Lesbian writer freaks out after actress Margo Robbie takes husband’s last name

The actress has taken Tom Ackerley’s last name, becoming Margot Ackerley. She is expected to still go by Margot Robbie in her acting career, keeping it as a stage name. The two were married in 2016, and went on to have a son together in 2024.

Rebecca Shaw wrote for The Guardian that “being a lesbian in a heretofore heteronormative society means having to go along with lots of things that don’t make sense to your beautiful lesbian brain. One such thing for me is the ongoing expectation that women who marry men should change their surname to their husband’s.” Shaw wrote that her “tolerance was tested again” when the actress’ name change was revealed.

Shaw wrote, “we don’t know why she has done this, but it has nonetheless caused a stir. We got the usual discourse of blah blah tradition, blah blah patriarchy, blah blah women’s individual choice and so on.”

Shaw said that in a pushback against how in an “overwhelming majority of straight marriages, the woman changes her name to the man’s,” including her own friends, “I play my part by putting all my married male friends in my phone under their wives’ surnames.”

“Of course I have no personal sense of the societal pressure and systems that inform such decisions, which is why I don’t flip a table every time it happens – but I actually do mind when it’s the default decision with no discussion,” Shaw wrote.

Shaw wrote that she has no issue “with women taking their man’s surname,” citing explanations such as the woman “hat[ing] her dad,” feeling “no attachment to her name,” and otherwise, “the problem comes when there is no choosing. When it’s a foregone conclusion, when it hasn’t been actively decided.”

“I don’t really care about the reasoning, I just care that there is a reason. That said, when it comes to which surname a baby gets, that’s when I really get irritated. If we really have stopped considering a man’s wife and children his property, why on earth is giving them his name still the default,” Shaw wrote. “Women carry and birth the babies. Women are still far more likely to do the lion’s share of childcare. Hello?? The lesbian mind boggles.”

Shaw said that there was a “solution” in which readers “may be surprised that it doesn’t involve any gender politics whatsoever!” She wrote, “My solution is that we throw tradition out the window and that if a couple wants to share a name, we make the decision based on … which surname is cooler. Which surname sounds better, which surname will offer more success – that’s the one you should both use.”

She said she’d like to sit in a courtroom setting with herself serving as a sort of Judge Judy figure, ruling on whose name the couple will take. “No longer would awesome surnames be swallowed by the crap oesophagus of patriarchy. No longer would it be considered weak or weird for a man to take his wife’s last name – instead it would be cool and wise. Even though my loyalty always lies with women, I am willing to maintain neutrality in the courtroom.”

Shaw concluded, “And sorry, Mr Ackerley, which sounds a bit like a cat throwing up – you’re now Mr Robbie.”