"Miss goes missing on French official forms" - let's do the same here!

[Alittlefeminist]

Hurray for French feminists who have pushed through a revision of women's titles: www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/22/mademoiselle-removed-from-french-official-forms :)

Let's do the same!

Hazlenutt - are you saying that the default option should be Ms? Then if you so choose to correct them with either Miss or Mrs?
Sounds good in principal - however I think there are many who just don't like the sound of Ms.
PS I'm Mrs, I kept my maiden name after marriage, thereafter with the arrival of children I wanted us to all have the same name, so I took DHSurname. For a while I kept my maiden name at work and other places where I'm an individual - but to be honest it just got tiring after a while having two names. So opted to be Mrs everywhere.

well in principle I would prefer the French and German option and Mrs for all adult women.

Making up a third title in my opinion was a mistake and I don't know any other languages who have anything similar. As it is there now then yes, I would prefer this to be the default one and honestly I don't understand why so many people object.

The main argument I've heard is that you can't pronounce it, but I don't buy that -if you can pronounce, say, illegitimate or entrepreneurial or Mrs, which is no more a word than Ms, then [miz] should not be that complicated either.

Mx (From Wikipaedia): "Mx, a gender-neutral honorific replacing "Mr." and "Ms.""

An aside to those of you who dislike Ms because of the way it sounds - I agree with you, I would prefer to be Mrs. But only if ALL WOMEN were Mrs, regardless of marital status.

Until that happens, I will identify with Ms, because it is the only logical option available to feminists and/or any women who wants to be treated as an adult on their own merit, not their state of attachment to a man.

The sound of it is irrelevant, and anyone who doesn't use it purely because of the sound while ignoring the principles of the protest is surely a tad shallow, IMO.

For whoever asked - yes, you can be Ms HisName if you like. You can call yourself anything you like - there are no rules. I'm Ms HisName, or Ms MyName HisName, depending on how much name-writing energy I have at the time.

The problem is that whatever titles you put in or leave out, someone is always going to be upset. I think it has to be either all titles or none.

And Annie - I am sorry you think I am shallow - but I enjoy words and I enjoy music, and I don't think judging a word on its aesthetics is wrong. I don't just dislike it because of the way it sounds, but also because, to me, it isn't a proper word. Wasn't it William Morris who said you should have nothing in your life which you didn't either believe to be useful or consider to be beautiful. Well - I don't find Ms either beautiful, or useful for me, so I don't want it in my life. But if you want it in yours, then that is your absolute right.

Anne-Elisabeth Moutet explains why the French have got it all wrong.

And, yes, she is right!

As a compromise - why not spell it Ms and pronounce it Misses (Mrs)? After all we don't pronounce Mr as Murrrr so Ms can be a contraction of anything we want really.

Sounds like a fine plan, hocus.

Bonsoir's link describes a pay gap of 27% between women and men doing the same job in France

NarkedPuffin - indeed, and that is before tax. After tax the pay gap gets even worse, because in married couples the second earner (usually the woman, because of the pay gap), gets taxed at her DH's marginal rate. So if you are married to a higher rate tax payer, you are f*d. And of course, to add insult to injury, spousal maintenance on divorce is almost zilch.

This also explains why some, more advanced, women are rather attached to their Mademoiselle status in France - they aren't ripped off by it!

They talked about this on BBC Breakfast on Friday morning. I think they were hoping for a bit of a bunfight but didn't get one because both guests basically agreed that the French have done good!

I always choose Ms but would be perfectly happy to use Mrs if that were to become the default. The point is, men don't have/require a choice, so why do we? Let's pick one title and all stick with it!

I don't really understand this argument. I'm 41, not married (but have a partner) and very proud of my right to use 'Miss'. In my simple book, 'Miss' means you're not married, 'Mrs' means you are. I see no negative connotation to it at all. In this day and age there is no shame whatsoever in not being married and to be honest, if I was respected less by anyone for not being married they can go swing. I'm not married. Why on earth should I pretend to be? What on earth is so less respectable about a woman who hasn't legally shackled herself to a man? (to clarify, I'm not against marriage. I may do it myself one day, and if I do, I'll call myself 'Mrs'). If people call me up and say "is that 'Mrs 'X'" I correct them to 'Miss'. I am 100% pro-choice. Married women should have the right to call themselves Mrs/Ms/Miss as they see fit, and partnered/single women should have the right to call themselves what they want (although I'd feel very sad to hear a single woman let people believe she was a 'Mrs' out of embarrassment for not being married). Feminism is surely about women's rights, freedom and choices? For me, true feminism is not caring how 'society' and other people see you or categorise you as a woman.

I don't want to lose my right to call myself 'Miss' rather than the 'I don't want anyone to know I'm not married' 'Ms'. If the Miss option was taken away and I had the choice of Ms or Mrs, I'd cross both out. To take away a woman's pride & self-respect in being single is anti-feminism IMHO.

But Fjord, even though there is no negative connotation to being married or not, why should the general public know your marital status? Why do women only get an adult title when they're married? It's not about pride in being single, it's about getting respect as an adult women with no reference to your marital status at all.

It's about men having one title. Mr. And women having three. Why? Feminism is about everyone being treated as equal, which can never happen as long as society feels that women's marital status is so important and intrinsic to her worth that it should be in the public domain for all to see and judge.

I am not married and generally use Miss because I always have although I tend to tick the "Ms" option if it's there. I feel a bit silly sometimes being a Miss at 40! However, I get called all 3 (usually Mrs) which only underlines how ridiculous the whole thing is. When (if!) we ever get married, I don't intend to change my name or title. Being known as Mr X's wife when I'm at work also seems totally ridiculous!

I also know that if DH was questioned for any reason or there was a male equivalent he would happily say he was married/ use the equivalent .

Really? But there isn't a male equivalent to Mrs so it's all hypothetical. I've never read an article in a newspaper by a man demanding an equivalent but I've read plenty by women demanding an equivalent to Mr. That's a bit like women who say that they changed their name when they married so they could have a family name. They could easily have chosen their name but ended up choosing their husband's. Funny that.

Those of you who like Miss - does it not trouble you that have the same title as my 3yo DD? 'Miss' just says 'child' to me.

Well done the French and Germans. Let's show a little European solidarity for once and adopt the same custom.

Fjord nicely put, much more eloquent than I managed :o

Annie - my headmistress when I was 10 was unmarried and nearing retirement, and we all knew her as Miss Pugh - so I have never seen Miss as implying that the holder of that title is a child. Believe you me, no-one treated Miss Pugh with anything less than utter respect!! I think that has coloured my view of the title in a very positive way.

Agree with SDTG, 'Miss' has never had a childish connotation to me. I was always brought up that this was what you were known as if you weren't married. I don't feel that calling myself 'Miss' over 40 is childish. I had teachers in their 50's & 60's who were 'Miss', as single women (& one who was married but chose to retain her maiden name professionally) & I never thought that strange either.

AnnieLobeseder - I accept your points but not allowing people to know something so they can't judge it is not tackling the problem. Surely legislation should be there to protect people from discrimination on the basis of anything rather than encourage them to hide much about themselves in case someone else chooses to judge them harshly? I agree that there should be equality, and DP agreed with me when I discussed it with him that it is more of a problem that men don't have a choice. After all, 'Ms' was brought in relatively recently to give women choice to use a title that revealed their marital status or not. Why did no-one think of giving men that choice also?

It's about giving people freedom & choice rather than impelling people to not express who they fully are in an official capacity as they choose. Personally, I think men should have more choice of title. If the argument is about forms being unnecessarily complicated, then we should also remove the right of Profs, Drs, Lords etc to use theirs and stick to Mr & Ms. But that's a lot of rights taken away from a lot of people. Here in Norway, titles aren't used at all & there is no real Norwegian equivalent of Mr, Mrs, Ms or Miss. If it's an issue of forms perhaps the choice should be 'enter a title' or 'leave title box blank'? Or just ask for a first name, surname & gender?

i was Ms MyName first time I was married and Mrs DHName now. I was/am comfortable both times. I do not see an issue.

Crystals
"Dear Sirs" is still taught all over the world as a polite form to address a group of people for the first time. You obviously do not deal with many foreigners.

Not read it all, but would HATE to be ms. Why are you trying to take away my right to choose what to be called?