Names that make you go eeeeeek!

Every Amanda or Donna I've ever known in real life has been a stuck up cow.

Amanda, Amber, Ashley...ugh anymore A-named people you want to toss at me? Like wet cats seeking vengeance! No offense to anyone with those names or an "A" name, my history with them is horrible and only one or two of those names came out good. And there are of course quite a few more names...but these stand out.

You need to spend half a second with our very own Susie, and all your negative associations with her name will be swept away!

For me it's David/Dave. I have an evil Uncle David. My psycho ex-boyfriend is named Dave, and my cousin's horrid ex-husband is David. I know a few others, and one is more or less okay, the rest...shudder. No offense to any Davids here!

I have the sweetest cat named Susie you'd ever want to meet.

I had a writing employer once named Amanda, and that's the name I have to vote for. This person was so abusive and awful that I still hate to hear that name. Gah. I'm sure that there are nice Amandas out there, but that really tainted the name for me.

Bruce

*shudders*

WildScribe said:

Susan, Suzie, Suzanne, Sharon, Shirley, Sherry... Notice a pattern? What is UP here?

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Um . . . yeah . . . there definitely is a pattern. From college psychology classes, I recall associative comparison and projection.

What may be up is someone's convinced Aunt Sherry was evil, and someone associates the sibilant sounds of her name with evil and projects evilness onto anyone whose name begins with the sound.

They might react in an unfriendly manner when someone screams in their faces: "My god! What a horrible name! You cannot be anything other than the evil bitch of the known universe!"

Or it just could be the breath of folks in and around Gilroy, California. Garlic isn't just for ticking off vampires.

All my DH's former partners were called Sarah... I bucked the trend, being Shona

This is interesting question-- we do tend to form associations with names. I have an evil Aunt and whenever i see her name, it just reminds me of her (not a positive association-- it was a little hard beta reading this one story where one of the females had the same name.)

I've known so many people of so many names, that they've really lost all association for me. Take for instance, my Hubby's name. The first student I had with his name was hard for me. I kept thinking, "That name's already been taken! By someone better than you!" (Didn't help that the kid was a total slug.) I've now completely detached myself from nearly all first names. Only in context of first and last name do names mean anything to me. Eric is just a name, commonly associated with my brother, but could be anyone. Eric Smith is a local newscaster. Eric M. is a student. Etc.

Also, I think it's human nature to look for patterns. It's part of how the brain works, to organize and figure out how to deal with things in the future. It a little Pavlovian, I'm afraid. And very coincidental. Like a "lucky hat" or something.

So, I don't really have any names anymore. And none that really bother me. (Unless there's a surname, because that's a specific person whom I may or may not wish disembowlment on.)

ElaraSophia said:

You need to spend half a second with our very own Susie, and all your negative associations with her name will be swept away!

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If you knew Susie, like I know Susie, oh, oh, oh what a gal....

Seriously, there was a Susan and a Suzanne on The Partridge Family and that show has some of the meanest fans you could wish, though I can't think of any bad ones named Suzie.

I have also NEVER had a good experience with a René(e). There was one in grade school/Jr. High with a real attitude. All the incidents I remember about her were obnoxious, especially when we were required to give out "white elephant gifts," supposedly anonymous, but she guessed or found out I had presented her with a handmade gift and ran me down in the hall saying, "I don't have any use for it," like she expected me to replace it with something better. I refused to take it back. She didn't know the meaning of "white elephant" or "gift."

I had a pen pal, Renee, who kept reminding me her birthday was November 2. (See? After thirty-five years I still remember.) After sending her birthday and Christmas presents, never heard from the little minx again.

I now have an evil next door neighbor René--female with the male spelling. The nicer I have tried to be, the more hostile she becomes. I now avoid anything associated with her at all costs. Someday I'd like to just put my CD player on Repeat and play "Just walk away, René" over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over....

What's weird is she is nice to at least some other people and they like her, but she's a widely enough recognized psycho that I don't have to worry about my perceptions being off at all.

For me it's the names Ashley and James. I've never known a nice person named Ashley, and both guys I've dated with the name James ended up being psychotic.

I shudder every time I see a name w/ an inappropriate 'y' or other "unique spelling" or when humans are named after cities, streets or countries.

For me, it's Stalin. Every Josef Stalin I've ever known has been a total jerk.

My antagonist is named "Susan" - seems I have picked well! It's funny how certain names will come up in what seems to be patterns - someone above posted that it is human nature to search for patterns, which is absolutely true. For me, I've had bad experiences with several Daves, and I often catch myself coming up with all sorts of preconceived notions when a new Dave comes into my life. And I've had a couple of horrid Veronicas in my life (and the bitchy girl in the Archie comics also happens to be named Veronica).

Amanda, Jim, Kyle... all bad, all the time fer me. >.<

-An

For a while there, the name Heather seemed to mark a person, and sure enough the movie "Heathers" came out and proved it true

I noticed a kind of bad naming pattern in my life: guys who were the III or more. Hmmm The one named a hideous concoction of names topped off by the 'IV' was when I finally noticed it. Whatever godawful family would make a point of passing that name on for 4 generations apparently also passed along issues on the child-rearing front

Veronica and Heather have very negative associations for me, too.

I was thinking that one of the reasons Dave is mentioned often on this thread is because it's a very common name (and the same for Susan). I love the name David, and have known so many Daves that the various associations are all merged into a blur now.

Smiling Ted said:

For me, it's Stalin. Every Josef Stalin I've ever known has been a total jerk.

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Good one, Ted. Puts the random name-calling into perspective. Pol Pot does the same for me, but what the heck is this doing in an advice-from-experts forum?

Well it makes sense for it to be here, if you want to make a character that people won't like (for whatever reasoning, there are many reasons!) then by using a name that is commonly associated, by many people, with bad character; it would be beneficial.

Well, as you say, no offense.