Things you were told weren't ladylike

I don't think I have any new ones! So will just add mine to swell the numbers:
Chewing gum at all
Eating in the street
Open-mouthed or noisy eating/chewing/swallowing
Showing your slip (in the days when they were regularly worn)
Nail polish on the toenails
Any ornamentation on the legs, actually (ankle chains, toe rings etc.)
Shouting
Whistling (from my gran: "A whistling woman and a cackling hen are use neither to God nor men" - cheers, Gran)
Loud laughter
Loud sneezing
Spitting
Swearing
Burping
Farting
Drinking pints (I got VERY cross when a pub refused to serve me my pint!); and in fact being in a pub at all
Sitting legs akimbo
Wearing jeans, or in fact any trousers (Dad)
Wearing trainers as shoes, not for sport
Sweating
Having short hair (I never did this anyway but I know it was An Issue)
Wearing too much make up - eyeliner came under this heading.

I think that's it...

What a load of fucking bollocks!!

Ladylike my arse!!

Lots are these are just ill mannered because they make other people feel uncomfortable but applicable to both genders - eating. smoking, drinking in the street for example, yawning without hands. burping farting - they're 'time and place' things that you would avoid but absolutely sod all to do with being a woman (ladylike - pah!).

Quite honestly, if I came out with this drivel to DD I'd be ashamed. As long as people are healthy and happy and their behaviour does not impinge on anyone else they can do as they jolly well please.

It sounds as though you all have my MIL as a mum - pity my poor DH who would go by many of these things if I let him (and insists on pardon and uses 'serviette' - says it all really!!)

Jeans
Smoking
Farting
Burping
Swearing
Sniffing
Being loud
Drinking
Whistling

Ah they were the good old days.

oh & I was called a GeezerBird on a date once because not only did I know what offside ment but I knew the rules of cricket!!!!!!!

I have an 'O' one - Opinions - as in strong Opinions! It is not ladylike for a woman to have strong opinions - though funny enough I have only felt this when I have been strongly disagreeing with a man!

my dad once told me quite proudly probably best to not let on that I knew more about golf football and rugby than most men if i wanted a bf (i was about 13) but used to very proudly after a pint have huge chats with me and his friends about sports and like to take the mick out of them when i argued rightly about football etc with them. I was the youngest by 13 years and only girl. So he raised me the same as his sons including drinking pints and going to the match, much to my mothers dismay I was never a pretty in pink lady :)

Oh yes - never phone a bloke

Black - only ever ware it at funerals
Black tights are a no-no as well, tights should always be opaque
I never go into a pub alone or first nor do I go to the bar

Drinking pints.
Chatting with men.
Eating in the street.
Cleavage.
My hobby (heritage railways).
Shouting.
Not wearing hat and gloves in church.
Running.

Phoning a boy .... He had to phone first! I rebelled against this as my mother pursed her lips in horror!

Oh God - my mothers list ..... which I broadly adhere to.

No smoking in public
No eating whilst standing or on the move
No swearing in public
No swigging from bottles or cans
No chewing gum

Pint glasses? oh no just no
Skirts above the knee? never.
No more than an inch of cleevage

Yup - ankle chains are a prostitutes marker!
Tattoos belong to the criminal underclass

Chewing gum
Swearing
Drinking pints
Smoking
Bending over (rather than crouching)
Tattoos
Burping/farting

One of the lads and always will be :-D sorry mum

We were told that when a woman whistled, "Our Lady" i.e. the Virgin Mary, cried.

I was once called "trollopy" for having the belt of my coat undone, even though the buttons were closed.

My mother and her sisters had a Byzantinely complicated social code, which I think was their way of differentiating themselves from other people, at a time when everyone around them lived in an equal state of poverty. They considered themselves the "respectable poor."

Chewing gum
Running
Drinking pints
Going into a pub by yourself
Wearing DMs
Wearing glasses.
Arguing.

Lots more. Didn't take.

All of the above, plus:

Wearing black apart from at funerals (considered attention seeking )
Mowing the lawn, reaching up high for things above your head (e.g. changing a lightbulb) or driving.
Going into a pub alone my mum would hardly ever go into a pub at all).
Eating something messy like a burger.
Breaking a sweat

Being apart from your husband. DH often works away from home and this is met with the same disapproval as if we'd got divorced.
Going out without coat, hat and gloves in winter.

Didn't an ankle chain mean you were a lady of ill repute?

apparently so or according to my nan a hoor wears ankle bracelets

Hilarious. I was told the whistling thing too. In fairness to home, they never said this stuff. School did.
Does anyone remember a children's programme, I think Jim Henson's crowd made it. It was about dinosaurs, but not really IYKWIM. can't for the life of me remember what it was called. In one episode all the men dinosaurs went off to a football game and the women dinosaurs stayed in the cave.
One woman said 'c'mon we'll have a beer'.
Another replied: 'oh Harry doesn't like me drinking beer, he says it's not ladylike'.
To which the dinosaur woman now drinking the beer and burping replied: 'well, when Harry's laid an egg the size of his head, he can tell me what's ladylike'.
I always quote this when someone is rabbiting on some shite about what's ladylike.

Didn't an ankle chain mean you were a lady of ill repute?

Ankle jewellery, tattoos, drinking beer. Thanks mum.

Or BlueStones, being gentlemanly doesn't stop boys and men from doing the fun stuff, like on Christmas Day when the men go to the pub while the women stay home and cook the dinner although in my family the women got rat arsed while the turkey was cooking and one them might get up to baste it every hour or so so it wasn't all bad, but yes you can still hold a door open every once in a while and help ladies carry things and it doesn't tie you up with assisting with drudgery.

my image of un-lady-like is Catherine Tate's swearing gran character.

Anything that was fun was unladylike, I recall. A ladylike girl would sit nicely and silently whilst the boys went out and played games. She might be allowed to help Granny dust, if she's bored.

I HATE the concept. It's pure control. You don't see young boys being exhorted to always be gentlemanly.

This thread is funny!! Mine isn't so much about unladylike behaviour but something peculiar my Grandma once said - I should never do the splits as I would never be able to have children if I did! (DD proves that one wrong!)

whistling women & crowing hens are neither fit for God nor men

shame as I love whistling & am good at it

Eating in the street
Drinking pints

FIL ordered me to get a more ladylike drink on my wedding day. Then when I failed to follow his orders gave me a dressing down. Sod him, I'd ordered the polypins of real ale for myself and I wasn't drinking it out of a wine glass I did share my ale with the guests

My toenails are currently teal. I'm finding it concerning that painted toenails aren't ladylike as the only other option I can see is manly. Is it manly to have painted toenails?

FIL (again - misogynistic twat) likes DDs in dresses. So they only ever wear jeans when he comes round despite being allowed to wear party dresses all day long if they want to the rest of the time.