I am with Zeeskite. Proper use of language DOES often affect our perception of a person’s intelligence, sometimes unfairly. We are becoming a nation of inarticulate people. We have dumbed-down curriculae, allowed many people who have no basic spelling and grammatical skills to teach our next generation of students, who will likewise have poor language skills, and we have encouraged the use of “fillers” in normal conversation, in place of real thought and verbal expression.
I really have trouble when someone is speaking and repeatedly says, “you know,” “like,” “um,” and the ubiquitious “whatever.” Those are poor substitutes for expressing oneself. There was a time when elocution was part of the subjects taught in school, and I think it is time to bring that subject back. (“Elocution??? Didn’t Ben Franklin discover that?”)