Outrage time! Turns out that men don't really want to take their wives' last names when they marry.
And that means there must be something wrong with men.
Thought Catalogue's Melanie Berliet surveyed 15 apparently random young males, ages 22 to 31, and asked the question: Would they, or if married, did they, switch to their bride's surname when they tied the knot?
The answer of 13 of the 15 was: No way!
No. 14, 23-year-old "Titus," said he'd "take his wife's name in an instant," but only if his wife didn't pressure him to have a vasectomy as a form of "male birth control." I think that could be interpreted as only a qualified "yes."
No. 15, 22-year-old "Stephen," said: "I’m totally open to it. As long as my DNA is in my child’s blood, I don’t care what our last name is." Okay, Stephen!
The other 13 responses included:
“I run the house—handle the cleaning, make the money, plan the vacations, arrange most meals, etc. My wife is a chill ass woman, so a lot of that is just informed by our different personality types. But since I’m the one doing all the work, I think I’ve earned the right to have her take my name.” –Oscar, 31.
“There’s something so emasculating about the notion of a man washing away his name altogether. The thought makes me uncomfortable, and kind of angry.”–Edgar, 25.
"…It’s half a biological impulse, and half a contextual thing. Biologically, the word ‘domain’ keeps popping into my head. That sounds misogynistic, I know. But at my core, when all is said and done, I believe that the family is my domain. For instance, in any hypothetical state of emergency, I’m going be the one to sacrifice my life to save my wife and children. I should be the one whose name lives on.”–Raul, 29.
Those responses enraged the already-excitable ladies of Jezebel. Rachel Veronica Cote quickly penned a sarcasm-IV piece titled "Fifteen Imaginary Women React to the Idea of a Man Taking Their Name":
Cote wrote:
We were aggrieved, nay, heartsick as we contemplated the gnawing terror experienced by Poor Men who are asked to take the names of their female partners.
We want above all else to assuage this Man Pain. And that is why we sought high and low for fifteen women willing to sympathize with you on this delicate and testicular-focused matter. We couldn’t find any, but we were able to scrounge up fifteen imaginary women who ally themselves deeply with your male-centric ethos.
Some samples demonstrating that there's no such thing as "too heavy-handed" for Cote:
Adrienne, 25: “I have it on good authority that the emasculating trauma of taking a woman’s surname can directly result in the deflation of the testicles. It would be so difficult to procreate after that. Just to play it safe, I want to ensure that my sweet hubby never doubts his dominion over my body and soul.”
Hélène, 22: “My husband take MY surname? Who the hell cracked your skull? I’m not only taking his name as my surname — I’m taking it as my first and middle names too! Or maybe I’ll just change my first name to Mrs…
Bell, 40: “I’ve never once voted because I want my husband to know I trust him to make the best decisions for us. Little things like that sustain a marriage. If I hadn’t taken his name, how could he ever feel confident as patriarch?”
As an aside, judging from the above, Cote seems to find it as infuriating for a wife to want to take her husband's surname as for a husband not to want to take his wife's.
But that's neither here nor there. What's refreshing is the evidence from Berliet's article that not all young men are emo metrosexuals–and are willing to stand up for their masculinity.