Apparently I can't be a feminist because I changed my name when I married.

[dustandfluff]

I heard someone (a feminist writer dunno who) on Radio 4 a few months ago saying women who change their names when they get married are not feminists.

. I have long been interested in feminism and women's rights. I appreciate the feminist arguments against changing your name. I had my reasons but I don't think that's relevant here. To me this sounds as though to "be" a feminist you have to meet a particular standard.

I think this is the kind of thing that puts a lot of women off the movement.

Opinion s anyone?

Perhaps the important task for our generation is to support our son's wives in keeping their own names and passing them on to our grandchild if they wish to.

Look, I'm not a person who changed my name.
But whatever things were like in the past, we live in a country where

• a person can legally call herself anything s/he wants
• a family can exist with more than one surname with next to no problems
• a man can change to the woman's surname on marriage if desired
• or the couple can pluck something out of thin air and all change
• at pretty much any time in their relationship
• the biggest issue with names seems to be snotty attitudes, not actual legal problems

It's weight of numbers that makes this an issue: women are still changing because it's 'what you do' but that's a hangover from times when it was indeed what you had to do (unless you were an upper class woman marrying beneath herself). We are arguing over a battle which has been won. Unlike the 23746 other battles like the pay gap and FGM etc.

Hully - so you think it's acceptable to make judgments about another woman, if she has changed her name?

I don't. So yes, it makes me the better person.

Ugh, it's the trivilisation of such matters that allows misogyny to carry on creeping over every life situation - often subtly - and allows female progression beyond ownership and dictatorship by males to crawl along at a snail's pace in reality.

My name is my name. My dad has his own name. My nose is mine, though it looks just like his. Or is it really his because he gave it to me?

Lanacre no one here said this was the most important issue in the world, but I would have put my mortage on the fact that someone would soon pop up to tell us that there were 'bigger fish to fry' (as if we didn't know).

I would also put my mortage on the fact that there are few men thinking and arguing about this and wondering if whether they change their name or not reflects their political identities and ideas. They don't have to. The onus is on women to change, justify, explain, tell themselves it doesn't matter because the name they've had all their lives isn't really theirs anyway, is horrible etc...

Tess, your argument is fallacious.

I don't understand the argument "you choose between your husband's name and your father's name". Your name has been your name since birth. Before that is was my father's yes and also my mother's (by marriage). But the point is that it is MY name and has been all my life.

Nor do I get the "you can't double-barrel because your children will end up with 4 names upon marriage" argument. Er no. They can choose their surname upon marriage as I did. They might choose to change names to their spouse's. They might choose to mix one from one side and one from the other. They might pick something entirely new for their family. They will be adults capable of making their own decisions and choices.

I am always a little surprised (and I suppose, disappointed) at how many women do still change their names in this day and age, but it is a matter of personal choice. IMHO you can still be a feminist if you take your husband's name, but by not taking it, you are making a feminist statement.

Tess wrote: "I asked DS1 whether he would want to change his (if I did), and he stunned me by saying he would want to change his even if I didn't. He was only 6-years old at the time, but he seemed certain he wanted to share his name with his dad, the man who loved him like his own."

I don't understand how this story can be anything other than a positive argument to keep your own family name (whether adopted or inherited) throughout your life and not give it up simply to pander to out of date traditions

Lotta I am the same with my name: I don't have a great attachment to it (usual parent difficulties/it's not particularly mellifluous) but the thought of the sentimentality that I think is the main driver for women to change made it a total no-no.

I firmly believe that many women (as you rightly point out) change because they buy into the whole cheesefest that is the wedding industry and ascribe a lot of false symbolism to the act of changing their name - in the same way that they like a big white dress and cutting the cake.

I agree, Furo, they are not doing it with ownership at the forefront of their minds BUT namechanging is freighted very heavily with historical meaning and continues ot be so.

Perhaps if all name changing was stopped for 100 years to make sure the freight was jettisoned, people could then start agian deciding whether to choose a name, change a name etc.

'I would also put my mortage on the fact that there are few men thinking and arguing about this and wondering if whether they change their name or not reflects their political identities and ideas. They don't have to'

When my mate brought up the name-changing issue with her DH before their wedding, she suggested in a jokey way that maybe he would change his name to hers. He was absolutely horrified and said that if they had children and they gave the children her last name, his father would actually disown him. Now he and his father are enormous twunts, but I think this attitude is widespread. It is down to women to change and accommdate and assimilate into his life (usually) rather than the other way round.

Yet another reason why inclusion of gay couples in marriage laws would be such a great thing - I am no fan of marriage but equal marriage would shake up all these old notions of what women do in marriage and what men do in marraige and make the situation more equal for everybody.

at 'cheesefest' weddings - like it!

Who was it who said that when thinking about whether to do a thing or not, look at the men and see if they are doing it...?

I don't think "Mrs" sits well with femininsm either.

Hully, I think that was Caitlin Moran. Not a huge fan of hers but she does come out with some gems and that's one!

Hully, is it? Is it really still thought of is ownership? I just don't see that.
I think people find it easy if a couple has the same name, because categorising them as 'together' takes no thought. They don't think much further beyond that, surely?

No it isn't (see above) but it carries the freight of those associations and connotations: the woman is assimilated into the man with his name. Come on, she changes her identity label to his!

Euro agree 100% with your first point

oh yes, lotta, it was her. It is a good one. Simple and effective.

I kept my name and really don't understand why anyone would ever change their name just because they got married. The DCs are double barrelled. In 16 years his has never caused any problems whatsoever.

To all the women saying "I hated my name so took DH's name when we married" if you hated it so much why didn't you change it before? Genuine question.

My cousin has changed her and her DC's names four times. She is now back using her birth name (although may get married again, I don't know what she'll do then). I don't know what name her (now adult) DCs use.

Euro agree 100% with your first point

What do you feel when a man changes his surname to his wife's?
I know it's rare as hen's teeth but it does happen.

I also know a lesbian couple who recently had a CP and have blended. I just see that as a slightly unnecessary but well-meant sentimental gesture. A marriage isn't the name of itself.

What do you feel when a man changes his surname to his wife's?

I don't think it's so bad because he is clearly not doing it just because everybody else does. Bit unnecessary though.

Unnecessary, exactly. I do wish more women felt the same

I remember a midwife said to me once she wished more children had their mothers last name, just because it makes it so much easier to find people.

That's another mystery to me just giving a child his dads name with to reference whatsoever to the mother. It just makes no sense to me.