Women are rude, tough, and fun. They are rarely proper and they're power is pretentious. They are attractive because they are members of the holy people who are most like people with the stick. People with the stick are not holy people. They are the opposites of the holy people. They are opposites of the holy people because holy people have holes and people with the stick have a stick where the hole is to holy people. Women are the holy people most like people with a stick. They are not refined like the lady, they are not accurate like the female, but rather rampant and chaotic.
Ladies are well behaved, graceful, and charming.
I don't know. For my part it is still a compliment to say someone is a lady. It implies to me that they have class and grace.
I confess I've made a mental difference in definition between women and ladies. And I guess it's an informal class distinction. IMO, all females are women, but not all women are ladies. I don't think of most of the women who appear on Springer as guests as ladies, for example.
They might work as Ladies of the Night Just another reason ladies gets a bad rap.
I grew up in a small southern town, and developed a distinct understanding of the difference between "a lady" and "a woman." Ladies always dress nice (no sweatshirts or non-fitted jeans, and certainly no boots), wear lots of makeup and shiny jewelry, drive nice cars or "soccer-mom" SUVs (and make it a point to not know a thing about vehicle maintenance), wouldn't dare touch any kind of tools for fear of ruining their manicures, drink wine or "girly" mixed drinks rather than beer or hard liquor, and don't curse in casual conversation (though proper grammar is optional for some reason). As I don't conform to any of these, I don't consider myself a lady. There are certain ladies in my hometown, for example, who are apalled that I perform my own vehicle maintenance; that's seen as "men's work."
woman: generic word for a female human being
man: generic word for a male human being
lady: a woman of refined behavior and speech
gentleman: a man of refined behavior and speech
Since the gender revolution, some women are insulted to be called “ladies,” feeling that the word suggests inferiority, hypocrisy, or condescension. Children, on the other hand, seem to be taught to call all women ladies, and Hollywood celebrities habitually use the word “lady” to mean “girlfriend” or “wife.”
I think of lady as a special word for a classy woman, one who dresses appropriately for different occasions and speaks and acts with unfailing courtesy to everyone she encounters. I wouldn’t say that a lady is “better” than a woman. I’d just say that certain things set a “lady” apart from your generic “woman.” To draw from the celebrity sphere, I might associate the word “lady” with Oprah or Meryl Streep, but probably not with Rosanne Barr or Britney Spears.
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, lady and woman still had connotations of social class. A NY Times article dated 1887 tells how a “gentleman” knocked down a cabman because he’d insulted the man’s wife by referring to her as a “woman.” In many novels, servants are careful to distinguish between “ladies and gentlemen,” and “persons” of lower rank. As late as 1966 Agatha Christie describes this exchange between Hercule Poirot and his manservant George:
Poirot considered this reply. He remembered the slight pause that George had made before the phrase–young lady. George was a delicate social recorder. He had been uncertain of the visitor’s status but had given her the benefit of the doubt.
“You are of the opinion that she is a young lady rather than, let us say, a young person?”
“I think so, sir, though it is not always easy to tell nowadays.” George spoke with genuine regret. –Third Girl
