to think that there is NEVER an acceptable reason to call a 32 year old woman a "young girl?"

[Hullygully]

No I'm not.

I couldn't care less what emotive flannel is flung about.

IT. IS.NOT.ACCEPTABLE.

The end.

So many professional women are on MN.

It would be interesting to start a thread to see how many didn't mind being called "young girl" in their 30s and 40s in a professional capacity.

Wouldn't it?

Hully I guess the root of the disagreement comes down to whether you think he was referring to them in a professional capacity or a personal one. I think the latter, you think the former.

I'm a professional (MD of a FTSE listed company) and I would fire anyone I heard referring to someone in sexist/racist/disablist terms (and have had to on more than one occasion, unfortunately). Including referring to someone as "young girl". As it happens, our company is a rather strict about even referring to people by gender, which is a little bit of an extreme position, but there you go, it works for us. And I work in one of the most sexist industries that exist - advertising and marketing. So if we can manage it, any company can.

But this was a families liaison officer representing the families, not the force. So representing the personal rather than the professional.

I'm a professional.

I'm a teacher. I teach young girls. I am not one of them myself. I find it very offensive actually. I expect to be spoken to and about with respect.

Even in a personal capacity a 32 year old woman is not and never can be a YOUNG GIRL.

The only remotely understandable usage would be a parent standing there saying she was MY young girl for eg.

Well said TheBossOfMe. I completely agree.

My answer to the thread title remains the same.

AIBU to think that there is NEVER an acceptable reason to call a 32 year old woman a "young girl?"

YABU, there are contexts where it is acceptable and contexts where it is not.

Two of us women got referred to as "the girls" (by a bloke) in a sports class yesterday. We are 55 and 53!

I can only assume it was ironic.

I see myself in my dotage chewing hard toffees, wearing wildly inappropriate clothes, with a poodle on my lap, referring to anyone below the age of 40 as a young girl or young boy. Perhaps driving a silver Tesla.

Maybe that's just me though!

I'm a professional

I'm 32

Im also a young girl thankyou very much

What's with the insults Hully?

What's the female equivalent to guys?

I mean, we have men and women, girls and boys, which are both gendered and age-distinct.

Guys is used to refer to both men and boys. As is chaps. So gender specific but not age specific.

But we don't have a female equivalent - a gender specific, but not age specific collective noun.

I don't want to be one of the guys, or the chaps. But I also don't want to be one of the girls, or one of the women, with the age specific connotations.

So what am I?

It's a fact. Not an insult. A woman of 32 calling herself a "young girl" is deluded.

She is over 18 ergo a woman.

Young girl = child.

Fact.

And please don't say the answer is "dolls" because its not.

Guys can be non gender specific, can't it? Though usually used for men, I agree. I've heard 'lads' used in the same way (to mixed groups) in Ireland.

Let's not re-claim 'guys' though -it makes most people sound like a wanker when they use it. Or S'Cliff.

Yanbu
I hate it.
I often comment on it and get accused of 'getting my knickers in a twist'
Interestingly 'getting your knickers in a twist' is a phrase often employed by those who call adult women 'girls'

Another example of putting women in their place perhaps

I have also noticed that 'girls' is very often used in conjunction with 'big' and/or 'curvy'

Referring to someone as a 'big girl' is common and makes me cringe.

I think everyone should grow the fuck up.

Innit

Yabvvvu Ian 35 and would love to be referred to as a girl. Though at 32 she is not a young gir, my dd is 5 and wuld be a young girl. Just because you don't like it does not mean other ladies feel the same. I often say Ian going out with the girls tonight, the same way as dh sas he's going for a drink with the boys, even though we're in our 30,s. Its an expression that's all

That is indeed part of the problem Boss, I was at a meeting recently with three other women (none of us will see 40 again) and the chair (male) came in and said "Evening," paused, looked at me, and said, "Shall I say ladies, girls? What?"

I suggested fellow committee members or folks or comrades.

yes piglet.

But you wouldn't refer to yourself as a "young" girl, would you?

Or say you were going out with drinking with "young girls"?

Because then you'd get very odd looks and rightly so.

WHY DOES EVERYONE KEEP IGNORING THE "yOUNG" PART?

Hully, at 19, I think I was still very much a girl. I had left home, had sex, lived with a boy, but really knew little of what real life was - I hadn't experienced bereavement, grief, real loss, real fear, poverty, or so many of the experiences that have made me who I am.

The right to vote didn't make me a woman, life experience did. There isn't a magical age at which girls become women, applying an random age doesn't make it so.

Why am I deluded?

Im young

Im a girl

oh shit you're right, Ive got a stonking great penis where my vagina should be, I AM deluded

Hullygully Fri 21-Sep-12 09:19:50
Yes, it's better to have a life where you care about important stuff affecting half the population, threeOrange, it is a shame you don't, I agree.

bollocks, being called a girl is not going to hurt anyone.
i will stick to fighting disiblism thanks as that affects my girl.

No not young girl as no I am not, that's a child, going out with the girls tonight, being referred to as a girl is fine by me, men are referred to as one f the boys, lads. I was called madam te other day ad felt aged by 20 years. No I prefer girl. My grandma was forever 21 even though she died in her 80's

Jesus, not 'folks'. We are not Bugs Bunny or Pam Ayres.

I am liking 'comrades'.

My Dh is 42 and often says he is out with the boys, or meeting up with the lads etc,

He would also say the boys at work, and would say to them come on boys etc. It is no reflection on their actual age.

Hully please, not comrades, you are giving me flashbacks to SWP meetings at Uni. And they aren't pleasant flashbacks! Funny how some of the most oppressive men I ever had the misfortune of being with hung out there.

Folks. Meh.

Maybe we need to start a new MN word. Use it often enough and it will pass into popular use. And we can go to our graves knowing we have really done something positive for womankind - given ourselves a good, gender but not age-specific collective noun.

If only I could think of a good one....Hully you go first.