The Feminist Pub (continued).

[UptoapointLordCopper]

Been busy. Came back today to have a look but the Pub thread was full! Shall we continue here?

Third episode of Borgen on tonight.

Back to women taking their husband's name - I can see how it makes sense for a family unit to all have the same name, and since the children usually end up with the man's name no matter how feminist the woman, then the woman ends up with a different name to everyone else, which is weird.

So I'm all for a family unit sharing a family name. What I object to is the default is very much that the woman takes the man's name. I would love each family to make their own decision. So if one is called Wartyface and one is called Mitchell, the obvious choice is Mitchell no matter whether it belongs to the man or the woman. Other options of course are going double-barrelled, combining the names into Mitchface or taking a whole new one. But each option should be equally likely and viable.

I would also have no objection to Mrs, as long as all women took the title at 16/18. But for women to have a child's title until they are validated as a real adult women by marrying a man just makes me so angry.

I'm also quite cross that I can't legally take both my unmarried and married names unless I do it by deed poll. I can drop my unmarried name and take my DH's just by providing a marriage certificate, or keep my unmarried name. But I can't use both. WTF not?!!

It would seem that I'm not a cake-stand person. We have a plastic box from the pound shop that contains cake when we have cake and contains other containers when we don't.

www.lakeland.co.uk/18433/Carousel-Cupcake-Caddy

Yes, and the fact you can use both (though as you say, not in the most formal legal sense) is dodgy too. When I got married it really gave us both pause that they said casually that I could just choose to use DH's name, I didn't need to do anything except, well, use it. But he'd need a deed poll.

I really, really want to give children my name if we have any, and DH is theoretically on board, so we shall see.

cupcakes are a bridge too far, upto. It would be like giving in to the patriarchy disguised in frosting.

(I really can't stand cupcakes.)

I just use my name. Besides I got my doctorate in my name and I have a thesis with my name on it and it's Dr Upto to those who have a title fetish. First name to my friends. (I once said that to somebody to their face in RL. )

I like cakes. I like icing up to a point, but I object to anything with more icing than cake.

Oh, Portmeirion, I see - I think I have some bowls that match that cake stand from TKMaxx.

LordCopper, I couldn't care less about titles, but I do use mine to avoid the whole Mrs/Ms thing.
And anyway, the only person who is MrsDH'sName is my MiL .

It is quite horrible that the husband's name is the default, but AFAIRemember we did not have to make any kind of decision about names when we got married (in Scotland - rules might be different?). Once our first child was born, we had to consider what his name was to be, the wider significance of choosing his last name was that all subsequent children would have to have the same name. So they have DH's name and I went double-barrelled. Which I dislike and never use other than when flying

I eat cupcakes.
And make them for the nursery bake sale.
They are miniature cakes with as little icing as I get away with - icing is the poor bakers cover-up and makes my teeth hurt with over-sweetness

True cupcakes, in the American style, are not over iced.

Ah, it's my early American upbringing that has imprinted the 'proper' cupcake on me

LRD - you don't like cupcakes?!?!

I'm sorry, you seemed so lovely. We can no longer be friends.

And Pacifist, I'd take the icing over the cake any day.

Annie, you can all the icing on your cupcake AND the icing from my cupcake (although you might have to fight DH for it)

have

Dammit

And you can have my cupcake, Pacifist!

This exact agreement is why DH and I have such a happy marriage.

Except we don't call it icing. We call it frosting.

Just for the record.

I did leave aged 6, about 200 years ago....

I left aged 34.

Exactly 10 years ago.

And many many of my son's school friends have been amazed by my delicious cupcakes. Because they are actual cake with a bit of frosting!

I hate the ones with frosting piled to the ceiling. So not the point of cupcakes. Or they'd be called cupfrosting!

I can't stand frosting/icing. I love a thin layer of water and icing sugar icing fairy cake style. But I scrape off frosting and leave it for the kids. Normally there is disappointingly little cake underneath!

Here I am, hapily chrocheting Christmas presents whilst listening to the radio, and I hear a feminist quote from a Labour MP who, it transpires, I went to school with! I am very happy for her but can't help feeling rather inadequare. Give me something feminist to do (nothing too taxing or time consuming, I am rather busy) to ease the guilt of my wasted life when compared to my worthy peer. Please!

Oh yegod I can so relate. I went to an all girls school in New York for high school and I get the alumni magazine and read all about the doctors, lawyers and politicians I graduated with.

Not that being a freelance graphic artist is so terrible. I still feel inadequate a lot though. It's really the only thing that still makes me feel that way.

You could stand up and sing we shall overcome?

Thanks TEE! I could give it a go. Might have to hum bits...

Oh no, so much to catch up on!

So, France and Germany have both ditched miss but not the UK. I notice here in the US that ms is the assumed title for women unless they say otherwise. My mother used to cope with me being dreadfully modern and address things to mrs myfirstname dhlastname but as she gets older she is reverting to her 1940s childhood an I now get cards with mrs hisname. So I have sent all my cards out with mrs first on them.

Personally, I see no point in titles at all. It's not like we're likely to meet a lord an need to know who is a squire and who is a mister etc. family names are also unnecessary and it wouldn't bother me to have a different one. My last name is dh's step father's name handed out randomly from an orphanage. It is a traditionally catholic Irish name, and dh's mum's family is northern Irish Methodist, so all totally random and lacking any symbolism.

Cupcakes! Love them. Make several thousand dollars a year from them! About to close down my small business as I don't have time to do weddings etc now I'm doing an MA (do I get feministy points?) but will still do summer school and bake for friends.

I started selling them when I had just got a green card and couldn't get a job due to the recession. So although typically female, they were a route into independence for me. Which opens up the huge topic of the female economy.

Oh, and the discussion about whether what you do affecting others and therefore being aware if that, is the topic of the public realm, which has been discussed since the 1700s, so I would say it is a fair point.

We call it icing in the South, Tee. Also frosting, but I think that may have to do with the increasing Yankeezation of our language.

I also went to a girls' school. That is actually pretty unusual for Americans.

I have 3 cake stands, including one that is Christmas themed. Southern women have cake stands. And pass them down to their daughters and granddaughters. I think you should go for it LRD.

I do understand the issue of having a name different from the rest of the family. That was my situation because my children had DH's name (one still does; my daughter took her husband's name). It was not ideal for many reasons, but I don't think it made us feel less of a cohesive unit.

Another thing I was thinking of in this regard is that the convention in the US is that if a woman takes her husband's surname on marriage, her maiden name becomes her middle name as in Hillary Rodham Clinton. The British married women I know have dropped their maiden names completely so Mary Rose Smith who married John Jones became Mary Rose Jones. Is this generally the case?