# Do you, or any adults you know, expect to be addressed as "Mr." or "Mrs." by other adults? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 15, 2025, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882 "2025-11-15T20:33:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 1:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/81 "2025-11-18T01:27:09Z")
If the judge said it then it must be you that is wrong. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/82 "2025-11-18T04:04:28Z")
> [@mnemosyne](#): > > Some people communicate by saying your name constantly, and while it irritates me, I don’t think I’ve ever said anything and I doubt I ever will. I just don’t like it much but can’t really explain why. I know my own name, why are you repeating it, I guess? That drives me nuts. It’s partly because I’m bad at names, so when someone uses my name, i feel stressed that I’m supposed to know their name. Partly it’s that it feels a little invasive. I’m less likely to buy something from you if you use my name, though. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/83 "2025-11-18T04:08:52Z")
Noted for the future Ms. Gal. 😉 (runs) ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/84 "2025-11-18T13:04:03Z")
I’ve a BIL that had to call his FIL & MIL using Mr. and Mrs. I thought it was very, very strange. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/85 "2025-11-18T13:45:00Z")
Quite. I doubt I’d ever call them anything after that ultimatum. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/86 "2025-11-18T18:15:19Z")
I really would have preferred to call my parents-in-law Mr. & Mrs. They were not comfortable with that, so I don’t, but if they had been I would have, happily. That’s leftover from childhood, when friends’ parents got the honorific. It would feel weird with friends and colleagues who are the same age as (or older than) my in-laws, though. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/87 "2025-11-18T18:34:27Z")
I donno. Might be a reginal thing. I did call my mother ‘Mom’ and my father ‘Dad’. My MIL and FIL where Marge and Bob. I certainly don’t address any work people with an honorific. That’s just not the custom here. Even for the top ‘Brass’. Colorado is pretty laid back. Especially in the mountains. ---
**Author:** ![minor7flat5](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/minor7flat5/32/258_2.png) [@minor7flat5](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minor7flat5)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/88 "2025-11-18T18:37:34Z")
I don’t expect or want to be addressed as Mr. I believe it was used in honest proper fashion once by a twentysomething girl at church, and it caught me off guard. It was part of her upbringing (and my own upbringing) so I wasn’t bothered by it. > [@Fretful\_Porpentine](#): > > I’d be fine with my first name if it were the culture on my campus for students to address professors that way, but it’s not. I have a friend who is a professor at a university, and she writes her name as Dr. Jones in casual emails and other communications and that grates on me a little. I have to pause and recognize that workplace cultures differ. By working in Big Pharma for decades, I have been surrounded by a population of scientists with a sizeable percentage being “Dr. So and So” but they all were “Joe” and “Sharon” and “Steve” and “Marie” without exception, so it feels weird to address anyone except a medical doctor as “Doctor” And even that bothers me if not used in a professional capacity. With that said, if I were wandering the hallowed halls of a university, I’d probably feel right at home calling someone “Dr. Smith” ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/89 "2025-11-18T19:57:18Z")
My husband and i awkwardly mostly didn’t address each-other’s parents by name until we had kids. And then we used their grandparent names. So his mother was Baba, and mine was Nanny. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2025, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/90 "2025-11-20T23:15:10Z")
> [@Dr.Drake](#): > > Dr.” is a weird title, because it is earned, as opposed to Mr. or Ms. which come with gender assignment. So refusing to use Dr. can feel tantamount to ignoring the accomplishment even though that’s not at all what’s going on. I had a great aunt who got livid anytime she was called Miss (or worse Mrs); she went to medical school in the 1930s and sacrificed _alot_ to be called Doctor. She didn’t mind being addressed by her old rank from the Army Medical Corps though. Women and people of color have and still are often denied honorifics taken for granted by white men in the same situations. Strom Thurmond was the first judge in South Carolina to address African-American lawyers by title instead of first name. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/91 "2025-11-21T03:38:25Z")
When I was still married to my ex-wife, we would call her parents お父さん otoosan and お母さん okaasan, father and mother. My SIL and BIL would call them the same but refer to them by first name, which I wasn’t ever comfortable doing. Certainly I would have never called them that. I grew up in a conservative environment and adults at church were Brother Smith and Sister Jones. Teachers at school were all Mr., Mrs. or Miss, as were other adults. Japanese has a lot of names parents can be called, in addition to the ones above (just giving for fathers for simplicity) お父様 otoosama, more formal and only used by old money; パパ papa, (from English); 父ちゃん toochan, which is much less respectful; and others. One former colleague said she never called her dad anything after she graduated from high school. You can get away without using subjects in Japanese sentences. ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/92 "2025-11-21T11:44:28Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#): > > I had a great aunt who got livid anytime she was called Miss (or worse Mrs); she went to medical school in the 1930s and sacrificed _alot_ to be called Doctor. She didn’t mind being addressed by her old rank from the Army Medical Corps though. Oh, yes, that brings to mind another story from college. I knew a guy (he wasn’t really a friend) who refused to call a female math professor “Doctor” or “Professor” or anything like that. He invariably referred to her as “Mrs. Lastname.” Because “Mrs. is the most important title a lady can ever have.” Ick. Perhaps wisely, he never said that to her face. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/93 "2025-11-21T17:56:28Z")
> [@MrAtoz](#): > > Perhaps wisely, he never said that to her face He never called her Mrs. Lastname to her face or he never explained why he called her that to her face? ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/94 "2025-11-21T18:14:32Z")
The latter. He did stop calling her Mrs. after she told him not to, but he mainly accomplished that by rarely saying her name at all. If you think about it, you don’t call people by name when you’re speaking directly to them, at least not most of the time. After that he called her Mrs. when he was talking about her, to other people. Unpleasant fellow. I’m hopeful that he’s gone on to lead a very undistinguished life. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882/95 "2025-11-21T18:20:09Z")
We call each other Mr. & Mrs. & Ms. in city council meetings but it’s almost more of a lark. Makes us sound more serious. I guess it would feel kind of disrespectful to the positions if we used first names. Everyone does kind of smirk when they say it. I used to work at Cinemark theaters when I was in college. Their policy was to call managers Mr. etc. It was wild because there were kids who were younger than me who were managers. I had been in high school with them. It was fun & funny to call them Mr. and Miss. But there ya go. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-or-any-adults-you-know-expect-to-be-addressed-as-mr-or-mrs-by-other-adults/1024882.md?page=4)