Example, Mr. and Mrs. John Smith
I hate this for the obvious reasons but it’s especially annoying to me because my wife didn’t take my surname!
They do that so that legally your wife can open the advertisement. They don’t and you wanted to be a loser, you could report her for tampering with your mail. I’m not sure what the postal investigator would do. “Knock it off and call a divorce lawyer” might feature somewhere in the possibilities.
In any case they’re just pulling names off a list some where. They assume you’re married and in a typical cis relationship.
Same reason they add “or current residents” as well.
They want it read, they don’t care if it’s you or your wife or the luchador that’s randomly moved in with you.
It is the most correct way. Even if she didn’t take your name, and even if your not married, she is your Mrs. Not sure why this would be infuriating, it’s the language.
Edit: honesty, the replies below are sexist and masogonistic. Yes, the women that you married is your Mrs, it’s the definition of the word. And likewise the man that you married is your Mr, for the same reason. It does not matter whether either party changes their name, it applies either way.
To suggest that marriage is ownership rather than partnership is disgusting, you should be ashamed of yourselves. Did slaves get referred to as Mrs. (slave owner)? No, they did not. Your suggestion is entirely inappropriate, and takes away from the reality that slaves had to live with. Disgusting misappropriation!
Grow up people, you can’t change the language to reflect your personal biases, insecurities and misunderstandings.
That’s a little sexist, don’t you think?
Absolutely not, it applies in either direction, universally. I am Mr (wife) (wife’s maiden name), this is how the language works. Why is this offensive to YOU?
That’s not how language works, that’s how culture works. Mrs and mr are referred to you, not relatively to your spouse. I am Mr John Smith, even if I’m married to Mrs Amy White. Amy is not Mrs Smith and John is not Mrs White. They are Mr Smith and Mrs White. In the usa for some reason it’s custom that the woman changes surname to that of his husband, in many other places it was like that in the past but ia not anymore
Per Debretts, it has been this way since at least the 1700s, not an “American” thing as you suggest. I’m starting to think this is just another social issue used to divide America, ie propaganda used to control people. And if it is purely preference in etiquette, what are you complaining about? The person sending the letter are allowed to exercise their etiquette preferences as well, right? Or do you also want to control people? Is this all just the fascists on the right vs the facisists on the left? This is how people like Trump rise to populisim, and how freedom and democracy die.
