There's

[Ayuda-Tulong]

Am I the only one who's practically incensed over the widespread misuse of the contraction there+is vs there+are?

For example, I first offer what I consider to be four grammatically correct sentences, with and without contractions:

1] There are lots of people who support your opinion.
2] There is a lot of support for your opinion.
3] There're lots of people who support your opinion.
4] There's lots of support for your opinion.

Next, I offer two examples of modern usage:

5] There's lots of people who support your opinion.
6] There's lots of support for your opinion.

I contend that sentence #5 is grammatically incorrect due to a plural noun following the contraction, therefore, the word 'is' should be replaced with the word 'are.' It cannot be correct that "There is lots of people . . . "

For some reason, even highly-educated professionals, including public speakers, news anchors, politicians, educators, etc, etc use the contraction "there=is" followed by a plural word.

[fiona bramble]

Yup, it's true
My theory is that we are forward processors and have difficulty sorting out the verb agreement before its true subject
Ah, being a prescriptivist is such a cross to bear