Can't just select by character, auto-selects by word

[Deleted User]

I'm not sure when this started happening, but whenever I long-press text to select, and try to drag the little thumb knobs to select more or less, it'll stop at the end of a word until I drag far enough then just either select the whole next word or chunks of special characters (like comma space), meaning if I'm trying to move things around or specifically select only certain characters, I either have to pull too far then back, or select more or less than I want and paste-delete or retype... it causes a lot more work than it saves.

This is so annoying and counter-useful... I know iOS has been doing this for years, and Android actually used to make sense when selecting, letting me select exactly what I want, not making me select what it thinks I need.

Any way to disable this? I'm not seeing an option anywhere, and I'm sure that complaining through Google's "feedback" will go into their usual snobbish black hole.

I'm using Android 8 with the latest GBoard.