To think people should take naming their children seriously?

[DreamsOfDownUnder]

Do they not imagine their name choice on the top of a CV or whatever when naming their child 'Ballerina' or 'Buttercup' or 'Tulip'. I find it tends to more girl names than boys.

I didn’t consider ‘would this name suit a ceo or a prime minister’ when I named my children. I instead thought ‘would I have liked to be called this’. I love my own name and picked three names I hoped I would have liked both as a child and an adult. Who cares what it looks like on a cv? I look at many in my job and I’m not worrying about what the applicant’s parents named them, I’m looking at their experience and whether they switch jobs frequently (generally a bad sign) and of course if they have spell checked.

There's some pretty ordinary names in here! Not one I like, but 'Wayne' is hardly unusual. Love some of the others.

I was named after a grandparent. I like it, it’s simple, classic and timeless.
One of my grandparents' names has had a mention

Aubrey

I feel a bit sorry for children with unusual spellings. Who are going to have to spend their entire life telling people how to spell their name.

Nah. My name is a really regular traditional name and I’ve spent my entire life telling people how to spell it. I even gave up for a while as a teenager and started using all the random spellings that I came across.

I have an unusual name, I have a more traditional nickname that I hand out to people who can't be bothered to pronounce my name which is literally two syllables.

Don't mind my name at all. Would hate to make all my future choices based on other people's standards and what they may think of me.

Names are pretty important, and are often the first bit of information we offer about ourselves to others. So are something a good bit of thought should be given to IMO. I probably over-thought it with my son, trying to pick a name which is easy to spell, suitable for a little boy or a grown man, well-known, but still unusual enough that he is unlikely to meet too many others with the same name.

I do think some parents make choosing their child's name about them and their 'coolness' or should that be kewlness? and not about what is best for the child. Which is not on.

Unusual names are sometimes lovely and sometimes awful, but some mangled approximation of a name with random Ks or Ys inserted just to be different does no child any favors. It's like wearing a billboard proclaiming that their parents are twats - and if their parents are twats, some people will inevitably (and not entirely unreasonably) wonder if they are too.

I agree with OP
It's OK to have a real but unusual name but the chavy made up names with unusual spellings are painful. People name a cute baby but don't think about it ever being an adult which is selfish.
I was checking in children for something at a sports club and one child was called 'ai' so I assumed he /she was Chinese or named after someone Chinese and pronounced it -a-i. They dad got very huffy as though I was being stupid and said it's _-ay. So pronounced like quite a common name and I just thought WTF can't you spell?

2.47 onwards

Chandler:(Coming off the phone)Okay! We have our stripper, a Miss Crystal Chandelier!
Joey: Well sure, if you name a kid that, what do you expect them to grow up to be?

I have an unusual name. At AA meetings, we introduce ourselves by our first name. Someone I knew vaguely, from a meeting I ceased to attend, once managed to google me on the basis of my first name/location, find my full name and address (I'd had a company registered at my home address) and wrote to me.

I wished for the first time that I was called Sarah or Nicola (common for my age group).

We just have to accept it's the way it is. My daughter has a Boy, Phoenix, will.i.am, Jett in her class as "out there" names. But she also has a Nellie, Nelly, Bettie, Iris and Ivy in there too which are very old fashioned. I have a personal dislike to Teddy and Romeo. I just can't imagine addressing a Teddy or Romeo across a board room. But that's just personal preference. We can't change what other people name their kids, and if they really dislike it, they are the ones who will change it when they're older.

There's a newsreader called Tulip Mazumdar, it hasn't done her any harm career wise.

It’s thinly veiled class bias.

Upper class people are ‘allowed’ unusual names eg Tuppence, Thomasina, Harrison.

But if you are working class you must conform and give your child a top 10 name like Olivia or James or its your fault they don’t become a PM or CEO, because people looking at CVS never look at addresses.

We just have to accept it's the way it is. [...] I just can't imagine addressing a Teddy or Romeo across a board room. But that's just personal preference.

We don't have to 'accept it's the way it is', you know. You could interrogate your own class prejudice for a start. Can you imagine addressing Sixtus Rees-Mogg across a boardroom?

These threads always hinge on people's ingrained class consciousness --the disgust at unusual 'chavvy' names (not my term, but a hoary old regular on the baby names forum) and the dislike of 'pretentious' or 'try hard' names which people seem to default to assuming are given by social-climbing parents 'trying to be something they're not'. Which apparently leaves you with about ten 'acceptable' names which are neither.

Couldn't agree more op. Little Disney will one day have to attend a job interview!

I wonder how people feel about unisex names.

The unpleasant truth about CVs and names is that, while there's no current evidence that Tulip Smith or Buzz Baker-Andrews is discriminated against when hiring, there's ample evidence that names that are perceived to be from a BAME background are less likely to be shortlisted, even on identical CVs.

If we follow the logic of this thread, then people from BAME backgrounds should give their children 'white' names (and presumably change their surnames by deed poll?) in order to ensure they are not discriminated against when hiring. Or, you know, we could decide that this is racial bias and educate HR departments in how to weed it out.

I have a rather unusual first name that was given to me by my hippy parents, and I hated it when I was growing up, but as I got older people used to say 'ooooh that's a nice name!' And my kids love it, as I am the only person they - or any of their friends know - with this name. My kids AND their friends think my name is 'cool.' Whenever I meet new people, they say they love my unusual name.

Can't say it sorry, as it will DEFINITELY identify me to anyone reading (who knows me.) Think along the lines of unearthly names.

Sorry, missing the point of the thread a bit!

Yeah I don't think weird/unusual/exotic names are that bad. As a few people have said, it's becoming more normal now, so in a decade or two, (when the kids now are grown,) most people will not think anything of it.

It’s so depressing, these attitudes still so prevalent. Tracing family history is hard when ancestors, particularly Jewish ones, had to change their names because of the prejudice they faced hundreds of years ago and here we still are - deeply racist xenophobic antisemitic etc

YANBU.

When I was choosing my son's name I was conscious that I needed to pick a name that would work if he ended up a builder or a CEO (or anything in-between!).

I kind of see what you mean but one of my good friend’s is a doctor, she was born in the 1980s to a hippie. Her mum gave her a rather bizarre name, I’ll not say what as I don’t think there’d be anyone else out there with such a name! She’s a high flyer, I’ve worked with her, you actually forget how bizarre her name is, it’s only when you say to someone else “oh I’m going for lunch with x” and they giggle that you remember how silly the name is. She’s very established in her field of work, her name really doesn’t hold her back, if anything it makes her stand out from the crowd, you can talk about her by first name and everyone knows who it is.

In saying that another friend her sister in law is a gp, she changed her name because it is considered a chavvy name (sorry I couldn’t think of a better way to put it). I’ll not say what it was, but yes it was. She now goes by her middle name, she even made her family start calling her by her middle name, I found that very strange. My friend was talking about her and I had to ask who she was on about!

@Ladyfaith I love your name. I named my car that. I can imagine it is a bit of a burden for a human though.

Google microphone hears it as Shakira Dizzee!

Surely someone’s name doesn’t make them the same as everyone else with that name?

No of course it doesn't. But I'm so bored of hearing the same names churned out constantly that have been going for years and years. Be a bit creative and choose something a bit unusual and different.

I hear, grace, Emma, Evie, Lottie, jack, Alfie, jasper, Charlie. And I just think "wow could you not of come up with something a bit different" there not very eye catching names are they. People have been using these names for decades.

Last week I went to soft play with my girls and on the table next to us there was a little girl called avianna and I thought that was striking and so different. That's what I think is appealing about unusual names they become memorable. I don't bat an eyelid to all the names above because there so overused and bland.

I love that you named your cat. As a adult I’m fine with it, I just tell them my parents had a sense of humour, but as a child ,not so good. I asked Mum why many years later, she said , at least they’ll remember you....