"I'm sorry if you felt offended, but I don't think what I actually said came across."--Jenny
There is absolutely no need to apologize, my dear and lovely Jenny. I think I should qualify my statement. It was not you who offended me, but rather the idea that offended me. The idea of "Old Maid." And I think I was, and am, offended because of the fact that there is no reason at all these days for any woman to be labeled as this.
As you pointed out, in Jane's day not marrying had dire financial consequences, whereas today "Sisters are doin' it for themselves!" (Gotta love Annie Lennox and Patty LaBelle.) What frightens me is that even though, and I'm sure in some cases in spite of the fact, we can now have financial stability, single women of a certain age are still looked down on socially and labeled with derogatory names. (Men don't have this problem. If they never marry, they are simply called a bachelor. However, the term bachelorette is only applied to a woman who is about to get married. Hmpf! What's up with that?)
I guess what's really got my goat munchin' on my britches is that even though we now CAN do it ourselves, society doesn't really WANT us to. Or at least, it doesn't want us doing it for too long. And the scarey thing is that even though we feminists are fighting against this, somehow our little girls are still learning it, AND they're buying into it.
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It's not just women
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Ali, I soooo loved this article. Michael Kramer is spot on when talking about the married friend thing! However, the fact still remains that even though he gets the same type of pity single women get, he's still not labeled with a derogatory name like "Old Maid." (Which implies that the only thing the "old" woman is now good for is cleaning up after her family.) This is what I lament most of all. (Although I also lament the being single part and the pity part and the biological stopwatch--err, timeclock--part.) Maybe I should get ahold of this Kramer guy and lament together.
So we just need to surreptitiously push the "Old Lad" moniker to even things out. Once things are even we can go back and erradicate both. Sounds like a plan.
Of course there was the old term "confirmed bachelor" for an unmarried middle aged guy, which was usually code for closeted gay guy.
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