In your opinion, can people with names like 'Posy', 'Kitty' or 'Dotty' be taken seriously?

Dotty,is too cutesy as a name.too twee.kitty I think here,here kitty cat
I'm no fan of cutesy diminutive names
I think pick name,tell no one til birth.that way he just got to suck it up

I agree with your mother. I hate cutesy fluffy names being imposed on babies when you have no idea who or what they will grow up to be.

A cute nickname for home use is one thing but having Milly Molly Fluffy Princess Whatever on birth certificate is another.

I am with your mum.

I think a lot of people will, rightly or wrongly, make sweeping generalisations based upon names.

Although clearly there will be lots of adults with these cutesy names in the future, it does not necessarily mean they will be perceived in a positive way. Some of these cutesy names will be the equivalent of names like Tracey or Wayne in the future. So best to have a longer, more classic name as the name on the birth certificate and then at least they have another name to fall back on.

The point was - I really hated that they'd obviously both been to the same school of communication - which taught them to drop the persons name into every sentence.

I would have felt more resilient dealing with tough talking as Miss Grass - or even Weterrika Ivanovna.

Oh WetGrass now I'm concerned for your bum and your bank balance.

English lacks the tu/vous linguistic construct (that most languages have) which distinguishes your close friends and family from the wider world.

A nickname is meant to perform the same function: dual identities for your soft, intimate self and your formal, serious self. I think it is a healthy separation of public and private: Matilda had a bad day in her stressfull job; Tilly comes home to a cuddle from her family.

It might be because I come from a culture where tu/vous is respected - but I get creeped out by the false intimacy of my GP saying " Look, Sammy, you've got haemorrhoids because you're overweight" or my bank manager saying "So, Suzie, have you thought how your family would manage if you died suddenly" (obv not my real names - but true scenarios).

And yy to aspirations. That's so true. So many assumptions are being made about people due to their names.

No, I wouldn't be able to take a woman with any of these names seriously. Maybe after a while of having got to know them. They're nicknames. I'd go for something like Katherine and then call her Kitty wile young. This gives her the chance to start using a more grown-up name later on if she so wishes.

OP just tell your mother to mind her own business, she had her baby naming opportunity when she gave birth to you.

Don't give her any more ammunition, announce the name when the child is born and don't entertain any debate.

Your mother's right.
I know friends witb girly babyish names who have had to deal with assumptions about their intelligence and competence. Don't set your daughter up to be trivialised.

It's all about giving them choices. If Daisy's full name is Margaret, or Betsy's Elizabeth, they can choose rather than having cutesy imposed from birth.

I agree with your mother.

It is personal choice and aspiration. I didn't want to give my daughters' cutesy twee girly names because I didn't want to think of them becoming cutesy twee girly women. So I suppose I am inflicting my values on them, but it seemed to me sensible to choose a name with a certain gravitas as it is hard enough for women to be taken seriously as it is.

I think your Mum has a point. Why not call a child Kathleen or similar if you like Kitty and just leave the Kitty for the shortname. But not Kitty, Dotty and so on for the name. Posy is a bit cutesie too. Like it or not people are judged by their names.

OP, I would take the person seriously if they seemed competent at whatever they were doing. I might think someone has a nice name, a weird name, a horrible name etc, but that has no impact on their characteristics or abilities. Sweeping judgements based on name say negative things about the mental competence of the judge, not the female pilot named Kitty.

Oh I so wish we'd used Katherine instead of Catherine. She does get a little frustrated that her nn and her actual name begin with different letters. Though I suppose that's no different to, Bob, Ned or Lottie but still.

My daughter is a Kitty. She is almost 7. On her birth certificate, is Katherine.

My DD has already decided that when she's older she wants to be a Katherine, because she thinks Kitty is too babyish. She's happy with it now, whilst she's a little girl but wants a more grown up name for when she's older.

Her name, her choice. That's the benefit of having birth certificate names .

Yes, I have a friend whose 18yr old is called Grace. I remember everyone saying how lovely and unusual it was at the time. Fast forward a few years and it suddenly became very popular.

I also liked Jack 20 odd years ago, though we would have called him John on the BC. Then it suddenly seemed that every little boy was called Jack and just Jack.

I actually know 3 sets of boy/girl siblings who have a Jack and an Ellie. For a while it seemed that every new baby girl we were introduced to was called, Ellie. My 9yr old has 3 in his class too.

All my boys have long names but they are all known by the shortened version. Although that is more to do with the fact we have a short surname so wanted their full names to be a bit more interesting.

That's a good point squoosh about being put off a name because it's popular. If you had grown up dreaming of one day having a little girl called Lily, then finding that half the population have nicked 'your' name, how annoying is that.

I suppose I always wanted names that could be found in every generation going back and back and back; and hopefully forward too. I'm mid 40s and although lots of girls at school were, Sarah and Tracey, there was still Elizabeths and Catherines around.