Would you like to play "It's like Feminisim never happened" with me?

'My favourite was a job interview, was all going well until we got to the salary expectation. Told them the number and the manager says "But..for that money we could already hire a man!". Seriously. By the way, I did no apply for a position of a "woman".'

Wow. Just - wow.

Actually signed up because of this thread.

My favourite was a job interview, was all going well until we got to the salary expectation. Told them the number and the manager says "But..for that money we could already hire a man!". Seriously. By the way, I did no apply for a position of a "woman".

We live in France and yes, after the wedding I disappeared and am now Mme HisFirstName HisName. This I can still live with, but we had a heck of a time explaining at the bank, that I would have the main card for our joint account and he will have the supplemental one. They had never heard of this and the clerk actually had to go and ask if it is possible.

We used to live in Switzerland before this and don't get me started. Even though surprisingly I never had issues at work, in many other aspects this country is totally stuck in 50s. Then again, what would you expect from a country when the last Canton gave women the right to vote in 1990. Actually no, they didn't - the Supreme Court decided that the word "citizens" in the constitution also includes women, so they had to let women vote.

Someone I know was told by their child's kindergarten teacher that they really should consider working part time. When she asked why, was there something wrong with the child, the teacher said that no no, very well behaved and adjusted little boy, but it would just be better for mothers to work less.

Another friend went to the bank and as he did not have his permit in order yet, they opened an account for her only, asking the mail to be sent to her workplace. they later changed it to a joint one. Since then all the mail is sent to her office but addressed to him. He does not work there.

Another one is stay at home dad. Wife works. All teachers, doctors etc when dealing with him always ask for her number so they can call her and discuss something about the kids. (they only do it once though )

Alright if you know they are men, trillian! It's when referring to "the binmen are on strike" etc - lifeboatmen is a better example because they both know full well there are women on the lifeboat locally.

So am I not supposed to refer to 'the binmen' when I have only ever seen binmen and never binwomen emptying our bins? I suppose technically they are bin-and-recycling-persons, not just binmen, but it's a much more convenient word.

I often think of Greg Wise as "Mr Emma Thompson" .

Is he still with us, SharonGless? :o (Aren't you in the police, or am I thinking of someone else?)

DP and DF have learnt to regard to few milliseconds of icy silence after a comment like that (firemen, binmen, lifeboatmen etc) as the time to hastily correct themselves.

The Devil Wears Prada passes the Bechdel test, as does most of Sex and the City...

Just going back to the Bechdel Test when I was pg I would only watched Charmed as there were 3 female characters and it passed the test!

I was very hormonal.

Although not as hormonal as the other night when DH referred to the generic as "policeman" instead of "police officer"

I saw a job advertised last week on Gumtree asking for only attractive young ladies to apply for the postion of shop assistant as he needed to maximise profits.

Bizarrely, I can't think of when I've ever suffered any of these 'assumptions', even though I have to list my dh as 'house person' or 'household duties' on every application we ever make.

The worst it gets is people assuming my surname is his, which is understandable - other than one extremely hideous occasion of sexism in the pub last year after work. I didn't take it to HR because I thought he was a contractor, am totally gutted to discover he isn't and now it's too late.

My fave is my grandmother telling me she'd seen a TV programme in which the captain of a lifeboat was a woman.

Me and my mum: Err, so what is strange about that?
Grandmother: Well - men can't be expected to be led by a woman surely?!

Grandmother: Can they?
Me and my mum: Yes.
Grandmother: Ah.

OTOH I did one live in Mexico where at the time you could barely leave the house unaccompanied. I visited houses where women weren't offered a drink when the men were, you had to sort of say "yes I might be able to handle a glass of wine". And if my (male) friends' girlfriends came out with us, I could only speak to them, not to the blokes at all. But that was another time and another place.

Bar job, early '90s (so, OK, a few years ago).

It was customary to buy yourself a drink just before calling 'time', from your tips, & sit down for a rest & chat until 'drinking up time', when the clear-up began.

My boss told me off on my first evening shift for getting myself a pint of lager (as had the two barmen I was working with).

'This is NOT the sort of pub where females drink pints!'

I subsequently worked days & so met the Happy Hour crowd, many of whom were women. Because the deal was '£ a pint', female customers expected to be served their pint with an empty half pint glass (stemmed) to drink it from, in a presumably 'ladylike' fashion...

Eek.

Mind you, the same school (and I would be amused if it is yours, but yours sounds posher - mine was just wannabe posh) had a boys' school down the road. When my parents went to open day there, the headmaster reassured them that it was a great boys' school because there was a ready-made source of female talent just nearby - 'so your son won't end up going out with some girl who wants to be a hairdresser'.

the Lyrics to 'all the single ladies' yes not getting any better any time soon

Probably LRD. It was a private school as well, what a waste of cash. One of my teachers said to me 'I'll see you at the school gates in 10 years time dropping little Hugo and Arabella at prep school before going off to have lunch and do yoga'. Wtf? Also, my time at Oxford was seen by some as mainly being about finding someone rich to marry, rather than getting a degree.

fuschia, did you go to my old school?

Our university adviser told us we should all apply to Oxbridge and Durham in order to find rich, posh blokes to marry. She thought this was terribly funny.

my pushy, male estate agent rang me the other day to try and convince us to stay with them. i responded 'i will talk it over with dh and get back to you'

the next day he took a chance and dialed dh (usually out of range due to being on oil rig) and tried to convince him instead! dh, bless him, just said 'i'll talk it over with my wife and let you know!!!' divide and ocnquer tactics i know but he has truly lost us now!

Honeymoon, July 2003, France.

We go to possibly the most expensive restaurant we have ever (will ever?!) go to. Michelin stars.

DH is handed a menu with the prices on. I am handed a menu without the prices on.

The big irony is that I have always earned more than him and currently earn double what he earns!

I should admit however that I quite like pretending that he's treating me despite the fact we have always shared all our money and every bit of expenditure comes out of the same account.

I travel a lot for work - and am frequently asked who is looking after DS. When I reply, his father of course, people express suprise. I've also been told 'oh, I wouldn't like my wife to travel like you do'

And buying cars is always fun. I virtually have to sit the salesman down and explain gently that I like driving, do it a lot, for long periods, and need a car that is good for that. DH will instantly get attention though, and they will try to talk to him first before he gives them short shrift

halifax invited me into the braqnch for an account review thing. i stress they invited ME, regarding MY current account, not our joint one.

the halifax woman seated us and then spent half an hour trying to sell home insurance to DH, who had just come along to help with the baby.

after that she tried to convince DH to move his mortgage to halifax.

my account was never discussed.

i should have written a stinking letter shouldn't i. sigh

also i used to work with 2 ex marine coppers who, if they wren't so sweet the rest of the time i could have happily punched because every day there was a comment along the lines of....'gosh sungirltan, you're ever so good at map reading......for a woman!'

When I was at school, a teacher told me that it didn't really matter what career I went for, as I was obviously going to marry someone rich and any money I made I could spend on dresses and treats for the children. Honest to God. That was in about 2003, and I still get people saying it to me now even though I'm not married to anyone and have no children yet.

Tesco compare website will not allow you to choose ms when looking for van insurance but it will for car insurance. Maybe it's because there are so few female van drivers that they don't think they need to?

First BF's mum told me that I was imposing my vegetarianism on exBF because I wouldn't cook meat. Gently tried to suggest that he could cook his own meat and I would not object....no, I was still unreasonable.

Letting agents ask me whether my DH works full time. No I say, he's part time and self employed but I work full time. Does he have three years worth of accounts? No, but my salary is enough to cover the rent. oh.

Not that I remember

OTOH I watched Keeping Mum the other day, plenty of female characters in there :o