ls it Illegal for Married Women to Keep Their Last Names

Half of American Adults Think It Should Be

Working Mother

Meredith Bodgas

© iStock According to half the country, women should relinquish the right to choose their surname when they get hitched.

The reason why is infuriating.
Hi, my name is Meredith Bodgas. I've loved my husband, Paul, of nearly nine years since we were just middle school students. We have a two-and-a-half-year-old little boy, Jeremy, about whom we care deeply. I'm currently working from home as my son, who was too sick to go to daycare, naps, and I had to reschedule multiple meetings as a result. Paul has a regular day at the office and didn't have to cancel a thing today. But according to a significant amount of my fellow Americans I clearly care more about myself than my family, all because I didn't change my name when Paul and I had a wedding.
A study published in Gender Issues in January 2017 looked at earlier research as to why 70 percent of Americans believe women should take their husbands' last names, and why a whopping 50 percent believe the law should require that. To determine people's views of wives who keep their last names, respondents were told a made-up story about a woman, Carol, who'd been working extra hours in hopes of getting promoted. Her husband, Bill Cook, felt "burdened" because he had to do more than his typical share of housework as a result. The participants were then asked how many days per week Bill should accept Carol working late and how justified he'd be if he filed for divorce (LOL). The catch: Bill Cook's wife's last name changed depending on the sample group. She was Carol Cook to some, Carol Sherman-Cook to others and (gasp!) Carol Sherman to the rest.
The result? Carol's last name didn't sway women and better-educated men one way or the other. But, as researcher Emily Fitzgibbons Shafer, a sociology professor at Portland State University, wrote in her study, "Less educated men feel that a woman who didn’t take her husband’s name should be forgiven for fewer days late than a woman who has the same last name as her husband’s. And they believe that the woman’s husband would be more justified in divorcing her for her perceived neglect of the marriage (as measured through repeated lateness)."
The major takeaway for me is don't work for or marry men who think like this.
What's more, in an earlier study, people who believed women should change their names when they get married should do so because it "prioritizes their marriage and their family ahead of themselves."
I'm aghast. I'm not sure how one's last name is related to one's family responsibilities. I don't remember waking up every two hours to stare at my reflection in the mirror while holding a sign with my awkward, unpronounceable last name as my newborn wailed to be fed. I certainly don't recall sharing a first dance at my wedding with myself as I blew kisses to an anthropomorphic string of letters in the crowd that spelled out my last name. And I definitely can't think of a time when anyone questioned my husband's devotion to me or our son because he kept his last name, too.
The reasons I didn't change my name when I married Paul are numerous and varied (only a handful of people on the planet have this last name because the rest were slaughtered in the Holocaust, for one), but putting myself over my family isn't one of them. But even if it were, so what? Parents of both sexes routinely prioritize themselves over their families, through pampering, guys' and gals' nights out and sleeping in on the occasional Saturday while your spouse is on kid duty. It's how we hold onto our sanity. And I think parents who are in their right minds are a bit more capable than those who've lost theirs. So even then, we are putting our families first. Why should our last names make anyone think otherwise?