '14 at 22:05
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    nohat says "Whom remains in significant use following a preposition" at the earlier post. So 'To whom were you horrible?' perhaps sounds better than 'To who were you horrible?' However, when the wh-word is used to start the question, 'Who were you horrible to?' wins hands down (ie almost all people would use this variant) in spite of breaking a traditional 'rule'. Most people would also choose to start the question with the wh-word. – Edwin Ashworth Apr 23 '14 at 22:10
  • What @Edwin said. I don't normally use *whom* at all any more, but I still do occasionally use it after prepositions. Particularly, after *to* - but as he also points out, most of us (including me) would normally start questions of OP's form with *Who...* rather than *To whom...* anyway. – FumbleFingers Apr 23 '14 at 22:22
  • I always use whom in writing. I might let things slip a little in speech but I'm inwardly grimacing. –  Apr 24 '14 at 00:42
  • @ TheMathemagician You're disobeying the Pope (but don't we all): 'Kiss whom goodbye. It is rarely heard in conversation now, and just about never in clause-initial position. This word is nearly dead. It is close to being no more. It has all but ceased to be. If it wasn't Magic-Markered onto a defaced flag from time to time it would be pushing up the daisies. This is almost an ex-word.'

    Posted by Geoffrey K. Pullum at September 10, 2004 [with apologies to John Cleese, I'd have thought]

     – Edwin Ashworth Apr 24 '14 at 06:10

2 Answers2

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In the example given, 'whom' is correct, it is the object of the preposition to. Having said that, in North American English, 'who' would be much more common in everyday speech. But, I disagree with the statement "No one uses whom anymore" ... I use it, and I am someone! Those who study a foreign language where cases are important (such as Russian), know when to use it and when not to use it. "Who was your English teacher?" but "From whom did you learn English?" - both questions are grammatically correct.

Jim
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You can say "Whom were you horrible to?" or "Who were you horrible to?" Both are correct, but the latter is more common and less formal.

SEL
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