To be referred to as “Miss” or “Mrs.” is to be identified by one’s marital status before being identified as an individual. “Ms.” on the other hand, is a customary title of courtesy used before the name or names of a woman without making a distinction between married and unmarried status. It is also the only equivalent to the title used for all men, “Mr.”
I am and was and will always be an individual regardless of my marital status. I love my husband dearly and have been happily married for nearly twenty years. But I am not a wife before I am a woman, an individual. I was not born and created around my marital status. It’s terribly distressing to me that so few people seem to understand the weight and significance of using “Ms.”
I am incredibly offended when someone addresses me as “Mrs.” To me, it is a label outside of equality that should be shunned, not supported. I feel that feminism is dying and in order to have equality—the very definition of feminism—all women must save, preserve, educate and use “Ms.” as a title instead of “Miss” or “Mrs.”
When a woman gets married, there is no law or standard that states she must be addressed as “Mrs.” or take her husband’s last name. Being addressed as “Mrs.” is a choice, not a rule. It is an antiquated convention, especially if one cares about equality, for only “Ms.” is equal to “Mr.” If men are not addressed differently based on their marital status, why should women be?
Some people believe that if a woman chooses to be addressed as “Miss” or “Mrs.” over “Ms.” That it’s a minor detail that should be left for personal preferences and not made into a political issue, that it’s simply a preservation of tradition. It may be a tradition, but it’s also an example of inequality. It may be a minor detail, but minor details can change the very meaning of a thing. For example, the following two sentences have the exact same wording but depending on where I put the comas, (the small, seemingly insignificant details like a woman’s last name or doing away with the titles of “Miss” and “Mrs.” altogether) the meaning of the sentence changes completely:
“A woman without her man is lost.” (Meaning that women need men.)
Or:
“A woman, without her, man is lost.” (Meaning men need women.)
Small details make big changes. Perhaps if all married women kept their own name and used “Ms.” instead of “Miss” or “Mrs.” society would see them more as equals, and they would receive equal pay, and who knows … maybe, just maybe, someday a woman could be president.
