A Rose by any other Name

I would like to talk about patrilineal naming practices.
First, I would like to state that what is common in the US and GB for naming practices is not common everywhere.

First I would like to define those:
A woman taking her husband's name upon marriage is not only not the standard in other countries, in many places, like Quebec, France, Belgium, Greece, and Italy, it is something a person cannot legally do. In Japan, both spouses must assume one of their surnames, and while it doesn't have to be the man's, it usually is. In Malaysia, Korea, and the Netherlands it is normal custom for a person to not change their name upon getting married. In many Hispanic cultures it is normal for a woman to hyphenate her name with her spouse's, and even to give their children both surnames. In many Islamic cultures women keep their birth names when they get married. About 30% of US women now keep their birth names when they get married.

Patrilineal surnames are much more commonly given to children than matrilineal ones, or other forms of surnames. Even names that were originally not patrilineal, like patronymic and occupational surnames, have evolved to become patrilineal, like Potter, Smith, and MacEwan.

OK, so there is the background. Now, here is the commentary on this:

I had a male boss recently who's name was written with III after it. I saw someone on facebook today whose name was styled the same way. My uncle had Jr. after his name. My father, his father, etc. going back in a direct like 5 generations had the same first and last names, with a different middle name.

Showing your genealogy with your name is something that in this culture, only men can really do. For women it is almost considered inconsequential because of the assumption that someday they will marry a man and take his name. It is assumed that any children she has will bear their father's surname.

I am a fifth generation Texan, and I have ancestors through my mother's side who were at the Jamestown colony. These are things to be proud of. However our culture puts little to no value on who our mother's family is, as shown by our naming practices.

I have never seen a woman style her name Sr, Jr, or with a Roman numeral after it showing her to be descended from a family of notable women. Why? Well, do we accept with this that women of our ancestry and history are not notable? That is just ridiculous, and really, it ought to change. Because the history of women is just as important as the history of men.  Genetically we get 50% of our DNA from each parent, but we get all of our mitochondrial DNA from our mothers. So clearly our maternal line is at least as important as our paternal line, or more so, especially since it is very hard to lie about who someone's mother is.

OK, so now I want to talk about why women change their names when they get married. Why? Did who you are suddenly change just because you joined in a legally-confirmed long-term relationship?
The hassle of changing names almost always falls on the woman. She has to change all her ID's, her bank account information, and any degrees earned prior to marriage are no longer in her legal name. Why would someone do that to themselves? Oh, because "that is the way it is done"? Why? If men had to go through this, the process probably would have halted in the 1960's, or earlier. Is it because our career is deemed less important and therefore our professional reputation does not need to be maintained? If "family cohesiveness" were so important to the man, why does he not consider changing his own name, either to that of his spouse, or maybe they could both change their name to something new? "Well that is just silly!"
Why? Why is it any sillier than a woman giving up her identity, her professional renown, and all her monogrammed towels?

And have you ever noticed that in some cases men are treated with less respect if their wives choose not to change their names? This happened to Bill Clinton when he was running for office in Arkansas. Hillary Rodham, quite proud of her family, and wanting to preserve her professional name and independence, chose not to change her name when they got married. Bill some flack from got Arkansas voters for this and Hillary Rodham finally changed her surname to Clinton, in order to assist him in his campaign.

Well, I guess what I am saying is that it would have been cool if I had been named Catherine Potts III.
Perhaps some day, our society will progress to the point that a woman's identity is not based on some man in her life.

-ive ≠ -ed

If Americans were more adept at that language which they want to incorrectly attribute as being "the official language" of the United States, there wou'd be a lot less miscommunication on and off line.

In dating: Attractive does not equal Attracted. I can notice that someone/something is attractive without being attractive to them/it. Secretariat, Iman, and fritillaria meleagris are all living things I have been easily able to point to and call attractive, but never once have actually felt "attracted to" any of them. Further, people can actually be attracted to individuals that they might not actually consider attractive looking.

In social discourse: Offensive does not equal Offended. I can notice that something/someone says is offensive without actually feeling personally offended. Further, it is a common "subtle" slight on facebook to tell someone you are "sorry to have offended them" when they have not stated that they are offended. It implies you think they took offense in error and are being "over-sensitive"/
It is a backhanded response.

So please, if English is your native language, or if you consider yourself "highly fluent" in it, learn these things. It is not hard, and to refuse to do so shows willful ignorance.

When violences is so inherent in our society that it becomes a thing of cutesy slogans.

I am not a very religious person, but I was raised Christian and I have read the bible mostly straight through. And this pisses me off:
From a wheel cover on a jeep, "God will Judge Our Enemies.
We will arrange the meeting."

Now, some people might find this "funny" or a proud slogan. If you really think about it, what all this says, it is so much of what is wrong with the Christian right in the U.S.
You see, it assumes that their enemies are going against god, possibly just for being their enemies. It assumes that they know for a fact that they are on the right side of god and their enemies are not.
"We will arrange the meeting" is a cute euphemism for murdering your enemies. So this statement completely ignores the fact that from one of the earliest stories in Genesis, god has been telling us not to kill or murder, and that he does actually punish people for that. So the assumption that the speaker of this statement will not be judged for killing his enemies is very much against everything it says in the bible. And while it starts out saying "God will judge" it is in fact, a ridiculously judgemental statement, by making assumption that his enemies will be judged and found in the wrong, as evidenced by the fact that the speaker seems to be under the assumption that they are within their rights to kill their enemies. So, punishment before judgemental is their S.O.P.? I have yet to see that in the bible.
I am so tired of these hyper-masculine, violent, and hateful statements like this being considered acceptable in our culture.

First and foremost

Random eclecticity is the name of the game. I don't intend to stick to one topic. If that makes my blog less desirable to follow, ah well. I remain me.
Subjects you might find on my blog:
movie reviews
beauty and food product reviews
political opinions
social opinions
recipes
dieting updates
Pet information
Metaphors for real life
Art and fashion
dying(various medium)
poetry
anything else I happen to feel like writing about.

The mouse sighed sweetly as he looked at the sky. Ah well, the rain is gone, so much for that. He knew that it was not enough rain for the seeds to germinate and start growing. The other mice did not care and would probably eat the seeds. But this mouse always saved some to grow more for the weeks ahead. Some of the plants were nice to nibble on while growing, and soon, they would bud and then grow fruit and seeds. If only he could convince the other mice to listen, there would be plenty of food for all, if they just held back now.
He closed his umbrella and hoped for more rain.