I’d probably be clever about it if I were the parent, like giving the (old but otherwise normal) first name of Levi and a middle name of like Nathan or Ethan to let the kid come up with the nickname of Leviathan on their own.
Lol honestly I wouldn’t even mind. Where I grew up, that’d be a pretty cool name as a kid. Maybe not as an adult, but most adults I know can keep that shit to themselves.
I mean, hippie culture used names like “summer” and “rain” which are bonkers but we got used to it.
I watched an interview with someone who was named after a car part and they said it was fairly common, but I can’t find that interview to figure out what country it was anymore.
Old names that span cultures often have wildly different spellings, or pronunciations that don’t seem to make sense in English (like pretty much any Celtic name). It’s one thing to appropriate that culture, it’s another thing to say that names taken or derived from that culture are stupid. People move. People have parents or grandparents from other places. I don’t think it’s reasonable to say the name is bad just because it’s spelled unusually or is something that isn’t typically a name where we live.
Why is it better if a name is an English word? In fact isn’t that exactly why you’re saying they’re terrible names?
And it’s cute that you think those names fell out of fashion because they’re “bad” and that they won’t be back in a couple generation along with all the names that were popular at the same time as those ones.
In the meantime, why don’t we shit on names like “john” which is a stupid misspelling of the original Yohanan?
Like… I agree they’re bad. But mostly because people are just stealing little snippets of cultures they know nothing about, just to make their kids names unique.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with a unique name, but don’t make a mockery of another culture in the attempt.
But probably avoid names that rhyme with dirty words…
idk, i think it’s productive to make fun of names from time to time, i think we attach to them too much. It’s definitely too much to make fun of people with bad names though.
There are definitely a lot of other names in other cultures, but i would need some genuine context before hand. Otherwise im just going to assume it isn’t a real name, because people have a weird propensity to just fucking lie all the time for some reason.
That’s reasonable. Unfortunately the kid (and maybe even the parent) doesn’t know. They just saw it somewhere and copied it. Like all the “eigh” instead of “ey” is Celtic, but the folks naming their kids probably don’t even know that. As a result they make all Celtic names look dumb by association. That said, I love a good Celtic name, so I might be one of those people who’d do it 😅
You’re right though, people take names too seriously. As long as a name isn’t gonna rhyme with something nasty, it’s fine.
i genuinely cant imagine putting that much effort into naming someone only to completely fuck it up and for them to be stuck with a shitty name, or at least having a shitty name at one point for the entirety of their life.
Literally just stick to the normal names, pick one that people aren’t using at that point in time, or one that they are, literally who cares. Bonus points if you use the most common generic name because it provides slightly more anonymity.
You can’t imagine someone putting in that much effort.I can’t imagine why someone would be so passionate about making fun of someone else’s name.
Like… you’re saying “they might get made fun of” but youre the one making fun of them. Just dont. Idky, but it’s the people who are making fun of kids who are the most concerned that people will make fun of kids.
i mean look, if you dont want to put effort into your kids name, that’s fine, just use a name. Almost everyone does it. If you want it to be unique though, it better damn well be a good one.
I’m not explicitly making fun of people with bad names, i’m just saying that in my opinion, they’re bad names. That should mean nothing to anybody. That’s like the equivalent of me telling you that you use your brain wrong.
Another part of the problem here, is that names are somewhat explicitly tied to identity, which im sure people will love to yell at me about, like the people with weird names who get shit on have learned to deal with, much like everyone else with a weird name. It just doesn’t matter.
Damn well better pick a good one? If you don’t then what? Some loser on the internet makes fun of you or your kid? You think the kids are teasing each other when all their names are like this?
FWIW I think these people did put effort into these names, and in their bubble/micro-culture (which may not be the same culture from which they got the names), these names are great. Making fun of names is like making fun of clothes; at best it makes no difference and at worst you ignorantly insult someone’s culture and heritage.
I kind of agree wrt some of these names, which likely make a mockery of someone else’s culture - but it’s up to that culture to decide if they think it’s a mockery or not.
So you’re free to do call these names and parents stupid, but then people like me will be there pointing out that, unless you’re from one of these cultures, you’re at least as stupid for making a stink about it.
But like you said, a mountain of a molehill on both sides.
FWIW I think these people did put effort into these names, and in their bubble/micro-culture (which may not be the same culture from which they got the names), these names are great. Making fun of names is like making fun of clothes; at best it makes no difference and at worst you ignorantly insult someone’s culture and heritage.
i mean yeah, i could name my kid rape, because if i ever had a kid, it would be because i was raped. That would be a very clever and apt name. But also a completely and utterly shit name. The name is an intrinsically outwards facing property, you must both consider it’s meaning to you, your family, and the world, carefully. It’s a balance of all three.
I generally don’t think culture is that significant of a factor, the primary aspect that matters is geographical region. You either have that name there, don’t have it there, or it’s becoming a thing there, or fading away. Usually, if it’s becoming a thing, and it’s culture related, that’ll be immigration. Which tends to make it pretty apparent. It’s different on the internet of course, i have no idea what source that list of names is from, but we also have no idea whether that’s even real. We have no idea whether the tweet is from even exists. We know nothing about it, so it’s safe to assume nothing about it, since we’re in a vacuum.
I think you’re free to name your child whatever you want, but i also think you’re free to be made fun of relentlessly for naming your child a bad name.
And being style police is completely and utterly useless, and serves no purpose.
Just like telling other people that they’re bad at fashion, or simply don’t understand style.
My point with that example was to illustrate that you have a clever name, be a very shitty name simultaneously. Much like changing the i in brian, to a y, or vice versa, depending on how you feel. it’s all useless.
I worked under someone at an old job who named his son Jaxon. And kept pictures Jaxon drew and signed on the wall of his office. So every time I needed something from him, I would have to see Jaxon’s name in his office. And I hated it.
It’s to add a little uniqueness, and avoid them being the 14th Erica in the classroom, but not going so far as to not give them one of the “normal” names.
Or they just think it looks prettier. It doesn’t have to be about accomplishing something beyond “I like how that looks”.
You’d be surprised how little it actually matters. It just means they have to spell it for people occasionally.
My name isn’t common here, but it’s also perfectly well known and spelled in the traditional sense.
I have to spell it for people, and often use a middle name for takeout orders. That’s about the extent of the burden of having an unusual name.
My last name is also perfectly common, and I need to spell it as well.
I’ve seen a lot more “burden” on people with alphabetically late names, since they often are last in line for stuff.
Because you hate your child but don’t believe in abortion. Just yesterday, I avoided spelling my preferred email on a phone call because a company already had a different address on file.
Ex and I once joked about this subject. We decided it’d be funny to named an unwanted child Paisley.
Hm. In my experience, -eigh has always been pronounced -ee. In most cases, Leigh is a homophone of Lee, as it comes from an English word meaning “meadow”, and you’ll find many pronunciation guides that confirm this. Not that I find it all that intuitive, I would have assumed it to be pronounced -lay myself, like sleigh or eight. English is dumb like that, and if you or anyone else wants to pronounce it -lay, nothing should stop you.
Reminds me of the article about black Americans visiting Africa and being devastated that they weren’t “welcomed home” but rather just treated as visiting American tourists.
I’m all for unique and clear identifiers for everything, including people, but jesus christ, imagine yourself in elementary school having a weird name. Why would parents choose a hard mode for their progeny?
My name is a standard name, but super uncommon here. It’s not that bad, since I got picked on about as much as anyone else. It’s not like they won’t just because your name is unremarkable.
In the fall of 2019, Vandyck sponsored the Marijuana Pepsi Scholarship for first-generation African-American students at UW–Whitewater.
If someone with a brand name… name… starts a same-industry business in their name, or offers a scholarship for nazis, I wonder what kind of recourse the original brand has.
I guess if everyone has a weird name, that doesn’t matter. Maybe kids don’t make fun of weird names anymore. Who knows, maybe it’s the Johns and Marys who get made fun of for having uninteresting names.
I’m a big proponent of normal/semi obscure normal first name, weird middle name. John W Smith if you work in sales, J Wolfgang Smith if you’re an author. Perfect compromise.
We gave our daughter a somewhat disused but normal and formerly not uncommon name which was the name of a plant. We just wanted a name that wasn’t religious but still normal enough that she wouldn’t get bullied for it (she got bullied anyway). We realized later that it actually made sense in terms of her ancestry because her mother has a plant name, her grandmother has a plant name and her great-grandmother had a plant name. One long lineage of plant names.
Honestly being bullied for a weird name just feels like victim blaming. It’s just someone else’s shitty behaviour we’re expected to dance around? That was the one problem with the name.
I don’t disagree, but it’s also a parental responsibility, in my opinion, to help your child avoid bullying. It’s not possible to avoid entirely, but there are definitely ways to make it worse. And a weird name is one of them.
Dude I see you around here on the regular, so I’ll mention that this is ironic for me to read this, because we also named our daughter an old, obscure but “real” name that is also a plant (a flower, specifically).
It’s from France, so I asked a French friend before using it if it was ok to use and not a weird name, and they said “sure it’s ok, but it’s like an old grandma’s name no one uses anymore.” And that’s when I knew it was the one!
Same boat. I think I guessed it, and it’s absolutely killing me knowing I’ll never know if I’m right. But also, my brain itch doesn’t trump doxxing a person (or even a squid) or their kid.
It’s a pretty common practice where I live for a kid to be named after someone for their first name, but go by their middle name. So I think it’s perfectly fine to have one normal name and one weird name in any order.
A. John Smith is an accountant. Atreyu J. Smith is a musician who wears leather pants and some sort of studded headband.
If you don’t get bullied for your name, you’ll just get bullied for something else. At least with the name you can blame it on your parents, maybe. Kids are assholes.
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