Really? I thought that the reasons for choosing names was coffee-talk amongst mothers (in particular). “You named your child [name]. That is really pretty, is it a family name?” or some variation of that has been a conversation starter since I had children…I had no idea that I should be spitting at people who asked or that there are those who might spit at me for doing so.
I meant only if they were pissed about why I named the baby.
Okay, that is much better than the mental picture I got originally. 
Yeah, no one should be pissed about it…even if my son’s name had been “stolen” I would have just been a little miffed privately and would never have actually made it to “pissed” or said anything about it.
For the record, my mom was only annoyed because the woman took the first and middle name she had picked out just 2 weeks before I was born. To spend 8 1/2 months thinking about a name only to have to come up with a new one in 2 weeks or less, a name I would live with for the rest of my life, was disconcerting.
And to know that this child, who would have the name she had picked out for me with meaningful connections, in the same classes as me, was equally disconcerting.
It was just a strange thing.
What about if it’s a more common name?
What if your friend named her daughter Katherine and you named your daughter Katherine? Or Elizabeth? Or a son named Michael?
Or what if it’s a less common name like, say, Enid. But your grandmother you loved dearly was named Enid and you always wanted to name your daughter Enid. Are you name-napping if your friend names her daughter Enid first?
I wouldn’t consider any of those name-napping. I think that was addressed upthread…independently coming up with the same name is whole different kettle of fish than “stealing” the name. Likewise if you named your child Enid because your grandmother was so named, and your sister-in-law named her child the same, after the same grandmother, that would not be name-napping, just coincidence.
Why did she have to come up with a new one?
From the article:
This is exactly why we didn’t share the names we chose for our kids with anyone until we were just about to deliver. We didn’t want to be talked out of them, or told about how someone by that name used to bully Aunt Mildred in high school.
If it’s just a friend’s kid, I don’t have a problem using the name. In a family, it’s trickier, because (hopefully) they’ll be around your whole life. If my niece was named Emily I wouldn’t name my daughter Emily. Not only because they’d be peers and cousins, but also my parents would have two granddaughters named Emily which is just confusing.
- Not to mention that 25% of all girls under 15 are named Emily.
Doesn’t anybody move anymore? Just because your neighbor lives next door now, it’s hardly a guarantee that they’ll still be there in five years when the identically named kids start school.
In my opinion, getting upset about this, even between cousins, is ridiculous. Your kids will probably have two sets of cousins anyway. They’ll get over it.
I think “name napping” is douchey, but I wouldn’t say anything about it.
I also wouldn’t say anything to someone who suddenly started dressing like me our adopting my speech patterns or idiosyncrasies. That kind of imitation is a sincere (if immature and annoying) form of flattery among the socially inept. There’s no point in getting angry about it; it’s like yelling at a pet bird.
/edit: Obviously there can be no preemptive claim on a given name. If you’re that concerned that it stay secret, don’t mention it until it’s going on the birth certificate.
It’s truly bizarre to me, but then I don’t get the point of wanting your child to have a unique name anyway. When I was young, I had a friend named Pine, which I thought was a wonderful name, and I considered it for my future child. But that was only because I thought it was a great name, not because I wanted my child to be the only Pine around. I wouldn’t have cared if one of my friends chose Pine also. Besides, the original Pine hated it and went by Barbie.
My mother has several different stories about the origin of my name, which is familiar but not particularly common. What I do know for sure is that the daughter of her neighbors, who was two years older than I am, had the same name, and even though our families were friendly for 30 years, it never ocurred to me to worry that someone else had my name. I found the very rare confusion amusing rather than annoying.
Somebody else giving their kid the same name as yours does not amount to “imitation” of you.
Here’s a slightly different situation: When I was growing up, the teenage son of the people who lived across the street died in an accident. (I just called my mom to confirm details, but she didn’t remember much either.) He had a distinctive name; let’s say it was . . . Cecil. A short while later, the family that lived next door to them had a baby, and named him . . . Cecil.
My mom thinks it was specifically in tribute to the dead boy, but I remember it being regarded in neighborhood scuttlebutt as not a great idea. Imagine the dead boy’s mother every time her neighbors call their son out the back door . . .
I suppose they meant well, but I have to agree that it could cause some discomfort. (Not even family, just neighbors!) At least make it a middle name or something.
If it’s a very (or even fairly) uncommon name, yes, yes it does.
My sister (older) and cousin (younger) have an uncommon name in common - and no, it isn’t a family name. Apparently her parents “heard it somewhere” (perhaps hearing about their niece for several years) and that shared name is on the list of things that annoy my parents about that part of the family. It’s exactly like dressing the same, etc. Of course, it doesn’t harm me if you wear exactly what I wear. But it is a bit irksome.
The entire purpose of a name is to identify someone as a unique individual. It’s not a terrible tragedy if one person has the same first name as another in their peer group, but I’ve seen classes and workplaces where 3 or 4 people have the same first name! That’s just ridiculous.
If teachers and bosses have to keep refering to someone as “John 1” and “John 2”… to distinguish the two… or “Jennifer S” and “Jennifer B”… or even just invent nicknames, it can be really annoying.
IMHO, if I were to ever have kids, I’d aim for a name that was neither too common nor too unique.
/Raises hand! That would be me. My given first name was ridiculously common and one year at school there were no fewer than 6, that’s six(!) of us. To make matters worse, 4 of the 6 had the exact same middle name (it flows nicely with our first name) so the teachers tried to call us by last name, but wouldn’t you know it, 2 “Jones”, two “Smiths”, and then the two of us who were unique enough to have very difficult to pronounce last names. Joy! We knew our numbers by the end of the year and I routinely responded to “four”. Not fun, and not something that I wanted for my children. Although the youngest has a very common name and there is actually another girl at her school with the same first and last names- thankfully they are in different grades, so the confusion is minimal.
That was my intent for the one I got to name myself (the oldest is all mine, the others are step-). I think I did it because his name sounds “normal” and no one has any trouble spelling or pronouncing it, and yet in all these years (he is 20) we haven’t run into another one (but there are a few on the internet and one who shares his last name as well…) so we managed “unique” enough without being weird or the only one ever. The downside of that is that he never felt the need to use his last name at all and still tends to sign his name using only the first name. I guess that is a hard habit to break.
I agree.I don’t have a unique name, or any kids, but I’m surprised at the number of people who seem very annoyed at even the idea of someone naming people truly unique names. Why is this so bothersome to some people?
I have an exact namesake - my first and middle names are very unusual, and 6 months after I was born my mum saw a baby’s birth announcement with the exact same combination (small town and both of us had a photo and announcement in the paper). It doesn’t bother me knowing there is another one out there, but it would be somewhat disconcerting being in the same social circle as her. That may be because I have been the only person with this name anywhere I have been, so I am used to be a ‘one and only’.
My niece (born after I met her uncle) is named a name which is almost the same as me - we both think it does get a little confusing in conversation - would be even worse if the name was identical.
When it came to naming our baby, I removed all names from our wish list if we knew someone or their kid with the same name to avoid confusion. I also spent a great deal of time thinking about meanings, sound combinations etc to come up with what I think is a perfect name for our little girl (unusual, but classic). If by chance someone I was close to used this name I’d be surprised but not particularly bothered. If like the OP they used the name because they couldn’t be bothered thinking of anything else, I’d be a little irked - it would feel like copying my homework or something! But I guess I’d get over it.
With this response right here, you indicated you really don’t want to know the answer. You just want to argue how it’s stupid. So I see no reason to answer you.
It’s annoying in the same way it was annoying having a friend at school who always uses your ideas. It does absolutely no harm, but it’s annoying all the same. I think most people try to avoid names in their social group, when someone else goes deliberately against that unwritten code, it’s annoying.
It would be like having a neighbour who always gets what you have. Buy a new BMW, they buy a new BMW, get cable, they get cable, paint the house, they paint the house, name your kid “Death of Rats”, and they name their kid “Death of Rats”. No harm, just annoying.