Ms, Mrs or Miss?

janninew

Mojisola wrote: »

Filling in a form where everyone has to give their marital status is not an issue.

For me, being asked whether you are single or married so that someone can use Miss or Mrs when they write to you or send a delivery is an issue - it's not relevant.

Its not relevant, but it is polite to ask somebodies title when you are writing to them so the letter or invoice can be worded correctly. If its not relevant and you don't want the delivery man to know if you are married, single etc then Ms is available to use.

I'm all for women using whatever title they want, I don't agree that all women should have to use Ms.

From the tone of some and some of the comments, I get the feeling that some posters think being a single women or a divorced women is some how a bad thing or seen as being a bad thing. I can honestly say I've never given somebodies title a second thought and working in a secondary school and having lots of contact with parents, I use people's titles daily.

lostinrates

melanzana wrote: »

Asking marital status is a no no for me.

Unless I am filling in the Probate Form, where if my oh died without a will I would get something from being his spouse!

Other than that, I think it's an intrusion on my privacy TBH.

Sorry, just can't think at the moment of instances where marital status would be asked outside of say a passport application (but not sure about that being necessary though) or as said above, inheritance by right of spouse.

I'd love someone to show me other instances where marital status is so important (or critical) in relation to questions on documents etc.


Maybe benefits etc, but not sure... thanks.....

I include civil partnerships as maried fwiw

Tax, e.g. Free transfer between pouses
Health insuance ( sometimes also accorded to live in partners )
Nok decisions
Property ownerships, finacial affairs and insurances relating to them.
In fact, i think stats on married v others are calculated for other insuances too?


If marital status is personal, why even delare sex on forms?

Mojisola

janninew wrote: »

Its not relevant, but it is polite to ask somebodies title when you are writing to them so the letter or invoice can be worded correctly.

You see, I just don't understand this. If my OH phones up a company to order something, they ask his name and address and automatically title him as Mr because they can hear that he is a man.

If I phone up, I get asked Miss, Mrs or Ms. Why? I'm a woman - use the all-encompassing title that means adult woman - Ms.

Miss and Mrs have lost their original meanings because some married women use Miss and some living-together-but-not-married and some divorced women use Mrs. Miss and Mrs don't give anyone any accurate information about the person they are dealing with but people will make assumptions about you depending on which title you choose. All the plethora of titles does is lead to confusion.

Keep it simple - Mr for men, Ms for women.

lostinrates

Mojisola wrote: »

You see, I just don't understand this. If my OH phones up a company to order something, they ask his name and address and automatically title him as Mr because they can hear that he is a man.

If I phone up, I get asked Miss, Mrs or Ms. Why? I'm a woman - use the all-encompassing title that means adult woman - Ms.
.

I would deal with that proactively...

Phone: can i take you name and number so w can contact you?
Mojisola: yes of course, thats ms mojisola x, etc etc.

I do something like that anyway sometimes, shaves two seconds off a phone call....

Person_one

janninew wrote: »

From the tone of some and some of the comments, I get the feeling that some posters think being a single women or a divorced women is some how a bad thing or seen as being a bad thing.

This is one of the false stereotypes about women who use Ms that we were talking about earlier. It gets irritating!

I'm not ashamed of being single, I'm not proud of being single either, because its neither an achievement nor a failure. Its just the way I'm living my life at the moment.

Why I have to declare it to enter an iPad competition is what I don't understand and don't agree with!

faux_2

janninew wrote: »

Its not relevant, but it is polite to ask somebodies title when you are writing to them so the letter or invoice can be worded correctly. If its not relevant and you don't want the delivery man to know if you are married, single etc then Ms is available to use.

I'm all for women using whatever title they want, I don't agree that all women should have to use Ms.

From the tone of some and some of the comments, I get the feeling that some posters think being a single women or a divorced women is some how a bad thing or seen as being a bad thing. I can honestly say I've never given somebodies title a second thought and working in a secondary school and having lots of contact with parents, I use people's titles daily.

Should maybe then men should get a new title that declares them married, instead of the one title of Mr? You know to make it a little fairer, so they have the option to disclose their marrital status?

bugslet

Mojisola wrote: »

You see, I just don't understand this. If my OH phones up a company to order something, they ask his name and address and automatically title him as Mr because they can hear that he is a man.

If I phone up, I get asked Miss, Mrs or Ms. Why? I'm a woman - use the all-encompassing title that means adult woman - Ms.

Keep it simple - Mr for men, Ms for women.

I think that would be a lot easier myself, but some people don't like Ms, because they want to be a Miss or a Mrs. I have to address letters to clients occasionally and if they don't indicate their preferred form of address, then they get Ms. Next thing you get someone ringing to say 'It's miss/mrs actually...'

I'm living with and have been for 26 years. People can call me what they want;)

Mojisola

bugslet wrote: »

I think that would be a lot easier myself, but some people don't like Ms, because they want to be a Miss or a Mrs. I have to address letters to clients occasionally and if they don't indicate their preferred form of address, then they get Ms. Next thing you get someone ringing to say 'It's miss/mrs actually...'

I know they do but I don't understand why some women want to tell the world whether they are single or married in situations where it isn't necessary or relevant.

I'm a grown-up woman and a person in my own right. Why would I want the person I'm buying something from to know that I'm married or single?

Amanita_2

BlondeHeadOn wrote: »

:eek:

My 1980's feminist soul is weeping at this point, and in fact over this whole thread.....

'Ms' as a title was originally designed to replace BOTH 'Miss' and 'Mrs' as a single and only title for women, to bring it into line with males - i.e. 'Mr' and 'Ms' would be the only two titles used.

The whole idea was to have a title that did not differentiate between a married and unmarried woman, on the basis it should be immaterial to their status.

I find it so sad that what was originally conceived as a good idea to make women more equal – not insist on identifying their marital status in their title – has in fact ended up just being used to add yet more levels of marital status.

Absolutely. My marital status is my own affair.
I see no need to broadcast it to the world so I use Ms or preferably no title at all.

Although it isn't often I agree with the French (!) if they can drop the Mademoiselle designation and use Madame for all women why can't we follow suit?