There's a systemic component to this issue that perpetuates the status quo separately from men's attitudes toward changing their names, and that is that it is o

There's a systemic component to this issue that perpetuates the status quo separately from men's attitudes toward changing their names, and that is that it is often much harder for men to change their names. I am a man and married a woman, and initially we considered several options for a common last name that weren't just taking my original last name, including hyphenation, sort of portmanteau name-smashing, and a completely new name for both of us. We were met (in the US, in SC) with confusion and lack of support. Were my spouse to have changed her name, the process was literally as easy as checking a box when signing the marriage certificate. For me there was no such option. I would have had to go through a separate name change process unrelated to the marriage, and the government employees tasked with these processes just couldn't understand why I would want to change my name in the first place. When we asked how to accomplish it, the responses included things like "I guess he can change his name, just schedule your court date to justify why he wants to have a different name" and "wait, are you sure you want to change his name? Why?" It wasn't impossible to do, but the friction caused by a system that expected my spouse to change her name as a matter of course ended up being enough of a barrier that we never went through all the hoops, or even uncovered what they all were. When we later had a child she took my last name (which was still easy years after the fact) so the three of us would have a common last name.