What are some names that you feel are off limits to you because of their meanings or just certain associations you have with them?
Mine -
[name_u]Kennedy[/name_u] - Means “misshapen head.” Not a fan of the name anyway, but even if I did like it, the meaning is a big deal breaker.
[name_f]Mallory[/name_f] - Means “unfortunate.”
[name_f]Portia[/name_f] - Means “pig.” It also reminds me of the car, which some people pronounce the same way.
[name_m]Lucifer[/name_m] - The Satan association is too strong.
[name_m]Crispin[/name_m] - I think of a brand of hard cider.
[name_f]Jezebel[/name_f] - I don’t think I can ever get past its association.
[name_f]Alexia[/name_f] - A perfectly normal and beautiful sounding name, but I think of snack foods and frozen french fries. It’s also a reading disability.
[name_u]Blaise[/name_u] - Means “lisp” or “stutter” and it sounds too close to [name_u]Blaze[/name_u] which is too violent for my taste (I think of house or forest fires).
[name_u]Cameron[/name_u] - Means “crooked nose.”
[name_f]Narcissa[/name_f] - Sounds too close to “narcissist.”
[name_u]Tristan[/name_u] - Means “sad” or “sorrowful.”
[name_m]Mort[/name_m]/[name_m]Mortimer[/name_m] - [name_m]Mort[/name_m] means “dead” in [name_m]French[/name_m]. Too morbid.
Oleander - Too associated with the poisonous flower.
[name_m]Adolf[/name_m] - A good name if it wasn’t for Hitler.
[name_m]Judas[/name_m] - A nice sounding name, but he wasn’t a nice guy in the bible (I’m an atheist, but still couldn’t use it for my kid).
[name_m]Augustus[/name_m] - A great name, but I’m still going back and forth on whether or not I can live with naming a kid after [name_m]Augustus[/name_m] Gloop or a certain [name_m]Roman[/name_m] Emperor. [name_u]August[/name_u] feels safer, though it’s been getting more popular.
[name_m]Cohen[/name_m] - It’s considered offensive and insensitive to the Jewish faith.
[name_m]Damien[/name_m] - [name_u]Love[/name_u] it, but some people can’t stop thinking about The Omen. I also had a crush on a classmate with this name in 7th grade and he turned out to be a jerk.
[name_u]Colby[/name_u] - I think of cheese.
[name_f]Elsa[/name_f] - The movie Frozen. There was also a girl in my class in 5th grade who bullied me. The name itself is okay, but I couldn’t deal with the reminders.
[name_m]Homer[/name_m] - [name_m]Homer[/name_m] [name_m]Simpson[/name_m]. Enough said.
[name_m]Harvey[/name_m] - Probably would’ve used someday if it wasn’t for the hurricane.
[name_f]Maisy[/name_f] - The character on [name_u]Nick[/name_u] [name_m]Jr[/name_m].
[name_m]Harry[/name_m] - Had a substitute teacher in high school named [name_m]Harry[/name_m] Pitts and he was a jerk. And there’s [name_m]Harry[/name_m] [name_m]Potter[/name_m]!
[name_m]Ronald[/name_m] - [name_m]Ronald[/name_m] [name_m]McDonald[/name_m] and [name_m]Ronald[/name_m] [name_u]Reagan[/name_u].
[name_u]Hillary[/name_u]/[name_u]Hilary[/name_u] - Can’t shake the [name_u]Hillary[/name_u] [name_m]Clinton[/name_m] association.
[name_f]Delilah[/name_f] - There’s a gentlemen’s club in my birth place [name_u]Philadelphia[/name_u] called [name_f]Delilah[/name_f]'s [name_m]Den[/name_m]. The name itself isn’t awful though. I used to hate it, but it’s set at neutral now. Prefer the simpler [name_f]Lila[/name_f].
[name_m]Donald[/name_m] - President [name_m]Donald[/name_m] Trump and [name_m]Donald[/name_m] Duck.
[name_m]Gavin[/name_m] - My neighbors who moved away a couple years ago used to have a dog named [name_m]Gavin[/name_m]. He was a sweetie, but I don’t feel comfortable naming my kid directly after a pet.
[name_f]Maggie[/name_f] - My sister’s cat (I’m still very attached to that little gremlin kitty and her sister Skitz. lol). Like with [name_m]Gavin[/name_m], it doesn’t feel right. I could use [name_f]Magnolia[/name_f] or [name_f]Magdalena[/name_f] nn [name_f]Maggie[/name_f], but not [name_f]Maggie[/name_f] on its own.
[name_m]Gordon[/name_m] - I like it, but [name_m]Gordon[/name_m] [name_m]Ramsay[/name_m] comes to mind and while I love watching Masterchef [name_m]Junior[/name_m], his behavior is sometimes too over the top.
[name_m]Marco[/name_m] - The “[name_m]Marco[/name_m] [name_m]Polo[/name_m]” game.
[name_u]Devin[/name_u] - Another bully I went to school with.
[name_f]Isis[/name_f] - Probably not a good idea, considering it’s the name of a terrorist group.
[name_f]Claudia[/name_f]- lame, crippled
[name_f]Cecilia[/name_f]- blind
Almost every variation of [name_f]Mary[/name_f] had the meaning “bitter”
[name_f]Valentina[/name_f]- Mexican hot sauce (nothing wrong with the sauce, but we always have a bottle in our house)
[name_f]Victoria[/name_f]- Mexican beer brand (husband is [name_m]Victor[/name_m] so we wouldn’t use it anyways)
Can’t think of any for the boys. Most boy names I like have Biblical meanings. Sometimes certain students put me off their names.
[name_u]Madison[/name_u] / [name_u]Addison[/name_u] - the names means [name_m]SON[/name_m] of ____, so I don’t think that meaning goes well on a Girl. Girls are not sons and even if was for a boy I wouldn’t be a fan still. I don’t find it very feminine no matter how you spell it, the meaning still stays.
[name_m]Matthew[/name_m] - A really mean guy I had to deal with during Grade 8 because he abused me. Oh my Goodness, I am glad I don’t have to deal with him anymore.
[name_m]Cain[/name_m] - I like the sound of the name but the association between [name_m]Cain[/name_m] and [name_m]Abel[/name_m] makes it a kinda Off Limits for me.
I feel the same way about [name_u]Madison[/name_u]/[name_u]Addison[/name_u] and [name_m]Cain[/name_m]. [name_u]Madison[/name_u] is fine for a boy, though I’d stick it in the middle spot most likely. [name_u]Addison[/name_u] is okay for boys at first glance, but all I can think of is [name_u]Addison[/name_u]'s Disease for some reason so I can’t use it.
I honestly don’t get the appeal of boys’ names for girls. I feel that if you wouldn’t give a boy a traditionally feminine name, why is it okay to give a traditionally masculine name to a girl? It seems hypocritical (I’m not sure if we can use the other word I was thinking of here, so I’m trying to be more careful).
Sorry that [name_m]Matthew[/name_m] guy was such a jerk to you. [name_f]Glad[/name_f] you don’t have to deal with him anymore.
Bullies are evil!
I love [name_f]Cecilia[/name_f] and [name_f]Mary[/name_f], and [name_f]Claudia[/name_f] is nice, but the meanings turn me off. I also love [name_f]Valentina[/name_f] and [name_f]Victoria[/name_f], brand names aside (yes, I’m familiar with the products. I have a bottle of that hot sauce in my house too). Normally, I’m turned off by brand names being used as human names, but [name_f]Valentina[/name_f] and [name_f]Victoria[/name_f] are common enough and were well established as names before they were brands so most people would probably not think twice about it.
I don’t really have a problem with names that mean something bad as long as it’s not an actual word in English. I don’t care that [name_f]Mary[/name_f] means bitter in Ancient Hebrew or what have you, but I do care that [name_m]Ralph[/name_m] is used as slang for throwing up in English. Also applies to names that don’t have a bad word meaning in the US but do somewhere else, like [name_u]Randy[/name_u].
[name_f]Delilah[/name_f] is also bad because the Biblical character betrayed [name_m]Samson[/name_m], so not a great association there.
I have so many that it’s hard to think of them all, so I’ll just put a few down!
[name_m]Cain[/name_m] - The murdering brother in the Bible.
[name_m]Damien[/name_m] - The Omen
[name_m]Aryan[/name_m] - Racist, Nazi ideals
[name_f]Cecilia[/name_f] - Means blind
[name_m]Clinton[/name_m] - [name_m]Bill[/name_m] [name_m]Clinton[/name_m]