title: render :json => 'string here' expected result
body: <p>I have done this a thousand times but I'm still not comfortable with how the <code>render :json</code> handles strings.</p>
  
  <p>To set a scope let's talk about Rails 3</p>
  
  <p>This is how it behaves right now:</p>
  
  <pre><code>...
  render :json =&gt; 'This is the string'
  ...
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Will be returning to the browser:</p>
  
  <pre class="lang-none prettyprint-override"><code>This is the string
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>That's actually not a valid JSON response :S</p>
  
  <p>Ideally it should be rendering something like this:</p>
  
  <pre class="lang-none prettyprint-override"><code>"This is the string"
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Even the rails guides say:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>You don’t need to call to_json on the object that you want to render.
    If you use the :json option, render will automatically call to_json
    for you.</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>And calling <code>"This is the string".to_json</code> is actually returning <code>"\"This is the string\""</code> as expected.</p>
  
  <pre><code>"This is the string".to_json #=&gt; "\"This is the string\""
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Am I so wrong ? </p>