Who says WHOM is dead?
To whomsoever it may concern
I have no patience with those who, with an easy unconcern, discredit WHOM and deny its right to exist. Considering that it is mostly the native English speakers who are guilty of this negligence, it is both sad and surprising. I can't help but suspect that those who ignore the place of WHOM have no knowledge of any other language. If you know German or an Indian language, say Tamil, you will instinctively apply the equivalent of WHOM while speaking and writing.
For those, and only for those, who might have thrown WHOM unceremoniously out of the window, I present an example to validate its existence.
Consider this sentence.
He kisses her.
Now, if we are to frame a question for that affirmative sentence, it will read:
Q1: Who kisses her?
And the simplified answer will be: He
Now, let's frame the other question to draw the rest of the information from the sentence:
Q2: Who does he kiss?
The answer to that question is: Her
Now, compare the two questions and the corresponding answers.
Q1: Who? A1: He
Q2: Who? A2: Her
There seems to be something wrong and inconsistent here.
A2, it appears, has to be She, because you have He as the answer for Q1. Or, if A2 is assumed to be right, then A1 should be Him. Both are absurd, for then the original sentence would read: He kisses She or Him kisses her
The simple explanation is that we are dealing with two different cases: Nominative and Accusative.
He is the doer. He kisses.
She is the object. He kisses her.
Therefore, if the answer is: He kisses her, one part of the question is: Who kisses her? The other part of the question is: Whom does he kiss?
Who would want to argue with whom?
