Ms.

My daughter sent me a lovely Father's Day card. We (& I assume her) get a lot of address stickers; it seems that every Charity in the world send them out & since many Charities exchange mailing lists; we get more than enough address labels.

What stuck me was that my daughter's label was Ms. then her name. My wife does not particularly like the term "Ms." & I was wondering if my daughter noticed the name. If she is like me, I look & look for labels with just my name or both our names or some other combination (since we have so many each with different variations of our names) and can only find ones with my wife's name or other incorrect combination.

For us "Baby boomers", Ms. has a very women's lib meaning. If you are liberal & a feminist then Ms is a badge of honor; but not necessarily for happily married women like my daughter & wife.

“If Miss means respectably unmarried, and Mrs. respectably married, then Ms. means nudge, nudge, wink, wink.” Angela Carter

“Modern life is confusing - no "Ms take" about it.” Geraldine A. Ferraro

Ms. (n) a title used before the surname or full name of any woman regardless of her marital status (a neutral alternative to Mrs. or Miss)
• humorous used before an invented surname to imply that someone has a particular characteristic
ORIGIN 1950s: combination of Mrs. and miss