Mrs Yvette Cooper - BBC and titles - AIBU?

[Knickersnolongerinatwist]

A few months ago the BBC announced that they were going to stop using ordinary titles in news reports. They would continue to use titles such as president. About time too, I thought.

Just now on BBC Breakfast (sat 23rd aug approx 9:10am) they referred to the home secretary as "Mrs Yvette Cooper" and I was surprised that they seem to have reverted to using titles again and either
A) Yvette Cooper is choosing to use Mrs Cooper despite not being married to a Mr Cooper (although I can think of one person I know who did this upon marriage I don't think its a particularly common move)
Or
B) the BBC reporter chose the wrong title for her.
AIBU to think it's B?
And AIB doubly U to think reverting to using (pointless) titles is a poormmove by the BBC?

Mrs denotes the marital status not the surname of the spouse so Miss Cooper changing her title to Mrs Cooper not Mrs Balls on marriage is not unusual.

I do agree the mish mash of what the BBC called her was strange and peculiar though.

She’s actually MrsYvette Balls. Does it matter though?

I’m with you. The polite term, if people will insist on using outdated titles, is ‘Ms’ unless a woman has indicated another preference. I dislike the generic assumption that women automatically relinquish their own names on marriage.

you can see why she does not go by Yvette Balls
If you cannot just say it out loud

It matters because it’s an outdated reminder of the way men are viewed as default humans and women as adjuncts.

Titles are pretty much obsolete, anyway.

I wonder if maybe they were faffing over it because she's quite well known as a married woman who not only kept her own name but gave it to the kids, ie it's arguably their family name too. A situation with even less settled etiquette than usual with women's names and titles.

I wonder if anyone has ever asked her how she'd like to be addressed/referred to in news reports. I don't recall Teresa May being referred to as anything other than Mrs May. No faffing there.

I don't buy it, I write to MPs, great and the good etc., professionally, I always look up how to address them correctly, it wouldn't kill them to get it right at the BBC.

I was Ms from when I entered a very male dominated workplace as a fairly young woman until I became Dr.

Same. I expect because she did the 'standard' thing that didn't require anyone to think. It's quite common for some people to find anything other than that too complex for them.

Agree it would be interesting to know what title Yvette actually uses. Also can anyone remember a title being used for Liz Truss when she was still a thing? She kept her name too.

I am in favour of using titles to address people in a formal setting. I am also very much in favour of using Mrs for all women, not just married women. This used to be normal in the 19th century. It is still normal in France. I don't think that unmarried women should be stuck with a diminutive form of address and I don't think that people should assume that they can use a person's christian name when they don't know them. It indicates a level of familiarity that is not always suitable. That said, I think it is a good idea for people to be identified using both christian name and surname (Yvette Cooper), not as Mrs Cooper or Mr Cooper. That makes total sense and is a different use case from how you address people.

I’d think if Yvonne Cooper was unhappy she’d bring it up, I wouldnt be outraged on her behalf

I must say I'd be much more unhappy to be called Mrs anything than my first name, whatever the setting!

But this is the difficulty with the lack of a universal title for women, of course. Not having one creates problems. Mrs isn't that, and is unsuitable because of the connotations. I wonder if part of the reason for the general move away from titles is that we don't have set assumed rules any more so it's too much of a minefield.

Some women have gone down the Ms route, but I think that only entrenches the idea that Mrs denote marriage and that women are only afford the respect that men get automatically when they are married. Plus, when I worked somewhere that encouraged the use of Ms as a default, it made me wince every time someone used it for me. I never asked to by Ms. It felt like an assumption. Plus Ms is a modern title with no meaning or history. Mrs is the equivalent of Mr. If men get a respectful title automatically, so should women. The only actual solution to the problem is for all women to demand to be Mrs, regardless of marital status.

I stopped using Ms because it either was ignored and they used Mrs Myself, or they'd come out with daft comments like it meant I'm divorced.

I don't mind being called Mrs DPsurname, but Mrs Myself is my Mum.

It isn't the equivalent of Mr, not in the UK at least. Mr has never had any link to marital status, Mrs has for a long time and is still primarily used by those who are/have been married.

As someone who'd like a universal adult female title, I'm also not sure adult women en masse switching to Mrs regardless of marital status would achieve that. Reason being that we hear on here all the time from women who are delighted and proud to have a title that denotes their marital status, how they insist on being addressed as such and would be offended by anything else. They generally seem to be attached to Mrs for the meaning rather than because they particularly enjoy the word itself.

So if other women then make a decision that removes from them something they cherish, that raises the possibility that they don't play along and instead try to come up with a new married title. If enough of them do that, the concept of a universal title would be eroded. We'd need married Mrs users as a bloc to be on board, and I don't know that we can currently assume that would happen.

UpMyself, I'm very sympathetic. It is crazy how quickly Ms. (which was invented by women in the 1970's as an alternative for being defined by one's marital status) got re-contained by the patriarchs as only meaning "divorced." (Ancient feminist wanders off angrily to burn her bra. Well, actually no, because the ancient bosom is really a bit floppy....)
edited for odd formatting!

@NoVibrato , I don't really like the way people say it as Muzz. I say it as Miz.
I thought it was the female equivalent of Mr, i.e. adult female, but the 'living with, not married' or 'divorced' meanings seem prevalent and I still get things addressed Mrs.
My bosom is too ample for me to burn my bra.

I thought feminist meant believing women should be treated as equal to men, but that's been taken to mean man-hater.

My now divorced friend was Mrs Maiden name as her ex hated his surname. Their children were name his surname her surname, as a middle name not double barrelled

Ms, Miss and Mrs are all diminutive forms of mistress.

Ms dates back to the 17th century and was first suggested as a neutral term in the early 20th century.

There is no neutral honorific for woman, as there will always be someone to make assumptions and judge you for whichever one you choose to use.

There have been about a thousand threads on this in MN.

I go by Mrs Maiden Name. I know several people who do.

I have a stammer and C (ck not ss) words are harder than B words for me. A fellow stammerer struggles with F words.

Someone I worked with gave their baby the mother's surname to the child. Not sure if it was double-barrelled but the baby was something like Martha Balls Cooper.

@EBearhug , there probably have. I wouldn't bother with a title but if I don't specify one I get Mr!
My first name is a girl/woman's name, and it's not unisex or one that might be male.

I took a look at her website, no indication she uses one at all in her public persona.

Just like men don’t.

whether she actually uses Mrs, Ms or Miss is rather beside the point - the bbc doesn’t refer to e.g. Mr David Lammy, so it’s quite odd a that they used ‘Mrs’ for Yvette Cooper.

Totally agree.
Marital status is irrelevant in a professional capacity. When narrow minded, misogynistic traditionalists whine “but what shall I call you”, I tell that i have a perfectly good first name, but they can call me Dr if they must (my PhD is relevant to my job).

Yes, I mentioned upthread that its odd. The use of a title when the BBC said they wouldn't be doing that, and the flitting about. That's a given.