Posted on 11/10/2010 6:06:04 PM PST by ransomnote
Rejecting the top names of the past century, more and more parents are choosing gender-neutral boys' names. SNIP
When sportswriter Peter Richmond, author of Badasses, was expecting his first son 25 years ago, he didn’t want to name him Tom, after his father, or Burgess, after his grandfather, and he certainly didn’t want to name the poor kid after himself.
Instead, Richmond and his wife wanted to give their son a name that was unmistakably male yet broke rank with all the masculine names that came before it. Robert, William, and John have dominated boy-baby naming since statisticians began keeping track. SNIP
“Naming your kid Hunter or Breaker is like saying *expletive* you to the world that invented feminism,” said Richmond. “It’s a desperate cry to hold onto an archaic and useless form of masculinity, whereas naming your kid Robert III after your grandfather who invented the flyswatter and bought the house in Newport is a very different kind of holding onto an outmoded form of masculinity.”
(Excerpt) Read more at thedailybeast.com ...
I guess. Jr is pretty traditional. We didn’t do it altho there are Jrs on both sides of our family. I think they are confusing sometimes, altho I know jrs who are quite proud to have their dad’s name. It might depend entirely on the family dynamics. I think naming your child Apple or something made up or really trendy might be a worse thing. If you name them after a beloved family member it says they are part of something bigger than themselves instead of a possession like your dog.
All I can tell you is that we agonized over naming our sons. Didn’t want names that lent themselves to stupid nicknames. Didn’t want names that were cute for kids but awful for adults. Etc. And we did want to give them one name that had a family connection, but not a junior (because of the confusion and because we didn’t want one child to be a junior and the subsequent children not to be able to have that).
None of them have complained about their names.
My dogs, I have fun naming. My kids I worked hard on. :)
You mentioned “confusing” in conjunction with the “Jr.” issue. When I was a young man I had a part-time job with Sears in their collection department and many was the time that I thought that I was speaking to the customer and I was instead talking to his son or his father. Such are the delights in the stupid Jr. and Sr. bit.
And I was told by people who worked in the granting of credit that they encountered similar problems when trying to get a credit history from various organizations.
All because men who had such a lack of imagination in naming their sons, or, more likely, the heightened sense of their own star status that they conferred upon their son their own name, believing, I guess, that the glory would be reflected on their progeny.
Which reminds me. I once attended some single A baseball games (single A is a lowly form of professional baseball, men who want to be major league players start there) and on one team was Mickey Mantle, Jr. Well, of course, those genes come together very infrequently and Jr. was a big disappointment. He lacked the talent.
But he was Mickey Mantle Jr. and there were high expectations...not to be realized. He must have felt a failure.
Wow, you have a really strong opinion about this issue. All I can say is I don’t agree with you across the board, but I’m sorry if this has caused some problems in your own life. Most of the Juniors I know don’t seem to have any sort of issues with their fathers based on their having been given the family name. Perhaps you should talk it out with someone.
The same people who name their sons Precious and SirRoderick.
I'm in HR and both of these young men have applied for roles within our company.
And Precious? He's HUGE. 6'4"ish, 300 lbs, if he's an ounce.
Nice guy though.
In my extended family we have 4 Felix Fenton (last name redacted) and 4 Felix Fenton (other last name redacted)
Each of the IVs decided NOT to do a V.
One of my cousins (several times removed) was an astronaut. This was back in 1983, before he was going up on a mission, we had 7 of the 8 Felix Fenton's in one room, I called out to my 1st cousin Felix IV and I had all 7 turn to look at me. OY, it was funny! :-)
LOL
The Juniors I’ve known have all been fine with it. Im sure there are people who dislike their names no matter what they are, and if someone has a real issue, they can legally change it.
Well, indeed I do have a strong opinion on the issue. Naming someone after yourself strikes me as the action of someone quite “struck upon” himself and I’ve never been an admirer of those types of people. It is further evidence of men’s being far more conceited than women. Have you ever heard of a woman naming one of her daughters the same name as herself? It may happen but I would bet that it is very, very rare.
And the matter has never been a problem for me (aside from those occasions when I had to explain that I wanted to speak to Joe Smith Jr., not Joe Smith Sr., about his delinquent bill). Thankfully, I was never a Jr. If I had been, at age 21, you would have found me in the courthouse petitioning the court to have my name changed to something, say, more “individualistic”.
And no, ma’am, I feel no need to “talk it out with someone.” It was never a “family issue” with me because I never had children. I never wanted children. Those are other people’s problems.
I am 70 years of age, and my opinions are quite well-formed and I see no need to modify them at this point.
Doesn’t seem like any point in taking this conversation any further.
No, there is no point in doing so. We just don’t agree.
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