Since my wife is lugging around a 5-month-old fetus, we’re looking at baby names. Luckily only one name on our list is in the top 10 with most of our preferred names down in the '70s or lower.
But this compiled list of name has some that are rather… Youneeque. I pity the downtrodden child who goes through life as “Sorel”.
Marginally better are those with delusions of grandeur: “Commander” (Hopefully his last name isn’t Cobra); “Jeneral”; “Umajesty”.
Horrid is the family with the aversion to the letter X (“Maksymilian”) and families with a predeliction for the letter Y (Kwynncey, Ayreeanna, Charysma, Mysteek, Reynger, Bryttanni)
But the overall worst name is a tossup between Zurrenity and Phaith. I keep picturing Gary Oldman spitting out "Puh-fthAYth! works for Puh-fzir! and is best friends with Zuuuuuu- renity!
I worked as a day camp counselor this summer and over the past two weeks. That means I got to see all of the weirdass names that parents are giving their children nowadays. Most had just the generic brand of weird that is slowly becoming the norm, but some parents are naming their children [spirit fingers] with style! [/spirit fingers]. Stuff like Mikenze and Kelbi and Peiton (for a girl) and Treit Justus (for a boy), names that cause a little bit of me to die and rot away every time I say them or write them on the back of a craft we did or any business like that.
Compared to the above weirdness, the fact that my ex gave her new daughter the middle name of Rally barely makes the needle on the Freak-Name-O-Meter twitch.
I think a good controlling factor to these new names are if you can’t put the word “Senator” or “President” in front of your kid’s name, I feel you are definitely giving them a burden.
I mean, honestly, how diplomatic does Senator Zurrenity Smith sound.
CNN in 2025…
“Today, US President Umajesty Jones met with world leaders… and there was much subtle giggling when he was introduced.”
Our good friends have chosen “Lennon” as the name for their baby. “It’s good for a boy or a girl!” they crowed happily, “And it’s really original!”
Their faces fell when I told them of two people I know with that name – both of whom have chosen to go by their middle names rather than be known as “Lennon”. :rolleyes:
and another was someone actually had the middle name of Baby Boy. Yes. Um apparently on his birth certificate before his parents named him they had baby boy on it. When the picked the name and it was legalized on his certificate, someone left baby boy on there.
My grandmother’s “official” name is Baby Girl, but she goes by Mary Ann. It was a big hassle several years ago when she went to get a passport. My great-grandparents had had four girls by that point, and they were just like “screw it” when it came to another girl’s name.
I’m probably the only person on this board who thinks so, but in my opinion Xao Alexander is a cool name. It flows together pretty nicely.
As for a strange name, one of my family members has named her new daughter Precious Ayngel Lastname. This way, she says, her daughter will be able to know that she is loved and wanted. It seems to me that the kid could learn that based on her parent’s actions toward her, but whatever.
Also, I’m okay with people making up names for their children (all names had to have been made up at some point or another), but this trend of people using dictionaries for baby name ideas needs to stop. If you just have to do it, get a dictionary from another language, and choose a non-obscene, non-embarrassing word that you know how to pronounce.
I don’t think Hazel’s all that bad. Old-fashioned, maybe, but not too horrible. Good thing Julia can afford bodyguards for the kids, though, because little Phinnaeus will be getting his butt kicked on the playground. Poor guy.
The ones I don’t understand are the weird spellings for basic names. I met a Krysstina once. What is that? You’re setting the kid up for a lifetime of correcting people over the phone. “No, no, with a K. Two S’s. No, a Y, not an I.” I can understand that parents might be trying to be original so their child won’t share the same name as half a dozen of his or her playmates, but why mess with spelling so that it hurts the eyes?
I agree with Improvisor. A kid has to be able to grow into the name he’s given.
