Why would you be proud to be married?

AnnieLobeseder maybe in your definition.. but I think the majority of couples get to define their marriage as they see fit. The act of buying a car, house etc maybe legally easy. However, its the personal context, what buying a car etc signifies to you that matters and defines whether you see it as an achievement or not. It's relatively easy to get legally married. That doesn't mean that marriage has no value or is not something to be proud of for some people.

I am not "proud" of being married as in having the status of a married woman.

I am proud of getting though a traumatic divorce. I am proud of developing enough sense afterwards not to get into a similar mess again. I am proud of having a good marriage. Of course, partially it was luck, but I also definitely worked and continue working at it (and this is not to say that women should always "work at it". I obviously should not have in my first marriage). I am proud of a family that I am raising with my husband. I see it as a kind of work and as an achievement.

I use Ms as my title and never Mrs. I dislike Mrs for two reasons: There is no equivalent married marker for men, and I am just not into titles as they needlessly categorise people into different groups and hierarchies.

I am also a Dr and I almost never use this title outside work. I am not really "proud" to be a Dr either. I can be proud of my work, but not of the status.

Annie, their heads will explode.

My family is vair confused on proper etiquette on envelopes...

I don't care much what title I use or what other people address me as - of course there is not 'correct' one, just the one one might prefer to use.
I, personally, don't particularly like 'Mrs' because that makes me MrsPacificDogwood who is my Mil iykwim and 'forces' the use of DH's name. I don't really like 'Ms' although I approve of it more, but hate the fact that you have to make use of a clumsy new construction if you want to avoid the patriarchal "Mrs". I never used 'Miss', well, as a child, but not recently.
I have an academic title which I use most. With my 'own' name - nothing 'maiden' about it .

Wrt to double-barrelledness: I paid good money to have a double-barralled name in my passport to allow for travel with my children on my own without being challenged on the grounds that my name was differnt from theirs.

Whatever each of us chose to do, takes nothing away from the fact that these are ancient and misogynistic structures which set it all up.

(and do)? (and does)?

Neither seems right...

I'm not proud to be married per se.. I am proud that we, despite the odd argument, present a united and loving front to our dc. That we both carry out domestic duties, and also have equal amounts of time for fun. It makes me cross, that on the odd form, DH is automatically head of household. All of this could be the case of course, if we weren't married.

Penguins - ah, families and cards, eh! . My aunts and uncles still send cards to Mr and Mrs DH'sname Lobeseder. Every Christmas I seethe, but there's no point making a fuss. So it's just the bills that come to Ms Lobeseder.

I shall be interested to see what they do when I become Dr Annie Oldname-Lobeseder next year.

Interesting, Annie.

I started using Ms as a teenager because it struck me as ridiculous and unfair that women had different titles to tell everyone whether or not they were married.

So I've been Ms since before I really had any right to an "adult" title. I can't remember exactly how old I was, but probably about 13, maybe as old as 15.

And that decision, once made, was for keeps.

Surely though, while it's quite reasonable to be proud of certain aspects of your own personal marriage, it's quite bizarre to be proud of being married in general. Because it means nothing in and of itself except that you have gone through a legal/religious ceremony. Any idiot can (and do) do the same thing.

Annie - Yeah, it's easy enough to change things when I fill in forms and stuff. I just feel that if I started saying to family "Actually it's Ms Pancakes" on Christmas cards and that, I'd start a whole rumour of imminent divorce that I just can't be bothered dealing with.

You would think that a husband was the enemy rather than the person you love and want to spend the rest of your life with! Have the wedding that you choose, have the marriage that you want. You are not a victim!

Flora, I agree completely that the whole wedding industry is geared towards women being told that it's the best day of their lives blah blah blah. I still think if you did a random street poll of married men, the vast majority would be happy to describe themselves as "proud to be married".

I also suspect that everyone gets married for different reasons, whether it was the "done thing", parental pressure, following the crowd when all your mates are getting married, desire to have a big wedding, celebrate your relationship, enjoy the legal privileges....... Some of those reasons are problematic from a feminist analysis, and the historical concept of marriage likewise, but I don't believe that getting married is always an anti-feminist act nor one that is not worthy of pride.

Being proud of your wife is not the same as being proud to be married.

Penguins - I just stopped using Mrs one day and started using Ms. I didn't officially change anything, but over the years, whenever I signed up for anything new I used Ms, until now I think it's only the NHS that still has be down as Mrs. Similarly, I have also gone double-barrelled with my maiden name (another awful term!) and am just gradually easing it into everything with a minimum of fuss.

So changing title or name is not really a big deal at all. Particularly title, since it's not a legal thing; you can use whatever you like.

I'm not saying you should change, just that you shouldn't feel it's difficult.

FloraFox I don't agree at all - I've heard 2 men in the past few days say that they are proud of their wives, why wouldn't they be credited with feeling the same as women? As for the stag do ball & chain stuff, hen dos are exactly the same - it's all a bit of fun, surely no-one really feels like that?!

My husband says that our wedding was the best day of his life, and I feel the same. I'm a feminist and proud of it, and our day was about both of us; we both spoke and we both had a ball. I haven't taken his name because neither of us feel it to be right or necessary. We are equals and that why I'm proud of him.

I've just never heard anyone say that Mrs was the "correct" term to use if you were married.

Loads of women who are married don't use it and loads of women who aren't married do use it.

Indeed, penguins.

Which is why I am married. I may be a feminist, but I am not delusional and understand that the strength of my convictions won't be much good when I need legal protection inside a patriarchal set up. I don't feel great about it and I certainly don't see it as a free choice - it was the best option available to me at the time, across a set of options which were all circumscribed by the social implications of my having a womb.

What I would like instead of a traditionally demeaning ritual and the promised land of domestic servitude is proper equal pay, proper legal protection and for motherhood to stop being such an obstacle on the job market. The patriarchy can keep the ring.

I think the issue was that you said that the reason you used Mrs was because it was correct. If correctness is the reason for doing something, it implies other choices are incorrect IYSWIM. Rather than saying "Mrs is one of the options as a married woman and I just choose to use it"

I am confused by your post. I assume you use Ms, that fine. I am married, I dont have an issue showing that with my title so I do so

I dont think hat other things are wrong, that is just my chose. As was changing my name.

I am married and use Mrs. Because, er, I didn't give it enough thought when I married. Changing it now would be a 'big deal' though. I sometimes put it on forms for new things though.

"I use Mrs because I am married so it is the correct term. "

I'm married and I don't use it.

In what sense is that not "correct"?

I agree Blowfish.

The problem is that, in our patriarchal society, the alternative to marriage is to choose not marry: to have fewer legal protections on separation; to have basically no protection on pensions, etc; to have very curtailed rights to make medical decisions for your partner; to have to take extra steps as a father to ensure you are recognised as such, etc.

So whilst the issue of the institution of marriage is definitely worthy of feminist analysis, it also makes sense at a personal level for women operating within that patriarchal society to marry.

FamiliesShareGerms I agree that there are probably loads of men who would say they are proud of their wives or marriages but it's not something men generally do say to the same extent that women do. I'm struggling to think of an example where a man said such a thing IRL. Just as boys are not told their wedding day is the best day of their lives nor that marriage is an achievement for them. In fact the whole stag BS is about last day of freedom, ball and chains etc. I think I'm uncomfortable with the notion of women being proud of marriage as it seems to accept all these socially-imposed notions of marriage and women's place in society. Obviously lots of people (including me) are happily married but I don't see that as being the same thing as being proud to be married.

I use Mrs because I am married so it is the correct term.

Hopefully I will be able to use a different title in the future though,