Why are people in the DC area so weird about name popularity?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't get these comments that are like "oh they thought they were being so unique by naming their kid Milo but he's one of three in class." First of all, Milo is ranked #120 -- if there are three of them in one class, it's a freak accident unlikely to be repeated in that child's life. And second, since name popularity is published online and widely reported on, I doubt anyone is using a popular name without knowing it's popular. Parents giving their kids more popular names know they are more popular and are okay with it, and thus by definition cannot think they are being "so unique." If anything, they are bucking the apparent trend of obsessing over giving your name a totally original, rare name and just saying "screw it, we just really like this name and it's okay if our special snowflake sometimes shares a name with a classmate or coworker."

Milo is ranked #120 in the nation, but do you think it is ranked #120 in Little Rock? In Arlington, VA? In Arlington, TX? Names differ in popularity by region, and that is why we had 2 girls named Xanthe, 2 girls named Sage, and 2 boys named Gray in my kid’s 1st grade year in ny (45 kids total). Not a single Jacob.

... and? Who cares? Why does the popularity of the name matter? All of the names you just mentioned are not very popular overall, too, so even if the kid winds up in a little bubble where there are a couple in school with them, in the rest of their life they will have a fairly uncommon name.

So why does it matter? Why fixate?

?? I’m not fixated on anything. I’m just explaining why there are often 3 kids named Milo or whatever in a class even though the name is rare nationally. It’s just less rare in some areas and more rare in others. Relax. Your Milo is still one of a kind!

But what does that have to do with the topic at hand? Also your anecdote makes no sense because even if there were two kids named Xanthe in your child's class, I guarantee that name is still not "popular" where you live. That's just a random freak occurrence that could happen with any name, and there's probably no way to avoid it even if you pour over name popularity lists.

I answered a post that queried, “I don’t get it when parents say a name is overused when the name is not statistically popular” by pointing out that names can vary by locale in popularity, causing some names to be more prevalent in some areas than others. It’s not a random freak accident that you are more likely to have 2 kids named Chaim in a classroom in Brooklyn than in Mobile, Alabama. It’s not rocket science. And it’s “pore” not “pour”.

[Anonymous]

I can only answer for myself, and I personally have not noticed this more in DC than in other areas (and I have a pretty spread out friend group).

But for me - my name is Jennifer. Super, super common for women my age. I never have liked my name, and I hated as a kid always having to be Jen R. In fact, I once went to a summer camp where there was another Jen R. and I basically had to go by Jenny which is a name I hated even more. I hated having as many as THREE Jennifers in my class (the actual classroom, not the year). It just always felt boring and dull, and I found the endless confusion over which Jennifer to be really annoying, and almost like erasing? Dramatic, sure, but that's how it felt as a kid.

Flash forward to me naming my kids - I did not want to give them a common name. Unfortunately, my husband and I have really different taste in names, and so compromises needed to happen. We've got one kid with a super one of a kind name that we both happened to fall in love with, and one with a less common, but not unheard of, name. But for our other kid, the only name we could agree on is in the top 25 (but not the top 10) so we went with it.

There's another one in his grade. So now he's Leo S. and it REALLY bothers me.

(Actual names changed)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can only answer for myself, and I personally have not noticed this more in DC than in other areas (and I have a pretty spread out friend group).

But for me - my name is Jennifer. Super, super common for women my age. I never have liked my name, and I hated as a kid always having to be Jen R. In fact, I once went to a summer camp where there was another Jen R. and I basically had to go by Jenny which is a name I hated even more. I hated having as many as THREE Jennifers in my class (the actual classroom, not the year). It just always felt boring and dull, and I found the endless confusion over which Jennifer to be really annoying, and almost like erasing? Dramatic, sure, but that's how it felt as a kid.

Flash forward to me naming my kids - I did not want to give them a common name. Unfortunately, my husband and I have really different taste in names, and so compromises needed to happen. We've got one kid with a super one of a kind name that we both happened to fall in love with, and one with a less common, but not unheard of, name. But for our other kid, the only name we could agree on is in the top 25 (but not the top 10) so we went with it.

There's another one in his grade. So now he's Leo S. and it REALLY bothers me.

(Actual names changed)

PP to add - I also have a cousin who gave her son a name that was really unusual at the time, and then EXPLODED in popularity like 3-5 years later. Literally went from not being in the top 100 to being in the top 10 in that time. She was pissed and I thought that was really fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it is unique to this area. There are dozens of naming sites out there. So lots of people looking at this.

OP here. I'm not talking about people who are invested in what they name their kids. I think that's pretty universal. I'm talking about a specific obsession with unpopular names. Like the mom at the BBQ was specifically bragging about how her kids all have names outside the top thousand names, and how there were only 7 kids given her younger child's name the year they were born. That is a level of obsession I've never encountered anywhere. In the city where I used to live, people would consider any name outside maybe the top 30 or so sufficiently "unpopular" to ensure your kid won't be one of several in class.

That’s one person. Not indicative of a whole region of the US.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I don't get these comments that are like "oh they thought they were being so unique by naming their kid Milo but he's one of three in class." First of all, Milo is ranked #120 -- if there are three of them in one class, it's a freak accident unlikely to be repeated in that child's life. And second, since name popularity is published online and widely reported on, I doubt anyone is using a popular name without knowing it's popular. Parents giving their kids more popular names know they are more popular and are okay with it, and thus by definition cannot think they are being "so unique." If anything, they are bucking the apparent trend of obsessing over giving your name a totally original, rare name and just saying "screw it, we just really like this name and it's okay if our special snowflake sometimes shares a name with a classmate or coworker."

Milo is ranked #120 in the nation, but do you think it is ranked #120 in Little Rock? In Arlington, VA? In Arlington, TX? Names differ in popularity by region, and that is why we had 2 girls named Xanthe, 2 girls named Sage, and 2 boys named Gray in my kid’s 1st grade year in ny (45 kids total). Not a single Jacob.

... and? Who cares? Why does the popularity of the name matter? All of the names you just mentioned are not very popular overall, too, so even if the kid winds up in a little bubble where there are a couple in school with them, in the rest of their life they will have a fairly uncommon name.

So why does it matter? Why fixate?

?? I’m not fixated on anything. I’m just explaining why there are often 3 kids named Milo or whatever in a class even though the name is rare nationally. It’s just less rare in some areas and more rare in others. Relax. Your Milo is still one of a kind!

But what does that have to do with the topic at hand? Also your anecdote makes no sense because even if there were two kids named Xanthe in your child's class, I guarantee that name is still not "popular" where you live. That's just a random freak occurrence that could happen with any name, and there's probably no way to avoid it even if you pour over name popularity lists.

I answered a post that queried, “I don’t get it when parents say a name is overused when the name is not statistically popular” by pointing out that names can vary by locale in popularity, causing some names to be more prevalent in some areas than others. It’s not a random freak accident that you are more likely to have 2 kids named Chaim in a classroom in Brooklyn than in Mobile, Alabama. It’s not rocket science. And it’s “pore” not “pour”.

I think you misread the post you are responding to, which didn't say what you thought it did. You were answering a question no one asked, which is why you got pushback.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it is unique to this area. There are dozens of naming sites out there. So lots of people looking at this.

OP here. I'm not talking about people who are invested in what they name their kids. I think that's pretty universal. I'm talking about a specific obsession with unpopular names. Like the mom at the BBQ was specifically bragging about how her kids all have names outside the top thousand names, and how there were only 7 kids given her younger child's name the year they were born. That is a level of obsession I've never encountered anywhere. In the city where I used to live, people would consider any name outside maybe the top 30 or so sufficiently "unpopular" to ensure your kid won't be one of several in class.

That’s one person. Not indicative of a whole region of the US.

Region? No. DC and close in burbs, which are filled with people who are hyperconscious of status and "prestige" (lol this thread) and unusually competitive? Yes. It's definitely not just that one person. I've met many people in DC who will pontificate on this subject.

[Anonymous]

My son has a name that was in the top 10 the year he was born. He is 10, just finished 4th grade. He has never had another kid w his name in his class at school or on a sports team or in an activity and we don’t know any kids w his name in our neighborhood or among our friends’ kids. Meanwhile my daughter has a name that was 500 something the year she was born and we know 3 other kids w her name in our social circle. Weird. Luckily we didn’t choose our kids’ names based on popularity but just on how much we liked the names.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can only answer for myself, and I personally have not noticed this more in DC than in other areas (and I have a pretty spread out friend group).

But for me - my name is Jennifer. Super, super common for women my age. I never have liked my name, and I hated as a kid always having to be Jen R. In fact, I once went to a summer camp where there was another Jen R. and I basically had to go by Jenny which is a name I hated even more. I hated having as many as THREE Jennifers in my class (the actual classroom, not the year). It just always felt boring and dull, and I found the endless confusion over which Jennifer to be really annoying, and almost like erasing? Dramatic, sure, but that's how it felt as a kid.

Flash forward to me naming my kids - I did not want to give them a common name. Unfortunately, my husband and I have really different taste in names, and so compromises needed to happen. We've got one kid with a super one of a kind name that we both happened to fall in love with, and one with a less common, but not unheard of, name. But for our other kid, the only name we could agree on is in the top 25 (but not the top 10) so we went with it.

There's another one in his grade. So now he's Leo S. and it REALLY bothers me.

(Actual names changed)

PP to add - I also have a cousin who gave her son a name that was really unusual at the time, and then EXPLODED in popularity like 3-5 years later. Literally went from not being in the top 100 to being in the top 10 in that time. She was pissed and I thought that was really fair.

I think the whole thread is about confusion as to WHY she was pissed. She picked a name because she liked it and presumably other people did, too. Why was she mad? Did she pick the name because it was unpopular?

Signed,
A Jennifer who shrugs about name popularity in either direction

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it is unique to this area. There are dozens of naming sites out there. So lots of people looking at this.

OP here. I'm not talking about people who are invested in what they name their kids. I think that's pretty universal. I'm talking about a specific obsession with unpopular names. Like the mom at the BBQ was specifically bragging about how her kids all have names outside the top thousand names, and how there were only 7 kids given her younger child's name the year they were born. That is a level of obsession I've never encountered anywhere. In the city where I used to live, people would consider any name outside maybe the top 30 or so sufficiently "unpopular" to ensure your kid won't be one of several in class.

That’s one person. Not indicative of a whole region of the US.

Region? No. DC and close in burbs, which are filled with people who are hyperconscious of status and "prestige" (lol this thread) and unusually competitive? Yes. It's definitely not just that one person. I've met many people in DC who will pontificate on this subject.

It may be more of a thing in DC area than in other areas but it’s still not as ubiquitous as OP is making it out to be. It’s just that you notice more when someone does “pontificate” about it bc they are being obnoxious so that stands out more than the majority of parents who do not think this way and thus don’t have much to say on the topic.

[Anonymous]

It's all about status and prestige seeking. ESPECIALLY the trend to use traditional surnames as first names. WASPS would keep names in the family by recirculating maiden names or your mother's maiden name as a first or middle name.

Now people just pick WASPy last names as first names because it makes them sound fancy.

Again, trying too hard.

[Anonymous]

I was just looking at the SSA name website for the year my son was born. His name is in the 80s in popularity and thus far, he has been the only one in his classes in preschool and elementary school as well as the various sports teams. There is one kid in his grade with the most popular name of that year, another friend whose name is in the top 10 and the rest are scattered.

I just looked up my own name which was 21 in the year I was born and the year after. 21 was the height of its popularity. Now you don't hear of babies being named my name. I'm married to a Michael which was 1 for so many years. It is no longer in the top 10.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't get these comments that are like "oh they thought they were being so unique by naming their kid Milo but he's one of three in class." First of all, Milo is ranked #120 -- if there are three of them in one class, it's a freak accident unlikely to be repeated in that child's life. And second, since name popularity is published online and widely reported on, I doubt anyone is using a popular name without knowing it's popular. Parents giving their kids more popular names know they are more popular and are okay with it, and thus by definition cannot think they are being "so unique." If anything, they are bucking the apparent trend of obsessing over giving your name a totally original, rare name and just saying "screw it, we just really like this name and it's okay if our special snowflake sometimes shares a name with a classmate or coworker."

Milo is ranked #120 in the nation, but do you think it is ranked #120 in Little Rock? In Arlington, VA? In Arlington, TX? Names differ in popularity by region, and that is why we had 2 girls named Xanthe, 2 girls named Sage, and 2 boys named Gray in my kid’s 1st grade year in ny (45 kids total). Not a single Jacob.

... and? Who cares? Why does the popularity of the name matter? All of the names you just mentioned are not very popular overall, too, so even if the kid winds up in a little bubble where there are a couple in school with them, in the rest of their life they will have a fairly uncommon name.

So why does it matter? Why fixate?

Answered in the first comment posted-status. Giving your kid a trending name is often judged as low class. DC is a pretty status obsessed place and no parent here want to use Milo and in three years see it has become the next Brayden.

Brayden may be considered a "low class" name but it's not particularly popular. It's ranked #190, not far on the list from names like Finn, Oscar, Nico, and Max, all names used by people I know who valued a name that wasn't "too popular."

The popularity of a name is not what makes it low or high class. If anything, an obsession with choosing an "original" name is precisely what leads to those Utah manglings like Brayden/Jayden/Kayden or Kinsleigh/Paisley/Brynleigh. Those are efforts to be unique. It would have been been classier to just name their kids William and Sofia.

Popularity is similar but not the same as trends. Did you not read what I wrote, or can you not understand the difference?

A name Brayden is not as popular as James, but it is absolutely more trendy. Any name chart curve can show this information. It’s not popularity that makes a name low class (to some people) it’s trendiness.

Thank you, my reading comprehension is fine. This thread is about popularity, if you wanted to make a distinction about "trendiness" then you should have said so. Brayden is not that popular of a name. It might be trendy, but I think the real issue is that it trends among people who lack status. It is popular among middle class families in places like Utah, which makes it "low class" to a UMC person living in a coastal city. The issue is not its popularity but its social coding.

By comparison, look at the trend of the name Ezra, which has recently followed the same trajectory as Brayden but a few years behind: https://www.behindthename.com/name/brayden/top/united-states?compare=Ezra&type=percent

It's a similarly "spiky" name reflecting a very sudden interest in the name -- a trend. Yet Ezra is coded as intellectual, coastal, and cosmopolitan. It is currently much more popular than Brayden. But it's considered as more "high class" than Brayden.

So no, it's not just that popular names are viewed as more "low class".

Ezra is only viewed (by some) as more cosmopolitan and intellectual because it’s “a few years behind”, as you yourself acknowledged.

Soon enough the masses will catch on that “cosmopolitan intellectual” parents are using it and use it too and it will be just as plebeian as Mason or Braydon or something. This phenomenon has been widely documented.

I disagree. People in coastal cities will view Brayden and Ezra totally differently even when they have similar popularity because of other associations. Ezra is one of those "old person" names that have become popular recently. A lot of people using it are likely naming after a relative (fun fact: Ezra is a Hebrew name and in Ashkenazi tradition, you are not supposed to name children after living relatives, so there's kind of a built in name cycle in some Jewish communities as people name children after great-grandparents but rarely after grandparents) or have positive associations with famous Ezras like Ezra Pound.

Meanwhile, Brayden is one of those invented names that didn't exist before the year 2000. It has no history and thus has a much narrower association with the sorts of people who choose names like Brayden now, who are largely not well-educated elites in large cities.

They may have similar popularity spikes, but they will never have similar cultural or class associations because they are simply very different names.

Look, I’m sorry that you used a trendy name for your kid. You can disagree all you want but there is plenty of data and reporting on this phenomenon.

Names get popular and trend because the masses observe what names have cultural cachet and prestige and then use them for their own children. Then these names become “too popular” or too “common” and have less prestige so the masses move on to the next elite-sounding name.

Can you link to this "data and reporting"? Most of what I've read talks about how naming trends are just super diverse now and there are no more juggernaut names like Jennifer anymore. There was also this interesting article in the Post last year about how, as parents have started emphasizing individualism and uniqueness in baby names, trends become concentrated on sounds within the name. The article mostly focuses on name suffixes, but I've also seen commentary on sites like Nameberry about how names tend to cluster around popular starting letters or sounds, or how there are waves of trends around shorter versus longer names (for instance, the general trend of giving girls longer three- and four-syllable names has given way to a trend of shorter one- and two-syllable names, which has resulted in many of the nicknames for those longer names becoming popular stand along names for younger kids).

Anyway, I think your analysis is off, and not because I'm defensive about what I named my kid. I think you are viewing it narrowly as someone who is obsessed with the "prestige" of names, which in itself indicates a striver focus. In other words, exactly what others on the thread have mentioned -- DC has a striver culture of people who are determined to "win" at baby naming, and strivers are more focused on giving kids unusual names. Interestingly, a lot of the wealthy people I know have given their kids pretty popular, common names recently. I wonder if being wealthy allows them not to worry so much that their child's name will make or break them. Their kids are going to be fine no matter what, so they can go ahead and name them Zoe or Noah and not worry about it.

It’s funny this conversation has come full circle to my first comment, which you are now agreeing with and was the first comment in the entire thread. It comes down to status and prestige.

https://slate.com/business/2005/04/where-baby-names-come-from.html

The first comment in the thread says that some people think trendy names are a negative class indicator, but that's different from the argument above, which is about "prestige" not class. And even if you argue that prestige and class are the same thing, it's actually a different argument.

You are saying that people in the DC area choose unpopular names because of a fear of appearing "low class" by choosing a "trendy name" which you are defining as a popular name (even though some unpopular names are trendy and some popular names are decidedly not trendy).

The above argument says that people in DC choose unpopular names because they are actively seeking the "prestige" of a name no one else has. This argument ignores trendiness and focuses exclusively on popularity.

These are related but not the same.

Again with the lack of reading comprehension. I specifically clarified the difference between a popular name and a trendy name in this exact thread. You are making my points for me.

“James” is a popular name which is not trendy, as I already pointed out above.

Trendy names are the ones which have a big upswing in popularity and hence become associated as low status by elites, who then move on to something else.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't get these comments that are like "oh they thought they were being so unique by naming their kid Milo but he's one of three in class." First of all, Milo is ranked #120 -- if there are three of them in one class, it's a freak accident unlikely to be repeated in that child's life. And second, since name popularity is published online and widely reported on, I doubt anyone is using a popular name without knowing it's popular. Parents giving their kids more popular names know they are more popular and are okay with it, and thus by definition cannot think they are being "so unique." If anything, they are bucking the apparent trend of obsessing over giving your name a totally original, rare name and just saying "screw it, we just really like this name and it's okay if our special snowflake sometimes shares a name with a classmate or coworker."

Milo is ranked #120 in the nation, but do you think it is ranked #120 in Little Rock? In Arlington, VA? In Arlington, TX? Names differ in popularity by region, and that is why we had 2 girls named Xanthe, 2 girls named Sage, and 2 boys named Gray in my kid’s 1st grade year in ny (45 kids total). Not a single Jacob.

... and? Who cares? Why does the popularity of the name matter? All of the names you just mentioned are not very popular overall, too, so even if the kid winds up in a little bubble where there are a couple in school with them, in the rest of their life they will have a fairly uncommon name.

So why does it matter? Why fixate?

Answered in the first comment posted-status. Giving your kid a trending name is often judged as low class. DC is a pretty status obsessed place and no parent here want to use Milo and in three years see it has become the next Brayden.

Brayden may be considered a "low class" name but it's not particularly popular. It's ranked #190, not far on the list from names like Finn, Oscar, Nico, and Max, all names used by people I know who valued a name that wasn't "too popular."

The popularity of a name is not what makes it low or high class. If anything, an obsession with choosing an "original" name is precisely what leads to those Utah manglings like Brayden/Jayden/Kayden or Kinsleigh/Paisley/Brynleigh. Those are efforts to be unique. It would have been been classier to just name their kids William and Sofia.

Popularity is similar but not the same as trends. Did you not read what I wrote, or can you not understand the difference?

A name Brayden is not as popular as James, but it is absolutely more trendy. Any name chart curve can show this information. It’s not popularity that makes a name low class (to some people) it’s trendiness.

Thank you, my reading comprehension is fine. This thread is about popularity, if you wanted to make a distinction about "trendiness" then you should have said so. Brayden is not that popular of a name. It might be trendy, but I think the real issue is that it trends among people who lack status. It is popular among middle class families in places like Utah, which makes it "low class" to a UMC person living in a coastal city. The issue is not its popularity but its social coding.

By comparison, look at the trend of the name Ezra, which has recently followed the same trajectory as Brayden but a few years behind: https://www.behindthename.com/name/brayden/top/united-states?compare=Ezra&type=percent

It's a similarly "spiky" name reflecting a very sudden interest in the name -- a trend. Yet Ezra is coded as intellectual, coastal, and cosmopolitan. It is currently much more popular than Brayden. But it's considered as more "high class" than Brayden.

So no, it's not just that popular names are viewed as more "low class".

Ezra is only viewed (by some) as more cosmopolitan and intellectual because it’s “a few years behind”, as you yourself acknowledged.

Soon enough the masses will catch on that “cosmopolitan intellectual” parents are using it and use it too and it will be just as plebeian as Mason or Braydon or something. This phenomenon has been widely documented.

I disagree. People in coastal cities will view Brayden and Ezra totally differently even when they have similar popularity because of other associations. Ezra is one of those "old person" names that have become popular recently. A lot of people using it are likely naming after a relative (fun fact: Ezra is a Hebrew name and in Ashkenazi tradition, you are not supposed to name children after living relatives, so there's kind of a built in name cycle in some Jewish communities as people name children after great-grandparents but rarely after grandparents) or have positive associations with famous Ezras like Ezra Pound.

Meanwhile, Brayden is one of those invented names that didn't exist before the year 2000. It has no history and thus has a much narrower association with the sorts of people who choose names like Brayden now, who are largely not well-educated elites in large cities.

They may have similar popularity spikes, but they will never have similar cultural or class associations because they are simply very different names.

Look, I’m sorry that you used a trendy name for your kid. You can disagree all you want but there is plenty of data and reporting on this phenomenon.

Names get popular and trend because the masses observe what names have cultural cachet and prestige and then use them for their own children. Then these names become “too popular” or too “common” and have less prestige so the masses move on to the next elite-sounding name.

Can you link to this "data and reporting"? Most of what I've read talks about how naming trends are just super diverse now and there are no more juggernaut names like Jennifer anymore. There was also this interesting article in the Post last year about how, as parents have started emphasizing individualism and uniqueness in baby names, trends become concentrated on sounds within the name. The article mostly focuses on name suffixes, but I've also seen commentary on sites like Nameberry about how names tend to cluster around popular starting letters or sounds, or how there are waves of trends around shorter versus longer names (for instance, the general trend of giving girls longer three- and four-syllable names has given way to a trend of shorter one- and two-syllable names, which has resulted in many of the nicknames for those longer names becoming popular stand along names for younger kids).

Anyway, I think your analysis is off, and not because I'm defensive about what I named my kid. I think you are viewing it narrowly as someone who is obsessed with the "prestige" of names, which in itself indicates a striver focus. In other words, exactly what others on the thread have mentioned -- DC has a striver culture of people who are determined to "win" at baby naming, and strivers are more focused on giving kids unusual names. Interestingly, a lot of the wealthy people I know have given their kids pretty popular, common names recently. I wonder if being wealthy allows them not to worry so much that their child's name will make or break them. Their kids are going to be fine no matter what, so they can go ahead and name them Zoe or Noah and not worry about it.

It’s funny this conversation has come full circle to my first comment, which you are now agreeing with and was the first comment in the entire thread. It comes down to status and prestige.

https://slate.com/business/2005/04/where-baby-names-come-from.html

The first comment in the thread says that some people think trendy names are a negative class indicator, but that's different from the argument above, which is about "prestige" not class. And even if you argue that prestige and class are the same thing, it's actually a different argument.

You are saying that people in the DC area choose unpopular names because of a fear of appearing "low class" by choosing a "trendy name" which you are defining as a popular name (even though some unpopular names are trendy and some popular names are decidedly not trendy).

The above argument says that people in DC choose unpopular names because they are actively seeking the "prestige" of a name no one else has. This argument ignores trendiness and focuses exclusively on popularity.

These are related but not the same.

Again with the lack of reading comprehension. I specifically clarified the difference between a popular name and a trendy name in this exact thread. You are making my points for me.

“James” is a popular name which is not trendy, as I already pointed out above.

Trendy names are the ones which have a big upswing in popularity and hence become associated as low status by elites, who then move on to something else.

OP here and this PP is embodying the exact attitude I'm talking about, which I had never encountered before coming to DC. The condescension, rudeness, obsession with status, use of the term "elites" (lol), etc.

If you aren't actually my neighbor obsessed with giving her kids names outside the top 1000, I'm sad because it means there are at least two of you, probably more. Sigh.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't get these comments that are like "oh they thought they were being so unique by naming their kid Milo but he's one of three in class." First of all, Milo is ranked #120 -- if there are three of them in one class, it's a freak accident unlikely to be repeated in that child's life. And second, since name popularity is published online and widely reported on, I doubt anyone is using a popular name without knowing it's popular. Parents giving their kids more popular names know they are more popular and are okay with it, and thus by definition cannot think they are being "so unique." If anything, they are bucking the apparent trend of obsessing over giving your name a totally original, rare name and just saying "screw it, we just really like this name and it's okay if our special snowflake sometimes shares a name with a classmate or coworker."

Milo is ranked #120 in the nation, but do you think it is ranked #120 in Little Rock? In Arlington, VA? In Arlington, TX? Names differ in popularity by region, and that is why we had 2 girls named Xanthe, 2 girls named Sage, and 2 boys named Gray in my kid’s 1st grade year in ny (45 kids total). Not a single Jacob.

... and? Who cares? Why does the popularity of the name matter? All of the names you just mentioned are not very popular overall, too, so even if the kid winds up in a little bubble where there are a couple in school with them, in the rest of their life they will have a fairly uncommon name.

So why does it matter? Why fixate?

Answered in the first comment posted-status. Giving your kid a trending name is often judged as low class. DC is a pretty status obsessed place and no parent here want to use Milo and in three years see it has become the next Brayden.

Brayden may be considered a "low class" name but it's not particularly popular. It's ranked #190, not far on the list from names like Finn, Oscar, Nico, and Max, all names used by people I know who valued a name that wasn't "too popular."

The popularity of a name is not what makes it low or high class. If anything, an obsession with choosing an "original" name is precisely what leads to those Utah manglings like Brayden/Jayden/Kayden or Kinsleigh/Paisley/Brynleigh. Those are efforts to be unique. It would have been been classier to just name their kids William and Sofia.

Popularity is similar but not the same as trends. Did you not read what I wrote, or can you not understand the difference?

A name Brayden is not as popular as James, but it is absolutely more trendy. Any name chart curve can show this information. It’s not popularity that makes a name low class (to some people) it’s trendiness.

Thank you, my reading comprehension is fine. This thread is about popularity, if you wanted to make a distinction about "trendiness" then you should have said so. Brayden is not that popular of a name. It might be trendy, but I think the real issue is that it trends among people who lack status. It is popular among middle class families in places like Utah, which makes it "low class" to a UMC person living in a coastal city. The issue is not its popularity but its social coding.

By comparison, look at the trend of the name Ezra, which has recently followed the same trajectory as Brayden but a few years behind: https://www.behindthename.com/name/brayden/top/united-states?compare=Ezra&type=percent

It's a similarly "spiky" name reflecting a very sudden interest in the name -- a trend. Yet Ezra is coded as intellectual, coastal, and cosmopolitan. It is currently much more popular than Brayden. But it's considered as more "high class" than Brayden.

So no, it's not just that popular names are viewed as more "low class".

Ezra is coded as ethnic but nobody knows what ethnicity. Definitely not cosmopolitan. I can picture Ezra riding a donkey in some no-name dessert with a funny hat.

Brayden is considered to be what is known as a “shopping mall name.” The OGs were Tiffany, Britney, Ashley, Tyler, Cody. A lot of names ending in the letter Y.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't get these comments that are like "oh they thought they were being so unique by naming their kid Milo but he's one of three in class." First of all, Milo is ranked #120 -- if there are three of them in one class, it's a freak accident unlikely to be repeated in that child's life. And second, since name popularity is published online and widely reported on, I doubt anyone is using a popular name without knowing it's popular. Parents giving their kids more popular names know they are more popular and are okay with it, and thus by definition cannot think they are being "so unique." If anything, they are bucking the apparent trend of obsessing over giving your name a totally original, rare name and just saying "screw it, we just really like this name and it's okay if our special snowflake sometimes shares a name with a classmate or coworker."

Milo is ranked #120 in the nation, but do you think it is ranked #120 in Little Rock? In Arlington, VA? In Arlington, TX? Names differ in popularity by region, and that is why we had 2 girls named Xanthe, 2 girls named Sage, and 2 boys named Gray in my kid’s 1st grade year in ny (45 kids total). Not a single Jacob.

... and? Who cares? Why does the popularity of the name matter? All of the names you just mentioned are not very popular overall, too, so even if the kid winds up in a little bubble where there are a couple in school with them, in the rest of their life they will have a fairly uncommon name.

So why does it matter? Why fixate?

Answered in the first comment posted-status. Giving your kid a trending name is often judged as low class. DC is a pretty status obsessed place and no parent here want to use Milo and in three years see it has become the next Brayden.

Brayden may be considered a "low class" name but it's not particularly popular. It's ranked #190, not far on the list from names like Finn, Oscar, Nico, and Max, all names used by people I know who valued a name that wasn't "too popular."

The popularity of a name is not what makes it low or high class. If anything, an obsession with choosing an "original" name is precisely what leads to those Utah manglings like Brayden/Jayden/Kayden or Kinsleigh/Paisley/Brynleigh. Those are efforts to be unique. It would have been been classier to just name their kids William and Sofia.

Popularity is similar but not the same as trends. Did you not read what I wrote, or can you not understand the difference?

A name Brayden is not as popular as James, but it is absolutely more trendy. Any name chart curve can show this information. It’s not popularity that makes a name low class (to some people) it’s trendiness.

Thank you, my reading comprehension is fine. This thread is about popularity, if you wanted to make a distinction about "trendiness" then you should have said so. Brayden is not that popular of a name. It might be trendy, but I think the real issue is that it trends among people who lack status. It is popular among middle class families in places like Utah, which makes it "low class" to a UMC person living in a coastal city. The issue is not its popularity but its social coding.

By comparison, look at the trend of the name Ezra, which has recently followed the same trajectory as Brayden but a few years behind: https://www.behindthename.com/name/brayden/top/united-states?compare=Ezra&type=percent

It's a similarly "spiky" name reflecting a very sudden interest in the name -- a trend. Yet Ezra is coded as intellectual, coastal, and cosmopolitan. It is currently much more popular than Brayden. But it's considered as more "high class" than Brayden.

So no, it's not just that popular names are viewed as more "low class".

Ezra is coded as ethnic but nobody knows what ethnicity. Definitely not cosmopolitan. I can picture Ezra riding a donkey in some no-name dessert with a funny hat.

Brayden is considered to be what is known as a “shopping mall name.” The OGs were Tiffany, Britney, Ashley, Tyler, Cody. A lot of names ending in the letter Y.

Ezra is Hebrew and pretty much everyone knows that -- you could ask some random person in a small down in Arkansas, "what ethnicity is Ezra?" and they'd tell you Jewish.

"Shopping mall name" is pretty good though. I feel a little sad seeing names like Ashley and Cody lumped in with Brayden though. Brayden is a recently invented name AND a "tragedeigh" (randomly adding the "y" for no reason other than because some people feel extra letters make a name "fancy"). Whereas those other names used to be normal names and have normal spellings, but just got heavily adopted by the shopping mall crowd in the 80s and 90s and can't shake the association. If it's possible to feel sorry for a name, that's how I feel about those names.