Perhaps the most nonsensical appeals to reason are those that argue that the current year makes a particular activity no longer appropriate.
Catherine Deveny makes this appeal in regards to women changing their surname when they get married. “Wake up! We are in 2007. Women are no longer owned by their father and then their husband. So why are some women still changing their surnames? And why do some men still want them to? It’s sad, it’s misogynous, it’s archaic, it’s insecure and it’s unnecessary.”
She doesn’t beat around, and her strong use of language makes me wonder if she would have any fuel left in the tank in the event that she had a genuine issue to raise, such as the genocide in Sudan. Her inappropriate use of language aside, it is her method of arguing that I find frustrating.
Deveny claims that because it’s 2007, women changing their surnames is so obviously unnecessary. Have we become so enlightened in 2007 that we’ve suddenly realised things that we never realised before? Has 2007 created a new logic for our decision-making?
She assumes that as time goes on, humans become more advanced, more capable of acting in a more appropriate manner. The twentieth century, with more bloodshed than any before, is a great refutation of that argument.
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So how do we assign last names to women then if they do not take their family name?
Did she think through her argument at all?? Are we supposed to just choose a new family name for the kid once they are born? This idea is ill conceived by her at best.
I have a friend who has 5 names (1 first name, two middle names and a hyphenated surname for the bean counters)
He is a little worried about what happens on his wedding day because if his wife takes his hyphenated name then she assumes two names but if she doesn’t then there’s the potential for his children to have three hyphenated surnames!
His children would sound something like “Hi I’m Matthew Robert Smith-Mohammed-Farnzworthenstein”… I’m so glad my wife took on my last name (even though I’m not thrilled with my last name) because it made filling in the census papers last year a whole lot faster!
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