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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think it’s very sad certain professions are denied to some children

376 replies

continuallychargingmyphone · 27/07/2018 08:43

I just didn’t know when I joined MN that if your name is not suitably middle class you are forced into a life of servitude in Asda or Tesco. No being a high court judge for you.

Or, aibu to think people are ridiculous and call your baby what you like?

OP posts:
BlueBug45 · 27/07/2018 19:07

@craxmum the one advantage of her name is if she does well in her profession when she grows up people will remember who she is. That started to happen to the guy I knew with the stereotypical West Indian name before I lost contact with him.

@NotAsGreenAsCabbage while the name doesn't help, the child would be subject to stereotypes anyway just due to their ethnic background. In places where they don't do blind recruitment they still filter people out based on their ethnicity and sex at interview.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g · 27/07/2018 19:46

Can I just say that if I met a Callum I would assume he is Scottish or of Scottish heritage and therefore has a headstart in life. This is because I am Scottish.

I would also associate Conor and all its variants with the bright, lovely boy I knew from my son's year at primary school who went on to do very well indeed at school and university.

Some of these negative associations don't seem to be valid across the whole of the UK, or maybe it's just me.

JassyRadlett · 27/07/2018 23:30

Some of these negative associations don't seem to be valid across the whole of the UK, or maybe it's just me.

I took them from an article on what names teachers associate with naughtiness, I’ve no idea - helped by being foreign!

Do you have names with bad connotations?

BroomstickOfLove · 28/07/2018 07:24

Yes to the Catholic sounding name thing. I think that most of the Irish posters on here have noticed that plenty of names which are normal, unremarkable, and even rather staid in Ireland are considered chavvy on Mumsnet. And the K name thing also seems to wed out a lot of Irish names.

Siestalavista · 28/07/2018 07:36

Well Callum is the naughtiest boy in DS school! .. just saying!

BroomstickOfLove · 28/07/2018 07:46

"More traditional names have an obvious spelling which prevents constant asking/misspelling."

Have you never had a friend called Claire/Clare, Katherine/Catherine/Kathryn, Isobel/Isabel/Isabelle, Elisabeth/Elizabeth, Ann/Anne or Eleanor/Elinor?

PoisonousSmurf · 28/07/2018 07:49

Back in the 80s, we had a Geography teacher called 'Gaylord'.
Well... He didn't last long in our rough comprehensive.

Ozgirl75 · 28/07/2018 09:09

My DS’ school has a very large number of children from Chinese backgrounds and they give their children names with (presumably) minimal knowledge of cultural stereotypes, so I’m thrilled to see boys including Terrance, Walter, Victor and John, and girls including Victoria, Candice, Alison and Claire.

SugarIsAmazing · 28/07/2018 09:44

Clara is my name.
Shannon, Chloe, Molly, Sophie, Hayley, Sally and Millie (daughters and granddaughters)

Liam, Jackson, Riley and Mark (sons and grandson)

I wonder what these names say?

LadysFingers · 28/07/2018 09:53

DH used to recruit trainees for his firm. He used to get 400 CVs a year for 2 - 3 traineeships. He used to chuck any with chavvy names straight in the bin, as he said:

"Whoever heard of a chartered accountant called.....?"

He insisted on calling all three DC, traditional English (aka Biblical) names!

glintandglide · 28/07/2018 10:04

He’s awful lady fingers. Awful. And chartered accountants are called all sorts, it’s not being a high court judge you know. The qualification is terrifically popular in Africa and Asia so lots of variety in names. The last 2 chartered accountants I hired were called Darren and Claire.

TeaAddict235 · 28/07/2018 10:06

That's what everyone on those baby name threads is angsty about, and most parents who attend CofE or grammar schools, or essentially MC Britain @LadysFingers

TeaAddict235 · 28/07/2018 10:08

Out of curiosity @LadysFingers what's your DH called? Is it more biblical or creative?

BroomstickOfLove · 28/07/2018 10:09

Seriously, LadysFingers? And you are happy to be married to someone like that?

JassyRadlett · 28/07/2018 10:26

DH used to recruit trainees for his firm. He used to get 400 CVs a year for 2 - 3 traineeships. He used to chuck any with chavvy names straight in the bin

I hope the reason he doesn’t recruit any more is that his firm realised he was intentionally reducing the talent pool they had access to.

Actually, I hope they sidelined him to making the tea because they found out he’s thick as mince.

bigmouthstrikesagain · 28/07/2018 10:59

I think it is impossible to ignore our own upbringing, social class, education level, culture and age when choosing names and forming opinions about other people's names.

We drew on our interests when choosing my DC names all have personal and cultural significance to me but none have particularly unusual names. In fact ds name although it was not very common when he was born, in the last 14 years it has moved to the top 20.

Dd1 name is now associated with a well publisied tragic missing presumed dead child, so is less common than when I named her probably. Dd2 is named after a singer and cultural icon that DH and I love. She has a familiar and very easy to spell name straight out of a nursery rhyme. But it isn't particularly common.

Out of my family 3 have used different names to their given name. My dad left home young hated his family and dropped his given name so used his middle name the rest of his life - though his siblings continued to call him Tommy throughout his life and after he died.

My younger siblings both use different names than are on their birth certificates, db changed his name by deed poll. I have kept my given name, I like it, though I may have considered changing it if I was American as it is a name associated with being a bitch in Us popular culture.

My musings are basically that a name is important, it says something about your heritage, it can age you (know any 5 yo Gary's!!??), It can place you in a particular cultural socio-economic background... That is only a problem if it creates barriers for you. I probably haven't been disadvantaged by my name and my kids are unlikely to be held back by theirs. I would be lying if I said making sure their name would not cause them to be ridiculed or singled out was not a factor in naming them. Surely most people do that.

I will make some assumptions when I hear someone's name, their potential age, possibly ethnic background, social class. But only the same way as I make judgements about people based on how they look and sound, it is automatic and only an issue if I try to pretend that I am not making judgements or if I go on to make prejudicial decisions based on assumptions. It is more problematic to make out such prejudice no longer exists than to admit to cultural bias and address it. It is possible to avoid name based bias by having job applications sifted with names and ages redacted.

Abetes · 28/07/2018 11:11

People make assumptions about you depending on your name. I went to a really rough comprehensive school with a name from an Evelyn Waugh novel, got lots of grief about it and hated my name. Ended up working in the city with my kids going to private school, it is the most common name amongst my friends and now I don’t mind it at all.

People shouldn’t judge you but they do so it is worth bearing that in mind. My own kids have what I consider to be completely neutral names (which probably says something in itself).

MyLearnedFriend · 28/07/2018 14:04

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

lindalee3 · 28/07/2018 14:14

It's true though.

I know someone who got a job in a swanky company in London last summer where the jobs are VERY sought after.

Her name is Elizabeth and she is the daughter of a surgeon and a vicar from a little village in Cheshire. She was told if her name had been Shannon from Telford and she was the daughter of a single mother from a sink estate, she would not had even got an interview.

You're living in cloud cuckoo land if you think any differently.

glintandglide · 28/07/2018 14:21

Goodness lindalee you know ONE PERSON who works for a “swanky” London company? Where on Earth do you think people who live in London work? You wouldn’t believe the number of Kelly’s from Essex lining the walls of London offices. Come and work here, you’ll see what it’s really like.

Theycouldhavechoseneve · 28/07/2018 15:53

jassy pp’s husband isn’t the only one to do that. I understand why you find it objectionable but it happens and usually were vacancies are massively over applied for - its not fail safe but it’s a short cut.

Dauphinois · 28/07/2018 16:35

Silverhairedcat that happened to a friend of mine too. She's mixed race and has an African first name. She didn't get a look in career wise until she started using her British middle name and now has a high flying career .

OrdinarySnowflake · 28/07/2018 16:41

Jassy - the PP's husband is definately not the only one to do that. When it comes to training contracts like that, there's often someone handed a pile of 100 CVs, all of which have the required accademic qualifications, experience and intellegence to do the job, for 2-3 roles, they'll probably only want to interview around 10 people. So you need to find an "excuse" to throw out 90 CVs of people who on paper, are perfectly suitable for the role.

I know one person who just put them in two piles, ask a junior to pick one, threw away the other pile without even looking at them, because "luck is half the battle in this industry, I don't want anyone unlucky in my team."

"chavvy" names is a horrible thing to say, but it's not surprising at all.

glintandglide · 28/07/2018 16:49

I don’t understand that at all. Any decent company would have a recruitment department and it’s their job to shortlist. Even when I was a grad it was common for huge numbers of people to attend assessment centres and entrance tests. What kind of crap company has the hiring manager or their team sorting through hundreds of CVs dismissing them for having a “chavvy” name? If this actually happens what on Earth are these dimwits doing with the applications from the Muhammad’s nazereens, wing-lus, precious’ etc?

JassyRadlett · 28/07/2018 16:53

jassy pp’s husband isn’t the only one to do that. I understand why you find it objectionable but it happens and usually were vacancies are massively over applied for - its not fail safe but it’s a short cut.

I’m very aware that it’s widespread - I posted upthread about some of the evidence base on the issue, covering both race and class.

Just because it’s widespread doesn’t make it both abhorrent and stupid.

To describe knowing discrimination - which generally falls on racial as well as socioeconomic lines - as ‘not a failsafe’ is also pretty disgusting. People who do this probably also bang on about people needing to ‘pull themselves up by their bootstraps’ while putting barriers in the

I regularly lead sifts of very large numbers of applications (2-300 being a low cohort for some of or rounds.) It is perfectly possible to sift effectively based on qualifications, experience and demonstrated aptitude for the role. It is harder work, sure, than binning those you think are too poor or too non-white or too beneath you, but you get a better cut of the talent.

If I found anyone behaving like this, it would be a disciplinary, with gross misconduct as an option.

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