Why are nicknames so expected now?

[Alltheladies]

Why are nicknames so popular now? It feels like every new baby that is being born in the 2020s is expected to have a nickname. In my experience, as soon as you announce the baby’s name, someone instantly asks what you’re going to be calling them or starts suggesting nicknames (even when you haven’t implied that you’d like to call them something else). Even many parents seem to be more interested in and focused on potential nicknames rather than the actual name.

This thread was inspired by the fact that I had someone ask me if our Charlotte is going to be a Charlie or a Lottie. When I was a child, there were many kids who exclusively went by their full names. What has caused this societal change?

@FluffMagnet , What on earth are you on about OP? It's quite clear what the OP meant.

My question is why do parents feel they have the roght to be so precious over the name they decided to bestow on their offspring? It feels very controlling to me. Why is it controlling to want people to use the name you chose for your child?

I don’t know anyone who thought much about nicknames. I assumed it was a MNs thing and the desperation to be seen as UMC.

This. I see it on the baby name threads, all the time, people suggesting names, and straight away, some jumping to adding nn could be xyz.

@Alltheladies , I think it's because the trend is currently for long names and for cute names. I don't think it's that different from the 1960s trend for names like Debbie, Vicky, Nick, Tim, Jon, Chris and Alex.

On here there seems to be a need for a name to have lots of diminutives, some of them quite a stretch. e.g, Katherine could be Kate, Katie, Kat, Kitty, Kay, Kathy, Kiki, Erin...

And a name that is fine on it's own to have a long version in case little Max and Evie want to be High Court Judges.

It's not new.
100 years ago a typical school class would have been full of children named Jim, Billy, Lizzie, Kitty, Alfie, Peggy etc.
Their birth certificates would have said James, William, Elizabeth, Katherine, Alfred and Margaret.

There’s also something relating to class, I think, the linguistic gymnastics we see on this board to reverse engineer a ‘barrister’ name to somehow end up at Gigi, Tiggy, Coco etc.

Someone should create an algorithm to make a Venn diagram of UMC/cutesy/spirited/High Court Judge.

My parents gave me a name they were adamant couldn’t be shortened, but I was known by that shortening throughout school and university.

This is about two different things. Diminutives or nicknames. So the diminutive of Victoria could be Vicky. But if the child has curly hair for example she could acquire the nickname Curly. I have a long name, Elizabeth, and am called Lizzie by my family, but due to my constant hayfever my brothers know me as Sniff.

I don’t think it’s weird to want your child to be called by the name that you have given them until they’re old enough to express a preference. My mum has told me that she will be calling my daughter by her initials because she doesn’t like the name that has been chosen. I find that to be quite rude, but I ignore it because she’s my mum. I wouldn’t be happy if a stranger or other family member had the same idea.

This. Until this thread I wasn’t aware planning nicknames was a thing.

They're diminutives not nicknames. Lizzie is a diminutive, Sniff a nickname.

I posted about this a couple of months ago, I said I had only heard of nicknames on here. Was told I was weird..my name, DH, and 2 dks have names with 4 letters or less, they cannot be shortened,think Mark,or similar.It just didn't happen in my family. I had a cousin Isobel,who died almost 2 years ago,her name was never shortened.

DD has a name that can't be shortened but some people will insist on calling her by the 1st syllable of her name. She hates it and a "that's not my name" usually does the trick.

Whichever name you choose your child might end up with something totally different as a teenager! My husband changed his name legally as an adult as everyone at school called him a nickname that really suited him and it stuck. He hated his given name - it didn’t match his personality though his parents insisted on using it throughout his life. My son was called something totally different to his name at school - a nickname based on his surname - a practice in common with lots of his friends.

Someone I know purposely planned nicknames for her children. I do find it odd. She also commented on my children's names and said "but you can't shorten them" which I thought was bizarre! As if I was ridiculous to give my DC names that can't be shortened.

I have a four syllable name that’s always been shortened. I’ve never thought of that as a nickname but I suppose it is

I don’t think they are any more common than they used to be.

my kids aren’t known by nicknames and very few of their friends are either.

I think it’s a MN thing

People say nicknames when referring to diminutives because a lot of people don’t know what a diminutive is. It’s just easier.

There is often the opposite with short names though.
They get extended.
Mark often becomes Markie.

It's not correct though.

It’s always been a thing hasn’t it? My dad was born in the 50’s and had a nickname - his mum was born in the 20’s and had one too.

It’s not nicknames though. It’s diminutives eg Alex for Alexander.
A nickname evolves through time character or personality traits. Eg Professor Green , Snooty , Officer Dibble , Trumpton.

It is quite clear she is talking nonsense is my point - it is not at all a modern thing to have nicknames from an early age/birth.

And in terms of being precious, the name belongs to the owner, not the bestower. If someone is happy to have a nickname (which is often a term of endearment), it is not a a good look to have mummy in the background correcting people to her preferred moniker (as my colleague had with her son-in-law's mother...)

@FluffMagnet She's not talking nonsense, but it's not a recent thing. I can think of a Christopher who has only ever been known as Chris and a Max who says he didn't know he was Maximilian until he was about 8.

My parents named me a name they liked, not the diminutive. They weren't being 'precious'. They named me something like Eleanor not Ellie.

You are coming across as unnecessarily aggressive.

My parents were like your MIL, especially with my sister whose name has a number of shortenings (mine has hardly any).

They spent her whole school career trying to make sure that she was only known by the long form of her name and when she was a teenager I remember cringing as they corrected her friends publicly on this. She was furious and told them that if they kept that up she would correct the next one of their friends who referred to either of them by the shortened versions of their own names - because only my parents were allowed to be known by shortened versions of their names in our house and always were.!! They didn't appear to understand what a double standard that was until my sister and I (as adults) pointed it out. It then also sank in that their insistence on full names simply hadn't worked and had looked silly.

My MIL apparently used to say on the phone to friends calling “no, there’s no John living at this address, we do have a Jonathan, would you like to speak to him?”