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If you use "Madam" or "Ma'am," what are you saying about the President and the President of the Senate (on the other hand, have they earned the right to be called "Sir")?

This is a fairly common problem with salutations. In formal correspondence, we don't want to be too personal (Dear Jim, Dear Joan), we don't want to be too impersonal (Dear Smith, Dear Jones), so we use some kind of title (Dear Mr. Smith, Dear Mrs. Jones, and let's skip the Dear Ms. question). For civilians, the title almost always connotes gender (a problem not encountered when the title is military), which leads to the embarassing question of what to use when you don't know the person and the first name is not gender specific (e.g., Jean, Carol, Lynn, Shirley). If you are addressing the letter to a mixed group, what gender do you use? Do you list everyone in the salutation to avoid this problem? Or do you use some gender neutral term, such as Dear Person or Dear People?

wallyp  | Tuesday, March 25, 2008 |  08:52 AM

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Wait...why use Sir at all?

Use Mr., Ms., and Messrs, as appropriate. The President, President of the Senate and Speaker of the House are common people, not lords/ladies/masters/honored-subjects.

Plus, this avoids the so-called problem of the word Madam (Madam is foremosr a simple formal title).

Perplexed at the nonsense of Sir in the first place  | Monday, March 24, 2008 |  02:47 PM

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Nit Pickers...

Richard Wright  | Monday, March 24, 2008 |  02:14 PM

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So then what is Ms. Pelosi - a "madame". That doesn't sound so good either....

JT  | Monday, March 24, 2008 |  08:04 AM

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