Why do the mumsnet community hate popular names?

[YourAmberFawn]

Hi everyone,

Maybe a little rant… but I am genuinely curious.
I see a lot of hate on here for names for being popular
Names such as Margot, Jude, Sophia, Luca, e.x.t
While I understand being wary of a popular name, I personally think there’s a difference between popular and trendy - and most of these names have stood the test of time! A lot of the time a name is popular because it is a good name!!
I was wondering why a lot of you dislike popular names? But on the same hand, dislike any new and usual name and brand them impractical?

How high / low in the top 100 would your ideal baby name be?

I liked ottilie when I heard it but it feels a bit ‘instamum’ influencer now.

Some of the top twenty girls names in the UK at the moment I find absolutely gorgeous. I mean they're popular for a reason right.

At my kids school the only children who have duplicates in their class are boys and even then it's never more than two in a class. There's a much bigger pool of names to choose from then there was forty years ago.

Outside of Mumsnet who is naming their child ottilie or Quentin? I see them mentioned on here all the time but are they even in the top 20? I've NEVER met one.

I think we need to make a Mumsnet top 100 names list. It will be interesting to see how different it is from the actual UK top 100.

Babies called Quentin in England & Wales since 1996
Babies called Ottilie in England & Wales since 1996

Yes, I once read about the 100 year rule - that names become popular in cycles of 3-4 generations. I guess it takes that long for popular names to lose their popularity and start to sound ‘fresh’ again.

Just popping back to say I only mentioned Quentin as it seems to be a very common suggestion on here. I was being facetious because it epitomises those names on MN are just a bit too try-hard/want to fit in with a social set but still feel original. Imho, Quentin is one such wanky name.

I think the hand-wringing/hating a lot on popular names on MN is a very middle class phenomenon. A name has to be just right to make sure others in the set acknowledge it's quirky but not too outlandish. There are dozens of threads where people say Rose or Grace are just too plain and popular as middle names for a Sophia. It's mad.

The classes either side rarely care. They just feel confident enough to go with their choice without consulting others.

I posted recently asking if people thought names grow on you after birth, or if you have to love it straight away. DH and I only really like one name for a boy because it was bilingual, but we don't know if we like it enough to use it and it was recently the most popular boy's name in my county. We'd be choosing it only because we actively don't like anything else. Would it grate on me if I knew lots of other boys with that name?

Cue responses asking to know the name, and suggesting "accepted" names as alternatives... I didn't want to share it but it felt like I was having to screen my name to check if it was original enough.

I don’t think parents necessarily ‘try hard’ to choose names ‘to make sure others in a set acknowledge it’s quirkiness’

Many parents simply like names that aren’t overused/trendy/boring. They simply like names like Ottilie and Quentin (or Xavier, Orla etc).

Shouldn’t we be encouraging more name diversity rather than less?

@Bluelavenders Outside of MN, I'd agree (...to a point, but I still think the middle class are more conscious of social circles where names are concerned).

If MN is scorning popular names in favour of encouraging name diversity, why are there so many threads which turn to cackling about quirky spellings?

If I suggested Maiyah, Jasen or Kadence, I doubt I'd get a positive response on here. They're not my choice of name, but certainly diverse and not overly popular names.

And not all parents naming children in the UK have solely UK heritage. Orla, for instance, is the equivalent of Emma or Sarah in Ireland in terms of being extremely common. People like @OptimisticRealist2024 opining about something being ‘a wanky name’ are just exposing their own narrow experience and lower-middle-class conformity.

@PalazzoBarberini I am not English; I'm not talking about devolved nations of the UK which have their own ecosystems where names are concerned. Having done my entire education where English was taught as a second language, and with a heritage that isn't culturally English, I can choose a name and know it will be popular in my DC class/school and in my area, but not in the UK top 250.

Nor am I lower middle class (that bit actually made me laugh - I'm not even lower, lower middle class. Working class at best 😂).

I just really think that the middle classes are driving the popular names and they cling to names they think are timeless, but will date, thinking that they aren't conforming to fashion when, actually, they are. It happens with all sorts of things - cars, clothes, interiors...and names. I do think that they're a bit try-hard. Doesn't mean I'm right though, does it? For all I know they really are naming their DC after their grandmother or a name they just really loved and later found out was popular.

I think on MN, people choose X because you think it's an extension of their unique identity. They ask on MN to see what other people think. It shouldn't matter, but their motivation is either:

1. they don't want DC to be bullied, so they need to check it isn't too weird

or

2. they think it's really original but maybe, with 8 billion people in the world, it isn't and they want something more unusual.

People on MN tell them it's too common, and then you watch as Florence/Arlo/whatever drops further down the popularity rankings, and then something else becomes popular.

@OptimisticRealist2024 There’s a big difference between an underused classic and a made up spelling!

Parents can choose from thousands of lovely normal easy to spell names that are not ‘popular’ and overused without resorting to making up a weirdly spelled name (like your suggestions of Maiyah or Jason).

I agree with the previous poster that you finding certain (old classic names) ‘wanky’ says a lot about your narrow experience and class conformity.

@OptimisticRealist2024 , the thing with Rose/Grace/May as a middle name is that they seem to be every other Sophia/Freya/Lilys middle name.

In my age group, it seemed every other girl was Something Jane or Something Louise, so you knew several Sarah Janes, Laura Janes or Emma Louises.