To think it is unfair to call a child by it's mother/fathers name ?

[WildWoodFlower]

It seems to be most common amongst boys being named after their fathers especially in the states (Mike jnr etc..) .It doesn't seem to be that common for women to want to call their baby girl after themselves. I just feel apart from it being very confusing around the house having two names the same but i think somebody should be called a different name to their parents.I always think it is a lack of imagination from the parents but i might be wrong.Why do people do it?

None of my great grandparents were called by their first names.

I think that it was very common to name a baby for tradition and then call it whatever you liked.

I think YABU to say it is 'unfair'.

I call my DC lots of things, rarely their names so I don't think it's that much of an issue to them.

I agree it is unfair on the partner who has no say in what the baby is called though! There's no way I'd agree to it.

I hate the "Junior" thing, I feel especially in the US it's like attaching a big sign saying,

"There, look right there, that's my man sperm walking around doing his father proud, I'm so strong and mighty"

In my family my grandad was called Michael and know by that and his son was also called Michael but is known as Mickey. My mum's 'proper' name is Catherine but is known as 'Molly' I didn't know her name was Catherine until I was about 15 and I saw her driving license because no one had ever called her that.
She didn't find out her real name until she started school and nan said at school the teacher will call you 'Catherine' but we call you Molly

I know a family where the first 2 dcs were called after the parents, so 4 people and only 2 names, like 2 pairs. Then they had a 3rd dc who has a random name. The boy who was called after his dad has a son with the same name, the woman, called after her mum is still known as 'young sarah' even though she is pushing 70 and 'old sarah died years ago.

DS has a family name. There are now four of them alive in DH's family. However it stretches back to at least the 1700s, so not just a case of DH wanting a mini me. DS can also use his (gorgeous) middle name if he doesn't want to be confused with his dad.

Our neighbours did this with their baby. The mum of the family was very loud in bed, and it was really odd to hear her shouting her husband's name during sex, then the next day, shouting it to the toddler in the garden. I just hope she quietens down over the next few years, it's going to be bad enough for the poor kid hearing his parents having sex loudly without hearing his mum orgasm moaning his name [shocked]

DS has a family name as his middle name. It was his great granddad's and granddad's name, although his granddad was known by a nickname of his middle name to differentiate. Both DS's father and uncle have it as a middle name and now so does DS.

I think the name goes further back in the family than that and I hope it continues, it's part of a lovely family tradition. Plus it's a name I like, not sure I'd have the same opinion if it was one I hated

It is fairly common where I live to name daughters after their fathers. Thus Robert / Roberta (OK) but there are plenty of Dean/Deana, Angus/Angusina and, my personal favourite, Donald/Donalda.

There was one family with Dad Robert, son Robert and daughter Roberta.

Just looks arrogant to me, and as if children are just the next generation and not their own people. Not bothered by middle names / adding in the mother's sirname etc but, on a daily basis, what you call someone matters.

I don't understand it I wouldn't mind it as a middle name but it's bound to be confusing later in life!

I once worked on a ward where some man, about 35, turned up for an appointment for an operation, was a day case thing. Got the notes, looked at date of birth, looked at patient, asked DOB, Name, Address etc, name and address were right, DOB wrong, he had opened his Dads post, they had same name and lived at same address, and instead of thinking "oh, i have not even seen a doctor about anything that may require surgery, maybe it is for dad" assumed it was for him and turned up!

Mind you, I am named after my dad! The female version of his first and middle names....and we then both got the shortened version of the first name! My mom got very suspicious when young girls started ringing the house and as she thought asking for my dad, before realising they were asking for me.

Until about the 1930s it was basically the rule here to name your children after mother, father, and all 4 grandparents. Note also the habit of naming a new baby after a recently deceased family member. It´s about tradition and honouring, showing respect for and remembering your ancestors. Nothing to do with a lack of imagination. The mother´s maiden name was given in certain parts of the country as a middle name to make ancestry completely clear.

For practicalities sake, as has been mentioned up post, many variants were used of the same name so it was clear who was being addressed.

There is a weird cousin to this, which is that when you are pregnant almost every man you are friends with or related to will say something like "and don't forget, Michael/John/Matt/Prateek is a great name for a boy!"

I never ever met a woman who urged me to give in-utero DD her name.

It's not bad. I mean, it's just a jokey thing to say. But it's so ODD that so many men say it and women never do!

My DM and I have the same name. It's actually very useful now, particularly with passing the odd cheque into my account for example, also if she doesn't want to do something, she gets me to call up or do it using her name.

There are areas of UK, where it is normal for family names to be used as first names, It's quite the norm here.

first boy of each branch of the family gets the same name, and second boy gets second boy name and so on, then they use the same names for their sons, but they get called by a second name which is chosen, so you get generation of same families having same names,

the other tradition is you have the same first and second name, but you get called by a shortened or longer version of first name.

most the farms in this area have always been farmed by a person with the same name for hundreds of years, my butcher's shop which opened in the end of 1800, the owner has always had the same name, there has always been someone our parish council with the same name.

Oh, and I also have an aunt and cousin on my dad's side of the family with the same name as DM and I. Not to mention my step dad's ex wife. It does get a bit confusing at family weddings I have to admit.

In DHs family no one has an original name. SIL has the same name as MIL and there are 4 generations of males with the same first name, none of which are shortened. Family conversations tend to go:

MIL: Did you hear what Thomas did?

DH: Uncle Thomas or brother Thomas?

MIL: (tutting) BROTHER Thomas?

DH: Your brother Thomas or my brother Thomas.

AND no I didn't name my kids after anyone, not that I'm allowed to forget it

In our family, we actively try to avoid using a first name someone in the family already has. And this extends to aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.

Of course, it's not perfect, we do have a few duplicates because of inlaws, etc, but generally find a way to identify each person individually. We do have the odd biiiiiiig gathering but rarely a problem in getting the right person's attention.

What we are finding in our family is that people who want to name a child after a relative tend to add that name as a middle name, so no confusion.

Looking at the lists of the most popular boy and girl names for previous years, it does look as if it's more common for boys to be given family names, given that the same smallish group of names keeps cropping up so regularly.

The girls list seems so more varied with fashions changing the list order all the time.