Do we need titles Miss/Ms/Mrs/Mr etc?

[NuffSaidSam]

Do we still need these? Does anyone know what the purpose is?

I've just been asked by the TV license people and it's made me wonder if it's necessary anymore (the title, not the TV license).

I think I'd be happy to go without.

I've been a Ms for 50 years now, but I agree we don't really need titles.

We certainly don't need so many ones which indicate your sex and marital status.

I wish we could default to mumbling MistuZ for everyone.

Going by the youngster who served me in Peacocks earlier, any clue as to which gender they are would be a bonus

The irritation with salutations is that women can change from Miss/Mrs/Ms whereas men are always Mr. I'm a 52 year old Miss with two children and a partner so I'm assumed to be a Mrs.

Usual patriarchal bullshit.... Men have one label... women: lets classify them.
Why do we need our marital status identified?

I worked hard to be able to use Dr. For social titles though, I tend to agree.

Why?

Call me old fashioned but I like to know

No we don’t. I hate those drop down lists where you can’t leave it blank.

I'm a Miss. I like being a Miss.

no we don’t - I guess we need a shared prefix for when one’s surname is used instead of first name, but mn or something would do for everyone?

It's rubbish for women having their marital status indicated but I don't want someone calling me by my first name when it's a company or something. I like a bit of respect and formality sometimes. It's polite.

It doesn't matter though. You were served and if it went ok so thats the end.
Old fashioned is a strange way of saying you really want to know what gender a person is where it has no impact whatsoever on your experience of buying something in a shop.
What if they decided in the spirit of being old fashioned they wanted to know whether you are a Miss, Mrs, Ms, gay, straight, lesbian? If it has nothing to do with the transaction just mind your business, as do they.
You could always just only shop online but send the company a request as to the gender of the person/people making/packing/posting your goods?
Ridiculous.

The trouble is.
If someone is introduced by first name/last name that's ok. But unless we think it's appropriate to call everyone in every situation but their first name (and I don't) then we need a title. You can't just use the last name unless you want to sound like you are at a boy's boarding school, just the first name is too familiar, and using both all the time would just be weird.

There's been a definite move away from them in recent years.

We don’t need to indicate it. We’ve been conditioned to do so. I am married. I did not change my surname and when pushed I use Ms.

0Cut off there!

And I do get why organisations would do this. There are fewer constants with titles and names these days. Can't assume. People's response is usually that it's respectful to check, but that does take resources that cannot then be used elsewhere. I don't really want to pay for that.

I know someone with a PhD who uses the title Dr. on everything. All correspondence and zoom meetings. They find that people treat them better and respect them more

if you have to have an "honorific" (because some CRM systems require them) Mx means "person" and gives away nothing about you at all. I use it where offered.

My only problem with Firstname Lastname is i don't want some random young pup of a car salesman addressing me by my first name. I require the distance of a polite honorific.

So why not go the whole hog and wear a bedsheet over our heads, that way we would all be invisible to one another

It's a part of communication, you communicate based on knowing who you are speaking to

I don't want to live my life by ordering everything on line thank you

Yes, because not knowing whether someone is Miss or Ms is exactly the same as them wearing a bedsheet 🙄🙄🙄

How very odd you feel the need to know what genitals a “youngster” has, which has no relevance to the service they are providing.

I use Ms as well but I also know older generations take this to mean a divorced woman and I still get called Mrs fairly often.

It is feeling a bit antiquated isn't it. I wonder what non binary people use, I hadn't ever thought about that

Mx, I believe. Also used by some women who just don't want to disclose their sex.

I tend to choose the least likely options when filling in low stakes paperwork for my kids, unless there is an option to leave it blank. My toddler Professor, Rev'd Dr, or Lady. I don't really get why Mr, Mrs Miss or Ms are necessary. Dr has a use in academic / medical settings, and Lady / Baroness do in the House of Lords but who gives a shit if the person booking an air B&B or ordering a sofa has a PhD or a peerage?
I got married very young, the sort of age when you feel a bit insecure about being believed that you are in fact married. I'm pleased I got married but I changed my bank card to Mrs, and all my important ID matches that!