Your “fact” that some women may have inherited a name via a female line would only apply to very recent generations. It’s the tip of the iceberg. The only reason you keep bringing it up is because it’s your only way of undermining the impact of the patriarchal naming tradition in the UK.
The “fact” is, as I’ve repeatedly said, is that patriarchy exists. Have you noticed? The main transmission of this system of oppression has been through hereditary lineage and the male naming tradition.
So when you say “oh we don’t know if our names are patriarchal because we haven’t traced them,” this does come across as whataboutery and spectacularly missing the point. It’s also disingenuous because it’s distorting the fact of an oppressive system.
As I asked, would you argue we can’t be sure that the gender pay gap exists because some women earn more than men. Would you argue male on female violence is not a huge structural inequality in our society because some women may have attacked men?
That would be ridiculous wouldn’t it? Yes it’s a “fact” that some women have attacked men, but it should not detract from the wider picture if inequality. Yes it’s a “fact” that some Women may earn more than men, but it shouldn’t detract from the wider system of inequality. It may be a fact that sometimes, in more recent history, a female name has carried to children (eg single parent families or cohabiting couples) - but this should not detract from the structural inequality that has persisted for centuries.
When you look at an individual action, for instance, a woman taking her husband’s name in marriage, you have to look at it, not in isolation, but in the context of the wider historical structure and how it persists / manifests to this day.
The point of women taking their husband’s names, through history was, above all, to perpetrate the male line through offspring, to ensure that’s his name / legacy lives on, etc etc. This is still largely happening today.
All I’ve tried to argue is that is silly to look at one act, such as women taking their husband’s names or not, without looking at underlying structures. What perpetrates the patriarchy and all that comes with it is the transmission of names via male lines, regardless of what women do with their surnames. You can take any view you like on name-changing or not, but until it ceases to be default for children to inherit the father’s name, equality will not be achieved. So if you want equality, you have to accept that it does matter whose name a child inherits. As women. When we talk about “our name” the impact of the patriarchy need to be considered because it probably determined the name we cane into the world with, as well as any man’s name we may or may not change it to.
What I did or didn’t do in terms if my own relationship doesn’t really matter. This is where “feelings” come into it. I been honest that I don’t identify as a feminist in the way expressed on here. Yet that doesn’t mean I don’t understand structural inequalities and the feminist cause. But for me, the “facts” are the structural system. This system defines the very decisions we, as women, are required take, let alone what we decide. Some countries don’t allow women to change their names on marriage. Not because they are less patriarchal, but because women are incidental and the children get the male name anyway. We have experience if such a tradition this within our family.
So when I get frustrated with women who have so much to say about women who change their names in marriage, it’s not because I think they are wrong, as such. I just see everything as interconnected and underpinned by patriarchy anyway, so looking at acts in isolation makes no sense.