Gym thinks only men can be Drs

[DrElizabethPlimpton]

I've just seen a link to a Daily Fail article (I won't link obviously) about a gym in Cambridgeshire

A paediatrician joined and she found that her electronic key wouldn't allow her access to the female changing room. The 'glitch' was explained by staff - apparently her title Dr automatically defaulted to the assumption she was male.
I'm currently speechless.

Does that bring us back to Comrade as an honorific, then?!

I like it.

In a post-gender world, I see no issue with 'sisters' as a non-gendered form of address.

Ooh, this belongs on the other thread really, but the idea of that makes me feel odd.

Damn you, male-as-default conditioning

It is odd, isn't it?

About 80% of the time I love it when hardcore feminists address groups of women as 'sisters'. I have had a sister and I like having lots of them.

But the other 20% it feels impossibly cliquey and female. Which, as you say, is conditioning.

But I do love trying to think what terms we might use, post-gender. And it really interest me that the affectionate ones seem to be the first to become non-gendered. In formal contexts, terms are gendered even today. But as far back as I know of in English, you can just call someone 'love' and it doesn't specify gender. I think that's quite hopeful, isn't it?

That's interesting.

Sweetheart, cariad, darling, dear are all non gendered too I think.

I suppose maybe if you are in an intimate relationship, you have to try to relate to someone as a person?

Yes.

You'd know this better than me - how did terms of endearment arise? Were they linked to the love from and for god or very separate?

Dear is non-gendered except when patronising men want to tell people on the internet they're wrong, in which case it becomes a term for females who are wrong. They don't address men they think are wrong as Dear.

I'm now remembering a conversation I once had when specifying titles for a drop-down list where one of the men thought it was terribly important that we had Captain as an option. I then asked if he thought Brigadier, General and Flight-Lieutenant needed to go on the list. Then someone suggested Sergeant and Inspector, someone else said The Honourable and someone else suggested HRH in case one of the royal family signed up. Monseigneur came up at one point. No-one suggested Comrade or Citizen.

In the end we went back to basics and went for Mr, Ms, Miss, Mrs, Doctor and Reverend with an Other field that you had to fill in yourself. I don't think any of the titles were linked to sex though.

Apropos of nothing really...

Oh, I meant non-gendered in the very broad sense of the word being used for men and women. I agree lots of endearments are used more for women now and can be patronizing.

yonic - no, I don't know. I assume a lot must pre-date Christianity if they're just things like 'love'. Post-Christianity you get romantic/erotic terminology adopted to describe relationships with God, but I can't actually think of terms that start out as religious and then become endearments.

Thanks Jeanne! Reburial of Richard III is on C4 tomorrow pm, FYI, - I'll stick it in history club too.

Monseigneur - that sounds awesome! Is there a female equivalent or is that just Madame?

Hmm. Not familiar enough with Catholic hierarchy.

The titles discussion got a bit out of hand...

Ooh! Thanks. I shall watch.

I think we should all be monseigneur, really.

But you couldn't have a more patriarchial title, could you? It's the word for a feudal lord, and France does feudalism like noone else.

Monseigneur - that sounds awesome! Is there a female equivalent or is that just Madame?

Hardly given it's referring to a senior member of the Catholic clergy.

I can't remember if it includes Monseigneur but the drop down menu for The Royal Ballet at Covent Garden has an impressively long list of titles.

Well, linguistically it's madame (my lord/my lady). But they're not equivalent, both because of the clergy thing and because, in origin, the phrase is denoting your position in a society that has a hefty gendered power differential.

Ah, I didn't know it was a clergy thing! Thomas Boleyn uses it for his vanity title in Wolf Hall.

It's not originally to do with clergy. I adore him using it, though. Wolf Hall is really subtle on things like that.

It wasn't originally to do with the clergy. I've only come across it and used it in relation to Catholic clergy.

I'm reading Alison Weir's biog of Mary Boleyn at the moment. Thomas Boleyn comes across as a really unpleasant guy.

still, it just means 'my lord' in Old French.

ask - yeah, I think he was. Is the book any good?

Yup, I liked it. Gives Mary a good chit.

Jeanne yes I did know that but thank you for assuming I didn't.

In a modern context I think one is unlikely to encounter a "Monseigneur" who is not a high ranking member of the Catholic clergy ( who may or may not be French)

I should read it, then. Thanks.

My favourite titles are the ones used by people who are descendants of the Bourbon or Stuart monarchies or similar royal lines that came to a sticky end. They often run to paragraphs not just a simple drop down menu option.

The only Monseigneur I can think of is Bruce Kent, so I would say it's right these days that it's only high-ranking Catholic clergy.

I think in these days of globalisation, if we're allowing all sorts of titles, we should be including M, Mme, Herr, Frau, Sr, Sra...

Are there still Viceroys anywhere? Or did they go with the end of colonialism?