Can someone please explain to me why you call that side of our knits wrong?

As the title of my blog suggest, I am knitting in translation, and it goes further then me knitting in English (which is not my mother tongue) now. But this is the subject for another post.

Today I wanted to understand something that baffles me every time I hear it, see it or read it, the wrong side of the knit?!?

I don’t regard this side as wrong and can’t use this term, no sir! (or madam for that matter). I call it the back side or the left side as opposed to the front side or the right side of my knit. The right and left come from the names of the basic stitches in Hebrew, we call the knit: right and the purl: left!

Anyway, I can’t see anything wrong with that side of my knits, actually in many cases I quite like the looks of that side especially when the knit is done with many different yarns like fair isle. When it is done right, the back side of such a knit looks to me like the true manifestation of the piece of art that shows the skill level of the knitter.

Also, if something was wrong on that side of our knit, the whole thing would be wrong, no? as those sides are very strongly connected,,,, so I really don’t understand that term and don’t like it either.

And I wonder, is it only me or is there something wrong with that term?

Oh and by the way, I don’t understand why people don’t like to purl, actually I think it is my preferred stitch, maybe this is why I have such a problem with the name of it side of our knits!