![[Question] Ms. Pac-Man](http://el-oso.net/blog/wp-content/plugins/ttftitles/cache/f14394607b780f707056e28b65c44119.png){kind=small}
Posted 2 years, 10 months ago mid-morning by oso
Life is a highway, I wanna ride it … all night long. If you’re going my way, I wanna drive it … all night long.
Crazy ass song to have stuck in my head on a peaceful fog-surrounded Saturday morning right? But there you have it. I’m not the one who puts these things in my head … I’m just the receiver.
Anyway, let’s get straight to the point. Ms. Pac-Man? It makes no sense. Why not just Pac-Woman?
Entire encyclopedias could never get close to faithfully representing the complex ups and downs, ins and outs, of a singular love affair. And in Ms. Pac-Man we’re only given three brief glimpses.
First, love at first bite:
Next – and I’m sorry, but I have to chuckle a bit here – Ms. Pac-Man feverishly chasing after her mate:
And, finally, Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man scooping up who we presume is Pac Junior from the mythic stork:
So why Ms.? Is it a conflict of chronology? No single way to convey the various stages of Pac-Womanhood as she moves from Miss to Fiancé to Mrs.?
I’ve always had a distaste for the word Ms. Not only because I tend to dislike most words that end in Zzzzz, but also because it brings back an uncomfortable memory from 2nd grade, two decades ago, St. Timothy’s catholic school. I don’t remember her surname, but our second grade teacher was incredibly insistent that we not call her Miss nor Mrs., but rather Ms.
No one else in the class seemed to have a problem with this new policy, but then at this stage in my life, I had grown comfortable with being the only one to express disquiet in the atmosphere of general acceptance. I raised my hand. “Excuse me, what is the difference between Mzzzzzzz and Miss and Mrs.?”
I mean, isn’t this why we were school in the first place? To understand how all these things work? Mzzzzz Whatever-her-name-was didn’t seem pleased with my question. Miss means that someone is not married. Mrs. means they are. And Ms doesn’t mean either, she clarified with annoyance.
Two minutes later, after letting the gears crank in my 7-year-old brain for a while, my hand was back up in the air. “But, if Mzzzzz doesn’t mean anything, why not just use Miss or Mrs?”
She asked to speak with me after class. I don’t really remember our meeting. I only remember that I disliked her from day one.
A few nights ago, Rebecca, Oiwan, and I were talking about the trends over the past few decades in which women either do or do not adopt their husband’s last names. Rebecca said that in the 80’s (when Ms. Pac-Man was created) she thought women were less likely to adopt their husband’s last names, but that these days the convention is back in style. A reaction to hyper-feminism? A longing for yesteryear? (Somewhere, if my memory serves me well, RubySoho penned an excellent post about marriage and last names. If you can find it, you’re a far better searcher than I.)
To conclude, I think this chimp could beat Lena at Ms. Pacman.
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There is of course a whole Wikipedia page dedicated to the appellation: Ms.. It’s kind of a strange concept to a kid, why would a person want a less meaningful title applied by society?
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We’ll see about that. I have a cup full of quarters waiting for thar elusive day. And I’ll never be Mrs. Gunn, that’s my mother in law.
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As long as I don’t get called M’am, I’m fine.
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Tsk, imagine what changing my surname would do to my Google ranking. Surely that custom will be outdated soon.
Since it’s no one’s business whether I’m married or not, I prefer Ms. But you can call me Solana
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Joe, Solana,
OK, so now I understand the history and utility of Ms., but the logic still escapes me. I can understand why unmarried women wouldn’t want anyone to make any assumptions. But isn’t the whole point of marriage to make some sort of public declaration? (To tell you the truth, I’ve never understood the point of marriage at all, but this is what I am told.) So it seems like only a miss would use the mz no? The best solution of course is to get rid of all titles.
Itzpapalotl,
What about Gunnerette?
Cindylu,
You’ll always be Cindylu in my book.
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The point of marriage is to solidify a partnership bond in a way that grants spiritual (church marriage) and legal (state sponsored) benefits. It’s in the interest of churches and society to have pair-bonded couples, and that’s why those institutions sponsor marriage.
Now, why would a woman not want to announce her status in the workplace? Well, in some quarters there’s hiring and/or wage discrimination against married women because of a theory that women who are married already have a means of survival, through a husband, the converse was and probably still is true, that a married man /deserves/ a higher wage because he has a family to support. “Ms.” as a political construct is thus a way to eliminate the bias against using marriage as a determing factor to judge women in matters where entities might make decisions about rights and benefits based on marriage. And in a larger vein, consider that women might not want to be thought of solely in terms of their choice of partner in life, but rather on their own character and abilities.
I’m perhaps the strangest possible defender of feminism, I’ve become rather lassaiz-faire about my progressive tendencies, but I do think people have a right to try and control the contexts on which they are judged. I think I’ve internalized my feminist tendencies to a degree that it takes concentration to see them as feminist.
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Origins of the title of Ms. Magazine actually says it better than me – more coherent, and with more brevity.
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OK, in truth, I don’t really have anything against ‘Ms.’ My true hostilities are reserved for my second grade teacher and for all titles, sir.
Speaking of labels. I, too, consider myself an internalized feminist. And an internalized masculinist while I’m at it.
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Move to Spain and the point is moot. Had no choice, had to keep my last name (was planning on it anyway).
Also, here everyone is Sra. way too early!
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You’re not alone in your profound reflections:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dA1PY8YVk7I
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That video is pretty funny, but I found the guy’s voice incredibly annoying for some reason. I think the ‘ipso facto’ had something to do with it.