to think women who use their husband's email address are submissive stepford wives who don't have a life of their own?

[Picante]

Seriously, is it that hard to work out how to get your own email address?

The ones that share are bad enough e.g. '[email protected]' or whatever, but I've seen quite a few that simply have the man's name as the email address.

Yes I know there are more important things to worry about, but come on ladies, this is 2009!

and as I said - people said the same thing about mobile phones 10yrs ago - it hasn't happened.

Well, you may not be worked up about it, picante, but you can't be surprised that others are going to be if you call them "submissive stepford wives who don't have a life of their own". Pretty offensive stuff if you just think it's a bit daft.

yes but you don't have to share the contents of the message in the inbox, and you can always set up filters in your inbox if seeing "100 top male strippers" offends your eyes so much.

always looking, I haven't "skipped" the point, I took it further on with my comments about the nature of communication changing. A "landline" already seems slightly anachronistic.

The idea of having to phone a building where a person might be in order to find them, and that this was all you ever used to be able to do, already seems a bit weird to our children's generation. The expense of mobiles and the force of habit has meant people have kept their landlines for now.

can I make a confession here at this point??

I don't actually know what a "stepford wife" is

But why bother setting up filters and having to ignore things when having two separate inboxes is so much more straightforward?? I just don't get it.

I think people are going out of their way to jump through hoops to justify this shared inbox thing. It's very interesting to watch.

maybe it's changing that dramatically in your world - but like it or not - large numbers of people are still using them, and will continue to do so for some time.

A "Stepford Wife" is a reference to the film from the 1970s in which the women in the town were all robotic and submissive and a satirical exaggeration of the 1950s "good little housewife."

Yup, I'm sure people said the same about telegrams. And they were right, for maybe 10 years or so.

actually very few people have my mobile number, a few close friends, the schools, DH.

If most people want to contact me they are given by landline number - if I'm not here when they ring - tough shit. And THAT definitely isn't going to change in the foreseeable future.

I don't have filters on our inbox - I find it simple enough to scan down, delete the junk, open mine and leave DH's. It was just a suggestion for those that found it so hard.

Actually I lie - I do have some filters - but it's for my emails so I don't get inundated with freecycle stuff in my primary inbox

Does no-one have a sense of humour any more?

Am I the only one to slightly exaggerate a thread title in order to draw you in?

Does that make me needy?!

Probably.

ahh - thank you for humouring me on the Stepford Wife thing .

No I'm not one of them (account is in my name) and while DH is very domesticated I'm not sure he quite qualifies as a Stepford Husband

But that depends on how you use email, UQD. I don't really use email for personal, private stuff.

Someone used the example earlier on about how you couldn't write to a friend about your pelvic floor if it was a joint address and I agree but tbh I would never write to someone about my pelvic floor. For me those kinds of conversations take place in person/on the phone. Same with my mobile phone - I use it (mostly) for quick, convenient calls, not as a lifeline for long chats/staying in touch with texts etc which others do.

It's quite obvious that a lot of people enjoy using email for private conversations and that is great too. It's just not my style and therefore having a joint address for some communication serves my purpose perfectly.

No way is right or wrong or submissive or not, it is just different and doesn't warrant some of the rather outlandish judgements here.

It all depends if you use communication intelligently or allow it to use you. People have their own way of controlling it. If I don't want to answer the phone - land or mobile - I don't answer it. It irritates me that MIL, when we are at her house, will always get the phone no matter what she is doing, and expects us to do the same.

For the first two years of having a mobile phone, I used to keep it switched off and just pick up messages at my convenience.

DW uses the phone all the time. I hardly ever do. All my personal stuff is done on email or Facebook.

I have given up reading the whole thread but just to add my tuppeny bit in- The computer in our house is just another appliance to be used by us both. The email is a generic one. Not his- not mine.Both of us go on to the computer and thin the emails out. If it's something for him I might leave it as unread or put it into his file and the otherway round. Many emails concern both of us anyway eg airport parking, flight confirmation, hostel/hotel bookings,amazon orders,gig tickets etc.I don't find anything spooky, submissive or odd about this arrangement. Am I being odd to thing that we're normal. I'll just go and doubt the dynamics of our relationship now

well yes and they say the same thing about internet access - but as someone said below 30% of UK households don't even have it - let alone the dilemma of having shared/individual email.

It took a generation for television to take off.

well I the fact that very few people have my moible number so I know that only "important" calls will reach me when I'm out of the house (presuming I've remembered to take my phone with me ) I'd say I use it pretty intelligently.

If they're desperate to get hold of me on the landline and I'm not answering the phone - well they can leave a message and I'll get back to them at my convenience.

still hasn't taken off for many

i agree with UQD's assessment that bank accounts are not a helpful analogy.

Joint bank accounts make sense because you are running a family/household together. You are pooling your resources and making decisions on how money should be spent.

But an email message is essentially akin to having a real life conversation with someone. (For me, anyways. This thread is making it clear how some people just do not use email to discuss personal/sensitive things.) If you have a joint email address, then you are no longer really having a private email conversation! DH and I don't insist on being able to listen in on every single conversation that we each have with our friends and family. Similarly, we don't feel a need to read each other's emails.

As an example, I receive emails from friends who want to discuss very personal things about their lives. They don't necessarily want to share that with my DH, much as they like him!

oh I use email to dicuss personal things - DH just doesn't read emails that are for me.

Oh and we don't have a join bank account