How do members of this forum feel about DUers referring to Andrea Mitchell

[question everything]

as Mrs. Greenspan?

I found this offensive since she has been a reporter on her own right and does go by her professional name. But it appears that, at least on that GD thread I am viewed as a weird, at best.

Of course, I have never supported the notion that, once Jane Smith marries John White, she is now Mrs. John White..

[Poll_Blind]

1. I've only seen it used to alert/remind people that she's married to the fellow.

(and all that that implies, correctly or incorrectly)

Her impartiality as a reporter can be arguably called into question because of this relationship, fairly or unfairly.

PB

[endarkenment]

2. her conflict of interest is rather pertinent.

[Mojambo]

3. A lot of people, like myself, may not have known who she was married to

So in that sense it's good to be educated.

Frankly, I'd rather see her called Mrs. Greenspan than WHORE/BITCH/CUNT. Which is not uncommon to see around here when people get all worked up.

[Lerkfish]

4. I think, in this case, its important because she reports on issues directly affected by

the actions of her husband.

so, in this case, I don't view it as a misogynist action, but a highlighting of direct conflict of interest violation in journalism.

[librechik]

5. It is her name. It doesn't offend me.

more people should know about her conflict of interest. She should have to announce it at the beginning of every segment which touches on finance, the economy, and national interests that she's in. It is reprehensible--and unprofessional-- that she does not.

[lukasahero]

10. Is it her name?

I thought her name was Andrea Mitchell, not Andrea Greenspan.

[enough]

6. I see your point in general, but in this specific case, we have to acknowledge her connection with

one of the most influential people in the government/establishment over the past decade. It's as if the wife of a vice president, secretary of state, or even a president was acting as part of the gatekeeper mass media.

[question everything]

17. Than you can cast doubts about her reporting by pointing this connection

but, as stated by others, she did not change her name and calling her Mrs. Greenspan is insulting. I think that it will be insulting to any other woman who did not change her name and if she were on "our side" many would object.

[peacetalksforall]

7. I think it could be irony, sarcasm, emphasis, in addition to disrespect.

T believe the disrespect is because she aids the White House just as her husband did.

It seems you are concentrating on forms of address.

This disrespect goes beyound that.

[Beregond2]

8. I didn't realize she is Mrs. Greenspan.

I wondered what all the animosity here toward her was about. She has always seemed fair to me in her reporting.

[peace frog]

9. I have no problem with it

Her professional name is Andrea Mitchell but she is married to Alan Greenspan, making her Mrs. Greenspan. No sarcasm intended, no offense should be taken imho.

[lukasahero]

11. She did not take his name

"Ms. Mitchell, who is keeping her name," http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A01E0DE133DF935A35757C0A961958260

Her name is not Mrs. Greenspan, it is Ms. Mitchell.

[question everything]

12. Thank you, this is what I had in mind

and I disagree that she has been pushing his agenda, as many have said. It is easier to attack anyone who does not follow DU orthodoxy.

[peace frog]

13. I still have no problem with it

and we can agree to disagree without rancor.

[lukasahero]

14. Why would you have a problem with it - it's not your call to make

It's not her name and using the Mrs. Hisname is passive-aggressively disrespectful.

There are other ways to make the Greenspan information known without disrespecting a woman's right to her own name - "Andrea Mitchell, wife of Alan Greenspan" would be perfectly acceptable. The other is deliberately rude.

[question everything]

18. It must be a generation gap, or one's own pespective

I knew a woman who got married some 30 years ago and chose not to change her name and had hard time getting her marriage certificate.

And I knew professional women scientists who, once they got married, they were no longer Dr. Jane Smith but Mrs. John Black.

And, of course, some of us remember the days when an unmarried woman could not get credit or purchase a house without a man co-signing.

As I pointed above, if a woman from "our side" were referred to by her husband's name, even though she goes by her professional name, there will be angry comments here.

[iverglas]

24. you'd like my anecdote

Around 1977, I was a recent law school graduate working for the gummint. I was shopping in a Zellers downtown (a slightly more upmarket Canadian Walmart equivalent) and a young clerk I knew from buying things in her department approached me to apply for a store credit card. What the heck, I thought, she gets a commission, so sure. I applied.

Not long after, I got a reply from the credit department. Let's say my name is Angela Smith. The letter was addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Ang Smith, and informed us that we did not qualify for a credit card.

Well, I hadn't wanted a credit card. But they did give me one then, believe me.

[lukasahero]

15. :) Touched a nerve with me

My sister-in-law calls me Mrs. Hisfirstname Hislastname even though she knows I did not change my name. It's just plain rude.

I don't have a problem with the connection being made but there are better, less dismissive ways to do it. And I've given up on trying to keep up with which journalists DU hates this week - it's as bad as the Republicans claiming liberal bias everywhere.

[question everything]

19. If a woman changed her last name, I suppse she can be called

Mrs. Hislastname. But calling her Mrs. Hisfirstname Hislastname obliterates any hint of who she is.

This means that is irrelevant if her name is Jane, or Mary, or Christine. And, of course, it is irrelevant whether she is a teacher, a judge, or a stay at home mom.

I have been carrying this piece of paper with me for many years. There was a debate, apparently, in the local paper, and here is what someone wrote (I never checked the accuracy of this):

This is what Elizabeth Cady Stanton wrote to a friend in 1847:

"I have very serious objections, dear Rebecca, to being called Henry. Ask our colored brethren if there is nothing in a name. Why are the slaves nameless unless they take that of their master? They are mere chattels, with no civil or social rights. Even so with women. The custom of calling Mrs. John This and Mrs. Tom That, and colored men Sambo and Zip Coon, is founded on the principle that white men are the lords of all."

[iverglas]

25. a source

http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&url=http%3A%2F%2Fbooks.google.ca%2Fbooks%3Fid%3D8zvd92WUCmEC%26pg%3DPA245%26lpg%3DPA245%26dq%3D%2522I%2Bhave%2Bvery%2Bserious%2Bobjections%2C%2Bdear%2BRebecca%2522%26source%3Dweb%26ots%3D27WhvGANLy%26sig%3DwJHUa_EE6y6t9sIt3NUcWwxbBe0%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DX%26oi%3Dbook_result%26resnum%3D1%26ct%3Dresult&ei=ksHvSNfWC5icgQKJ55GzBg&usg=AFQjCNFPaMbU33uQLd9BeWMjeI4Akw2Ygw&sig2=hrhpNvMvmmEG0uXCjtqsuQ

The Feminist Papers: From Adams to de Beauvoir
by Alice S. Rossi - 1988

I can't get the danged thing to load, but it apparently contains your quotation, "I have very serious objections, dear Rebecca, to being called Henry. ..."

The thing is that when a woman is called "Mrs. John Smith", she isn't being "called" anything. She is being designated as the wife of a John Smith. That is the purpose served by the honorific "Mrs." in modern English.

Her name is Jane Smith. Her designation is Mrs. John Smith.

A woman's adoption of her husband's surname is analogous to a slave's adoption of his/her master's surname.

But the designation of a woman as Mrs. HisGivenName HisSurname is more equivalent to the Borg system. Seven of Nine; wife of John Smith.

[question everything]

26. Thank you so much!

I have tried to find the source before, searching for the writing of Stanton..

I used to love the "cozy" style mysteries like the ones by Agatha Cristie where often the events took place at a country house with several members of the family lived.

Thus, if there were three Hutchinson-Boze brothers, their wives would be designated by the staff as Mrs. Tom, Mrs. Earle and Mrs. James. I often wondered whether this is how we got into this "system," since, as you noted, such a designation does not exist in other cultures and languages.

[iverglas]

28. all my Agatha Christies

now live in Havana. ;) Along with my Margery Allinghams and Ngaio Marshes ...

When I lived in Toronto, every Sunday morning -- back when things were closed on Sunday morning -- I'd take a long, pleasant downhill walk to the train station, buy a paperback mystery at the newsstand there, and take the streetcar home and read it. I had a Canadian friend who trained in Havana as a doctor and was the head of a teaching polyclinic there before returning to Canada after many years, and that was where I read my first Agatha Christie. I would store them up and take her a suitcase full when I visited. That was also back when Cubans didn't need foreign medicines and vitamins and such. I wonder who's reading them now?

She was having marital problems when I was last there, and that was what ultimately prompted her return to Canada with her two kids. This was not long after the adoption of the Cuban family code, which was the result of lengthy discussion and debate from the grassroots, at the block committee level, on up -- browbeating the men, essentially one by one, into accepting that machismo and revolution did not go together. She and her Cuban husband had recently had a major dispute, and he had threatened to take his sons and leave -- as he would have been completely entitled to do a couple of years earlier. You do, she said, and you see how far you get. He got all huffy about how she'd been talking to lawyers.

Anyhow, actually, the convention is the same in French -- Mme Charles de Gaulle, e.g. -- it's just that Quebec abolished the taking the husband's surname thing, so there's no such title as "Mrs.", or "Mme" in its old sense (except for people married before the legislation), in Quebec now. Ain't that grand?

I actually wish we'd just gone back to "Mistress" as our single honorific, rather than the unfortunate "Ms." Reclaim one of those words ...


Just googing for when the rule was instituted in Quebec ... ah, heh heh, some poor woman can't change her name to her husband's ...

http://www.canada.com/topics/news/national/story.html?id=72ddc06b-4660-4b92-8b92-3a26ae24b377&k=5969

Caroline Parent assumed she would take her husband's surname after their wedding. But the Ontario-born newlywed, who lives in Quebec, was shocked to learn that a 1981 provincial law forbids it.

... "It's unbelievable and totally unfair. Why can't I take my husband's name if I want to, like anywhere else in the country?" asked Parent in a phone interview Wednesday.

But in Quebec, since a 1981 reform of the civil law, women are not permitted to adopt their husband's name at marriage, not even if they apply for an official name change.

Procedures for formal name change are very strict in Quebec and the decision is up the director of civil status. It requires a serious reason, such as difficulty of use due to spelling or pronunciation, or bearing a name that is mocked or that has been made infamous.

... "All I am asking for is that women have the choice to take the name they want," she said.

Awww. No freedom to be chattel. Well what about the menz, that's what I want to know. When will we be hearing from all the male spouses who just want to be able to choose to change their names to their wives'?? About the same time we hear large numbers of them whining about not getting any respect because they choose to turn the biologial and social function of parenthood into a "career", I imagine ...

[Nobody]

31. That wasn't always the case

Shakespeare's play, "Merry Wives of Windsor" referred to all women as "Mistress So and So". If she married, her last name would change, but her first name wouldn't. Mistress would go in front of her name, first and last, married or not. Mistress was abbreviated Mrs, again without regard to marital status. This appears in the script, so I assume that this was standard usage back in Elizabethan times. Somewhere along the way, the pronunciation became "missis" and "miss" popped up, but I don't know when.

[Nobody]

30. That reminds me of Roots

Kunta Kinte refused to be called "Toby". He was beaten nearly to death rather than be called by a name not his own. Eventually he had a daughter who learned to read and write and when he died, his daughter crossed out "Toby" on his tombstone and wrote "Kunta Kinte" in its place.

I saw the miniseries when I was 8, and these scenes stayed with me, along with many other things. Names are very powerful.

At that age, I knew I would never ever take anyone else's name. Ever. As it happens, I know a family in which the husband and wife both kept their own names, had twins, a boy and a girl. The boy has the father's last name and the girl has the mother's last name. That's the most logical way to do it.

[question everything]

32. I remember these scenes. They were powerful (nt)

[Scout]

16. since she did not change her name upon marriage, it is disrespectful

and unprofessional, and uncalled for.

I DID change my name the second time i married, and i am still NOT Mrs. Hisfirstname Hislastname. I AM Ms. Myfirstname Mylastname Ourlastname. The first time i married, i did not change my name and i was Ms. Myfirstname Mylastname. When i was single, I was Ms. Myfirstname Mylastname.

i will never be "mrs" anyone, whether i am married or not.

[iverglas]

20. fascinating responses

Surely there are men around who need to be identifed as the husbands of well-known women. I wonder how we'd do that. Shame that patriarchy hasn't provided us with a way of doing that, as it has with women.

"John, appendage of Jane Smith". We need a way of saying that.

Just for the info of the younger ones among us --

A woman is correctly addressed as Mrs. Jane Smith *only* if:

(a) she is Jane who married John Smith and adopted his surname and is now widowed, and chooses to use her own given name;
(b) she is Jane who married John Smith and is now divorced, and chooses to retain his surname.

A married woman, neither widowed nor divorced, is/was *never* corretly referred to as "Mrs. Jane Smith". "Mrs. John Smith" was the only correct form of address for social purposes; "Ms. Jane Smith" would be correct for business purposes.

"Mrs." is an honorific that identifies the wife of a particular man. It is used with his name, except, as mentioned, in the case of the husband's death (where convention allows the woman the choice of being known by her own married name or her husband's name) or divorce (where the woman is no longer the wife of the man and therefore is not entitled to use his name, only her own married name).

Andrea Mitchell's surname is not Greenspan. She is therefore not Mrs. Alan Greenspan.

The statement in one post here -- "Her professional name is Andrea Mitchell but she is married to Alan Greenspan, making her Mrs. Greenspan" -- would be correct IF she used the name Greenspan socially and the name Mitchell professionally. Apparently she does not.

Personally, I think that women who use their own names professionally and their husband's name socially can like or lump whatever they get called for whatever purpose. If they adopt their husband's name, their own former name is then just a pseudonym. We don't really get to have two names.

In this case it does not appear that Ms. Mitchell uses the surname Greenspan socially or otherwise.

Referring to her as Mrs. Alan Greenspan is therefore disrespectful, and plainly intentionally so.

It is disrespectful to women, not just to her. Just as all the other sexist and misogynist epithets and descriptions applied to individual women are.

But hey, it's always fun to read the defences of sexism/misogyny that appear hereabouts with such depressing regularity.

[question everything]

22. Thanks for the lesson

The bottom line is that it is insulting to refer to a woman by her husband's last name if she did not change it. And "justifying" it for whatever reasons is shameful, too.

Next time, when a woman whom we like is referred to by her husband's last name, protesting this by the ones who do not mind Andrea Mitchell will be the height of hypocrisy.

[iverglas]

23. yeah, I just use lots of words ;)

That is indeed the bottom line.

And it is insulting to *all* women to do that to *any* woman, just as it is insulting to all women to call any woman a bitch, etc.

A sidenote some might find intersting.

In Quebec, women may call themselves anything they like, socially. Just as all of us here may call ourselves Bozo the Clown, or Joan of Arc, for any purpose we like, as long as it's not fraudulent.

But women in Quebec may not change their names for official purposes on marriage. When Jeanne Tremblay marries John Smith, she continues to be Jeanne Tremblay 'til death do part her from her name.

The secondary effect is that "Mme" (Madame), basically the equivalent of "Mrs.", is now the honorific used for all adult women, and carries no marital-status connotation. No good equivalent of "Ms." ever did get invented/adopted in French ("Madelle" just never caught on, largely because it's just a non-word), so this solves that problem.

Unfortunately, francophones in Canada now work it backwards into English, so I am constantly being addressed by public servants, in my work, as "Mrs.", and it drives me up the fucking wall.

Anyhow, this means that the wife of Stéphane Dion, the current leader of the Liberal Party, is and always will be Janine Krieber, since they are residents of Quebec. And I had to go google that, because despite the fact that we have a federal election on Tuesday, I didn't have a clue what the possible next Prime Minister of Canada's wife's name is.

I know Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper's wife is Leueen or something like that -- okay, googlegoogle ... Laureen Harper -- and the wife of Jack Layton, the leader of the New Democratic Party, my own party, is Olivia Chow, also a member of Parliament. The leader of the Green Party is Elizabeth May, a single mother who may or may not have been married, I dunno, but that was her name when I went to school with her many ago so I assume it's her own. Back in 1976, Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Joe Clark's wife was (and she still is) Maureen McTeer. That one I know because I went to school with her too, and also because she was one of those political wives with careers of their own. And no one ever referred to her as Mrs. Clark.

Imagine not knowing the names of the spouses of your current head of government and possible next head of government (and I'm not atypical in that regard). How unmonarchical of us. ;)

[question everything]

27. Fascinating. What would be the last name of the children

born in these marriages? Do they take the name of the father? Would make it easier to inherit, I suppose. After all wasn't the purpose of marriage to ensure the propagation of wealth to heirs where the fathers were certain were his?

As for not knowing the name of the spouses... perhaps this is better. Look at the grief that Hillary took in 1992 and even Michelle Obama earlier this year.

[iverglas]

29. yeah, that was it ;)

As for not knowing the name of the spouses... perhaps this is better.

It is absolutely flabbergasting to us to watch the circus surrounding candidates' (and presidents') spouses. I mean, we had Margaret Trudeau, sure, but that was the 70s. And Imelda Mila Mulroney had a lot of shoes. I don't know who the wife of Paul Martin (the last brief Liberal PM) was. Couldn't name her if I tried. Aline Chrétien, wife of long-serving PM Jean, before Paul Martin, she did have her moment in the limelight.

http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=M1ARTM0010514

Some of the facts surrounding the break-in {at 24 Sussex, the PM's official residence in Ottawa} became clear last week. Aline Chrétien woke up about 2:45 a.m. on Sunday morning after hearing a noise in the three-storey stone mansion that stands next to a cliff above the Ottawa River. She got up to investigate, and in the hallway outside the Chrétiens' bedroom came face-to-face with a man carrying a jackknife and putting a glove on one hand. He had entered the house by breaking a side-door window. She retreated to the bedroom, locked the door and woke her husband. He did not believe what she told him. "You're dreaming," he replied, as he later related to journalists what had happened. As Madame Chrétien locked a second door to the room, the Prime Minister, to defend himself, grabbed a 15-inch Inuit stone carving of a loon. If the man had broken into the room, "he would have had one big headache," Chrétien said. The Prime Minister has often praised his wife for her political acumen; last week it was time to thank her for saving his life. "I am lucky she was there," he told reporters. "And I am grateful."

(Okay, there's one of my personal Canadian-English bugaboos. "Madame" means "Mrs.", nothing more or less. It is not some fancy title for important people. She's Mrs. Chrétien in English, not "Madame".)

Jean apparently took his wife's counsel, but the rest of us never saw or heard from her (unless they were off on some official junket, where spouses seem to be expected). As it should be. We don't elect spouses (by which, of course, we really mean wives). They're spouses, not members of the legislative or executive branches of government. And I, and many of us, are really truly gobsmacked at the essentially royal status bestowed on spouses in the US. Michelle Obama takes grief because her husband and his campaign put her in issue; their choice, and they get the consequences. If I were one of you, I'd be wondering why I am supposed to give a crap about her or any other political spouse, and why any spouse was playing any role connected with government at all. If a spouse wants to be in government, the spouse should run for something, sez I.

Oh, by the way, though. Three of our last four Governors General (figurehead representative of figurehead head of state, the Queen) have been women -- the last two, Adrienne Clarkson and Michaëlle Jean, being Hong Kong-born and Haiti-born, respectively. Their spouses (whose surnames are different) both have careers of their own (pompous egghead and filmmaker, respectively), and show(ed) up for photographs.

[Warpy]

21. I cringe

but I also know it's a not so gentle reminder of where her bias likely lies.

[Captain Hilts]

33. Doesn't bother me because a LOT of folks don't know to whom she is married, and I think...

it's relevant.

I've always wanted at the base of his columns in the WashPost that Howard Kurtz is married to a Republican party offical who helped the Bush transition team. Same thing.

[Nobody]

34. Mentioning relevant relationships is OK

But referring to someone by a name that is not theirs is not OK.

If they did mention that Howard Kurtz is married to Republican party official Sherri Annis, would they refer to him as Mr. Sherri Annis? Or would they say "Howard Kurtz, husband of Republican party official Sherri Annis"?

Sauce for the gander is sauce for the goose.

[iverglas]

35. you seem

to have avoided the point rather studiously.