Is it my imagination or are more male names on the nameberry ticker tape spelled correctly and fewer female names? That’s what I’ve noticed, but I could be wrong.
And if that is the case, why, I wonder?
In general parents are less “kre8iv” with boy’s names, hence fewer non-standard spellings.
Is your sense that this is so because they think boys names matter more professionally? That they can see ahead to their [name_m]Andrew[/name_m] or [name_m]Clark[/name_m] or [name_m]Philo[/name_m] as an adult as well as a baby? As opposed to parents playing around with or making up or misspelling girls’ names because they envision them always being little girls? Blubelle, [name_f]Lauralei[/name_f], Cidnee, etc.?
I’m bumping this b/c I really want to know why more people spell their sons’ names correctly than their daughters’ names.
To be frank, I think it’s because subconciously people are more likely to see their sons as people who will be an adult with a career one day than their daughters.
If so, that’s too bad. Spelling names right should not be saved for males; all genders deserve it. And I don’t mean [name_f]Carol[/name_f] or [name_f]Carole[/name_f] or [name_f]Janey[/name_f] or [name_f]Janie[/name_f] – I’m thinking more of Maddelinne or Mirannda or [name_f]Elianore[/name_f].
I personally dislike invented spellings for either gender. So I have no idea why it is more common for the girls. I am just speculating that perhaps when naming a son, parents think only in terms of school, life, work; whereas for a daughter parents are influenced by more factors–perhaps they think about things like the uniqueness, the glamour, the beauty, the strength, the whatever… I honestly do not know!
This is probably true. I also think it reflects a plain old lack of education. I’m starting to think that phonics lessons should be a part of every parenting class.
I think part of it is that there’s a gender bias as far as how acceptable unique names are. A lot of people feel perfectly comfortable experimenting with girls’ names, but I think there’s still a subconscious cultural fear that a boy will be targeted for harassment if parents venture too far beyond the socially sanctioned norm. Boys are supposed to be manly, tough, ambitious, etc., and a name like [name_u]Florian[/name_u] doesn’t embody that for a lot of parents. They’d rather stick with what feels familiar - and let’s face it, there are only so many ways to spell [name_m]David[/name_m], [name_m]Samuel[/name_m], [name_u]James[/name_u], [name_m]John[/name_m], [name_u]Michael[/name_u], [name_m]Matthew[/name_m], [name_m]Andrew[/name_m], [name_m]Scott[/name_m], etc.
It could be in part because parents are more concerned about their daughters having unique names than their sons, and changing the way a name is spelled can be a way to make it more original.
I agree with what others have said about subconsciously thinking about a boys’ future job and other comments along that line. I could be wrong, but I think boys are more likely to get a family name as a first name because they don’t go “out of style” as fast. When grandma and grandpa are [name_f]Deborah[/name_f] and [name_u]James[/name_u], well, I think [name_f]Deborah[/name_f] is more likely to end up in the middle.
I also think we have a tendency to treat boys like autonomous, future adults more than girls. Girls are more of an object, a play-thing, and she gets dressed up in all kinds of cute outfits, her hair brushed, her nails painted…like a doll, basically. And since she’s a doll, we can be fun and cutesy and creative and giver her a name that reflects that urge. Also, going with the creative expression angle, I think a lot of women use fashion and clothing to show off their individualism (men do this too, but less often) and naming is an extension of that. Why wear a plain pair of jeans and a black tee shirt when you can wear bedazzled leggings and the trendiest top, and why name your daughter [name_f]Caitlin[/name_f] when you can name her Khaytlynne?
I don’t think this happens consciously or with any malicious intent, but I think it happens nonetheless.
To add to what everyone’s said, I think people expect boys to be kind of unique in their own right through their choices and personality, whereas they expect that girls will need the extra help of being assigned a rare spelling or name to have a unique identity.
This, exactly, and I agree with what [name_f]Emily[/name_f] said, it’s due to old fashioned values instilled in us for hundreds of years - back in the 1700s or even the 1800s, those without wealth were often poorly educated, if at all, and women were rarely educated if they were born below the poverty line at the time. If the choice was between sending a son to school or a daughter, the son would attend school until the age of 12, where as the daughter may attend until she’s 16, but likely wouldn’t at all if the funds to send her did not exist. Due to this, many names became misspelled over the years because of the lack of education: Blubelle, [name_f]Elianore[/name_f], Margrit, [name_f]Mollie[/name_f], etc. It even ended up creating names too - [name_f]Meggie[/name_f] became [name_f]Maggie[/name_f], [name_f]Molly[/name_f] became [name_f]Polly[/name_f], which in turn could have arguably became [name_f]Dolly[/name_f], [name_f]Lily[/name_f] became [name_f]Lillie[/name_f], etc. I don’t believe it’s ever intentionally done this day in age in our society (though perhaps in developing nations?) but, subconsciously, yes, I think it does. [name_f]Do[/name_f] I think it’s wrong? Maybe, but how do you change a subconscious thought in the mind of millions?
I think it does have to do with what PPs have said about men having jobs and the like but I also think it has to do with the fact that a lot of people don’t even realize that the spelling they choose affects their child in the job market and they only care about the little baby in front of them. I also think that society wants your little girl to be pretty and unique, and to do that, you can change a spelling of a name to make the name have an ‘elegant y’ in the middle. Writing Madylyn on a piece of paper in cursive writing looks ‘more fancy and elegant’ than [name_f]Madeline[/name_f]. (There are people who genuinely think extra y’s adds elegance) Boys names don’t have to look elegant or pretty, so they don’t have to be changed, however, I’ve seen some kreative spellings of boys name. (My personal favorite was Kohlmynn for [name_m]Coleman[/name_m])
I also think we have a tendency to treat boys like autonomous, future adults more than girls. Girls are more of an object, a play-thing, and she gets dressed up in all kinds of cute outfits, her hair brushed, her nails painted…like a doll, basically. And since she’s a doll, we can be fun and cutesy and creative and giver her a name that reflects that urge.
I don’t think this accurate. As the mother of two daughters, I absolutely imagine my daughters being adults and having a careers. Doing something they love and supporting themselves. I find it insulting you think a parent would consider their daughter as merely a “play-thing” or an “object”. Never once have I thought of either one of them as a doll. They may have unique names that are “cute”, but I never have doubted once that they will be successful or merely thought of them as an object to be primped and prettied. That is just ridiculous.
This isn’t true. Many of the rhyming nicknames came about because the classics were pretty much the only names used long ago. They started using rhyming nicknames to differentiate your [name_f]Margaret[/name_f] from my [name_f]Margaret[/name_f] and our cousin’s [name_f]Margaret[/name_f] (who all might have the same last name!).
Also, Margrit is the [name_m]German[/name_m] variant of [name_f]Margaret[/name_f].
I completely agree with this!
It is absolutely not original (it is more ridiculous to me) and it doesn’t make people unique. It only complicates people’s lives.
Elianore exists 
It’s not a creative spelling, it’s a french name (just like Aliénor, Alianore, Alinore, Elinor, Eléanore, … I don’t know in English but they all have a different pronunciation in French).
It’s not untrue either though? Yes, rhyming nicknames did originate as a way to differentiate, but the spellings evolved due to incorrect/illegible spellings in census records, spelling based on the sound of a name, etc. Also, yes, Margrit may be a variation, but, in [name_u]America[/name_u] in the 1800s, it would be likely used as a phonetic spelling of [name_f]Margaret[/name_f] too. These were merely examples - there’s literally hundreds of records from the past with many more examples, but I was simply trying to explain the historic aspect of things, the examples may have not been the best, but my point was still made.
I think people are more concerned with their sons being taken seriously. A cutesy or kr8tively spelled name is frowned upon because someday he will be a man and men need strong, serious, respectable names.
I think the poster was speaking generally, not about any one nameberry user or parent. After all, we don’t know each other personally on nameberry usually and girls often do get treated (and named) more as cute objects or dolls than boys do. I’ve taught school for 27 years and have rarely if ever met a boy with a cutesy, misspelled name while I have met dozens (probably hundreds by now) of girls with such names.