to think kids don't get bullied for their names these days

Denial is not just a river in Egypt I see haha.
Of course kids bully. For all and no reason at all. Gingers. Curly haired. Short kids. Kids with 2 dads. Kids with the wrong brand shoes. And of course kids tease about weird names ... but maybe your kids names are just unusual and not idiotic.. like apricot or something 🤣

[quote Chocolattay]@noplayonasunday

No judgement as obviously you named her before Alexa was a thing but if it’s causing her so much grief can’t you just change it?[/quote]
Or elongate it - Alexandra/Alexis etc. Although I imagine if its escalated to her leaving school there are other issues.

@noplayonasunday

No judgement as obviously you named her before Alexa was a thing but if it’s causing her so much grief can’t you just change it?

I didn't call dd Venus as it rhymes with penis even though i love the name. I know what kids are like.

But anyway I think it’s to do with whether it’s a bulliable child to be honest. When I was at school there was a girl who was teased with a rhyme on her name (something like smelly Kelly, but not that). Thing was, there was another girl in the class with the same name who was never teased. The one who wasn’t teased was popular, confident, pretty, sporty, smart etc. Overall not a vulnerable kid. The one who was teased was teased for other things also, she was just victim of a group of bullies, so they made the name fit the bullying rather than bullied her because of her name. I’m sure if she had worn the same shoes as the other girl they would have picked on her shoes but not the other girl.

Yabu. Totally. Can you for one minute imagine having called your daughter Alexa. Before the product was invented. My daughter lives with it. Every. Single. Day. When she was in school that is. She doesn’t go any more. Every person on this thread who have stated that names aren’t a bullying thing any more are living in a fantasy world.

Yanbu

Kids will find the kid they want to bully and pick on anything.

I have an unusual name and was never bullied. The girls that were bullied were Samantha and Laura.

I feel like the kids that would be bullied for their name are kids that aren't named Oliver and Emma in villages.

I agree, names aren't a bullying thing any more. Neither is sexuality. Yet I find myself grinding my teeth so often when fellow parents say 'oh isn't it lovely no-one gets bullied anymore'. Yeah, try having a neuro diverse kid. It's just the targets have changed.

I’m not a kid, obviously, but the only time I’ve ever gone at a name was a baby called Johnathan Jesus [insert generic last name similar to Smith]

YANBU.

Only adults are nasty about names these days.
People can be horrid and snobbish towards K names/_den names

The teachers and TAs all have a good old laugh when they get the new intake lists in the summer trust me.

Well maybe you could learn a thing or two from the DC who are more accepting than the adults?!

No one is bullied over a name they get bullied because adults lead children by example and teach hate either knowingly or unknowingly. A bully will use anything they want to make life a misery and those who go along with it often do out of fear.

It’s not that kids get badly bullied due to names, but they do have to deal with small comments often. The comments are not necessarily even meant negatively but to have your name commented on so often is really annoying for them.

We live in S London and there was an equal spread of Nigerian, Polish, Vietnamese, Portuguese, Indian, etc etc plus middle class hippy, Hollywood CopyCat and so on. A huge range of names, all unfamiliar to at least one other community within the school.

Having a reaction to a name would have been considered deeply uncool in any of the 3 schools my kids attended.

I always think that people get cause and effect muddled up with this kind of thing anyway. Kids don't get bullied because of this kind of thing, they get bullied because they appear vulnerable or unacceptable to the other kids in some other way and if they happen to have a 'weird' name that becomes part of the bullying. But that kid wouldn't just have been left alone with another name. Some kids are accepted and seen as 'cool' by their peers and have a massive 'room for error', others aren't and don't - it isn't always clear why.

TA here. If they have an amusing or Yoonique name they will be teased.

My friend’s kid gets bullied for being ginger and I do know a boy who gets mocked by the other kids for his name (its very American). Also know two kids who cet bullied over their race.

Maybe my village is not as nice as I thought 🧐

Actually my children have red hair and aren’t even aware that red headed kids ever get bullied - the whole thing has seemingly passed them by

The kids at his school don’t even use the word ginger - I checked his watsapp class
Messages sometimes and they just refer to people as having red hair when it’s ever mentioned at all - I’ll admit I was pleasantly surprised by that.

DS1 was bullied and his name was used as part of that. I suppose he wasn't technically bullied "for his name" but it was another thing they could use.

I'm glad to hear that redhead bullying is less of a thing - I always thought it was among the most pointless and horrible bullying. Red hair is gorgeous!

I've not heard of it - that said both kids went to (well, son still at) a Jewish primary where quite a lot of kids have Hebrew names that aren't that common (unlike when we were kids and there was still this fear of sounding too Jewish so everyone was Daniel and Rebecca and Hannah etc), but they're not seen as weird at all in their context.

I think you might get circumstantial bullying - eg, as other people have mentioned, any lad called 'Bruno' might be in for it right now - but not for having a 'weird' name so much, as names are much more varied. I grew up with a slightly unusual name, but then I went to quite multicultural schools in London, so it wasn't really remarked on.