To get frustrated being referred to as a girl?

[achingabs]

I am in my 40's working a professional job, I started with a new company this year. Speaking to my DM who is 70, she keeps referring to me as a girl. For context, it's male dominated office apart from me. About once a week one of us brings in either biscuits/cake / breakfast/ lunch either bought from the shop or baked at home. I took something I baked in. I told my mother she explained with great glee all the aged old adage of 'the way to a man heart' (all men are married I am the only single person in the office) and then she was saying they must think 'what a nice girl I am'.
I explained this was patronising and again this week she referred to me at work as a 'clever girl' and how the men must appreciate having a 'clever girl' in the office.

She keeps saying how she doesn't understand this political correct things she should say. I have nicely explained I find it patronising and demeaning.

I am no long going to discuss my work with her. But am I being unreasonable in getting frustrated?

At least it's only your mum. My ex manager used to call us the girls and she was half our age.

Your mum is very old fashioned. Whether she cares is another matter.

It really isn't , it simply isn't, something to get worked up about. "Girl" is not politically incorrect or correct. I've never seen blokes, geezers, lads, gents getting their codpieces in a twist over 'boys' or 'lads'. Why does no one get near hysterical if a poster mentions their partner is on 'a lads night out' or 'away with the boys' ? Because it's irrelevant, that's why.

Never have I been on a 'womens night out' or 'away with the femmes', I have been on many 'girls nights out' and equally many 'ladies events'.

I think to your own mother you will always be a girl. Not that that means she shouldn't be able to understand the wider point.

I hate it when I'm referred to as a girl.

I work in an office with another woman and one of our (luckily rarely) visiting directors always says 'Hi, girls!' to us.

Never calls the men boys though.

I once said to him that I hadn't been a girl since about 30 years ago but he just said how young I look for my age and thought I'd take that as a compliment

In a work environment, I would find it annoying and demeaning (depending on the context), but by my non-feminist 72yo mum? I'd just roll my eyes, tell her why I found it annoying then carry on as usual. She's probably proud that her daughter is such a clever girl so don't spoil her enjoyment of this by refusing to talk about work.

Ok I will wind my neck in and grin and bare it.

Ironically she hates it when my sister says she's going out with the girls.

Your mum probably just still sees you as her baby / her little girl, because you always have been in her eyes and always will be. I'm sure she doesn't mean anything derogatory by it.

Couldn't get worked up about this personally!

I’m 37 and I LOVE being called a girl in fact really insulted when a random calls me a “woman”!

Dm calls me a girl too, doesn't bother me enough to mention it.

Manager at work called me a "good girl" once and I reacted and asked him if he thought I was a fucking alsatian dog. Bit inappropriate language for our office, he caught me at a bad time. I did apologise for swearing but told him, even if he didn't mean it, his comment was patronising. He never said it to anyone again. You can teach an old dog new tricks. 😉

@19lottie82 - I’m 37 and I LOVE being called a girl grin in fact really insulted when a random calls me a “woman”!

Why on earth would you prefer to be referred to as a child than as am adult?

I think it's ok if it's your own mother. You are her girl after all.

My step dad refers to myself (32), DH (34), DBro (35) dSil (27) collectively as 'the kids' - I think it's sweet.
Dnephew (4.5) Ds (3) Dniece (5mo) are 'the babies'

Can’t get worked up about this tbh. Hardly patronising either.

“I’m 37 and I LOVE being called a girl grin in fact really insulted when a random calls me a “woman”!”
You are, presumably, taking the piss?

I don’t like it either mostly because men are never referred to as boys.

Men are often called “the boys,” or “the lads,” under all sorts of circumstances.

Not appropriate in a work situation but your DM? Let it go. She probably does still think of you in a way as her girl. Can't even get worked up about 'girls' night out' or similar because you do definitely hear 'lads' or boys' night out' just as, if not more frequently, so there doesn't seem to be any patronising meaning to it. 'Men's night out' or 'Women's night out' just sounds wrong, even if it is 'correct'.

What MyOpinionIsValid said on P1.
I posted something on a thread last night, that I've never met anyone in real life who dislikes this term. Where I live (or in my generation ?), it is a friendly term for a group of female friends.

Can't see why people on MN get worked up about it

Give over

YANBU. I hate it when people refer to women as girls. I know lots of other people don’t understand my outrage, but I don’t understand their complacency.

@BertrandRussell - “I’m 37 and I LOVE being called a girl grin in fact really insulted when a random calls me a “woman”!”
You are, presumably, taking the piss?

I don't know. Surprisingly, even in this day and age, there are people who think like this. My 56 year old sil hates being called a woman and can't understand why I would want to be called a woman.

I’ll stop objecting to adult women being referred to a girls when it is routine for a manager to say “Oh, take that to the boy in Accounts” when the person concerned is a 45 year old man.

I think my irritation stems from the difference of treatment by DM who has very positively said such things as how strong a woman I am with regard to children, my relationships etc, but when it comes to my career she refers to me as a girl and almost belittles me.
My brother she says how proud she is of his achievements how he's doing so well at work but never what a clever bit he is.

It's like she has little value on my hard work - like it's a bit of a giggle for me to go to work, if that makes sense.

Absolutely she means no harm. The AIBU is my reaction.

Context is everything, but my feeling is that you probably shouldn't use "girls" in the same sentence as "men" if referring to equal adults.

So it might be one thing to talk about how the boys in the office did this and the girls did that, but it sounds as if the mother used men and girls for the same context.