AIBU to think that Purplebricks don't actually need to know whether I'm married?

[borlottibeans]

All I want to do is book a fucking viewing!!!

The only options are Mr, Mrs, Miss or Dr. I was very tempted to put Dr but didn't want to have to keep explaining to people that I've faked a PhD out of spite.

Jessie no, I disagree with the OP but DO think it should be Mr or Mrs so that men and women are treated equally and given equal weight.

... disagree with the pp ...

This has been enlightening for me - I genuinely always thought Ms was for unmarried women who don’t want people to know they aren’t married! I didn’t realise this was such an issue for so many people. I really love being a “Mrs”, but if people don’t I suppose they are entitled to the same anonymity as men get with “Mr”.

I hate it when I am asked over the telephone Mrs or Miss. I just say either. I don't really want to have to justify my position, as it's boring and irritating, but sometimes I am put into the position where I have to, which I resent.

Ms has been around for decades now, so why on earth is it not an option on all forms. I would prefer to go with Miss rather than Mrs, even though I'm happily married. Why should strangers know my marital status. I am thinking of doing a PHD, just so I can avoid this s**t! DD is doing a PHD and feels exactly the same!

you can choose whichever one you want. I am married but use Mrs, Miss and Ms interchangeably therefore managing to apparently confuse, mislead, lie to and keep my marital status from all sorts of people. Strangely enough, no one has ever given the tiniest shit about what title I use.

In my work, there is a huge choice of titles and people often choose Brigadier or Wing Commander just for the hell of it.

We've been asking for years for the list to be cut down.

I'm Dr and I have given my title as Dr to them be asked "yes but is it Mrs or Miss?". So frustrating.

Just replying to Walking, can’t believe I’m having to explain this, but no I don’t want to be defined by a Victorian label “Miss” - I woul correct people who called me Mrs and tell them I am Ms.

Or actually more often I tell them to call me Puppy as I don’t have any aversion to people - even shock horror STRANGERS - calling me by my actual name.

I hate and i mean hate ms and refuse to ever fill that in so for me this works but op if you hate miss and mrs as much as i hate ms yanbu there should be an other option.

But why Mrs and not Ms to treat men and women equally unobtainable? Mrs is ingrained in people’s minds as meaning “married” so even if it was the only option it would still have the potential to cause confusion.

Well on the Aldi photos website the only options are mr and mrs. I put myself as mr. I'm not a mr.

Technically, Mrs and Miss are both short forms of the same word, 'Mistress'. And that was used - with various abbreviations- until the 18th century to describe ALL adult women.
'Miss' became fashionable among young women wishing to show that they were 'genteel' , after around 1740.

Really excellent article on 'Mrs and Miss' here: newrepublic.com/article/119432/history-female-titles-mistress-miss-mrs-or-ms

'Ms' has a surprisingly long history - it was used in the 17th & 18th cent and its reintroduction has been discussed since 1901: www.nytimes.com/2009/10/25/magazine/25FOB-onlanguage-t.html

Thank you for the interesting post florascotia2

I hate being called "Ms", it has feminist undertones that I do not accept, I don't care if I am Miss or Mrs, but I will read your links and educate myself a bit

At our secondary school, all the female staff are called ms/miss, I can't actually tell which it is, but it's a catch all.

Crispy if that was the case it wouldn't be very effective

I got married quite recently and part of the reason I'm pushing back against being called Mrs is that if I let it go I'm helping to undermine Ms. And as someone else has said I didn't change my name so Mrs feels wrong with my surname.

I used to work in retail and would always default to Ms when placing customer orders. I would then ring up about 5-10 customers a day and tell them their order was in. Every single day- literally- I would have an affronted woman correct me. ‘It’s Mrs’ or ‘Miss, not Ms’. Unfortunately I think there is no way to win this one.

I really love being a “Mrs”

@crispysausagerolls

Genuine question, but why do you love being Mrs?

The only difference i can see about being a Mrs, is that people know you’re married. Why is that so important? Why doesn’t your husband want a title that indicates his marital status?

I don’t care if people are married or not. I don’t care if other people know whether I am married or not.

I thought these days we were past judging women on whether they were worthy of marriage, so why does it matter if people know you are?

Mrs means married woman in every place I've ever been.

Never used to bother me, but it irks me now every time someone says Mrs, even though it's technically correct. I prefer Ms
I think you do need to have something though, I send correspondence to people who I don't know (i.e. Customers) I prefer a Dear Ms xxxxxxx rather than 'dear Jane'.

I couldn't care less if people think I am married or not, Mrs or the worst Ms only means they think you are old! No one called me "Mrs" in my early 20s, and no one will call me Miss nowadays. My marital status is actually irrelevant, people don't care anyway, they judge your youthful (or lack of) looks.

I am perfectly comfortable with being called Ms but there are many women my age (late 50s) and over who hate it and think it was used only by divorcees, lesbians, and unmarried women of a certain age who are embarrassed about beautiful no unmarried.

Obviously a very old-fashioned view, but one that persists in some circles, I imagine.

I don't know anyone younger than me who objects to Ms.

Should have said 'being unmarried'. Not sure how the beautiful crept in!

I use Ms. I'm divorced so am not longer a Mrs and certainly too old to be a Miss. Ms works for me.

Jessie, the Mrs Hughes thing in service jobs was to show seniority, it wasn't about respectability but hierarchy.

borlottibeans

Very interesting - I would love to see stats on how women who don’t change their names and the correlation to the use of Ms or Mrs! Is there anyone here who didn’t change their name but prefers Mrs?

reallyanotherone

It’s definitely a very girlish and childish thing about feeling married and having always wanted to be a “Mrs” - same reason I took my husband’s last name. I just really like it 🙈 but I’ve been married for just under a year so maybe ask me in a few more years 😂

crispy

And how did your husband change his name/title to convey that he feels the same way about being married to you?