Wednesday, February 09, 2011

not okay

This tendency, by the youth of today (I'm speaking to the twenty yr olds here), to abbreviate names.

I'm totally down with J-Lo, LiLo etc. I enjoy playing that game too, but there's a far more ridiculous trend I've been noticing on facebook and elsewhere.
Ryan becomes Ry.
Dylan becomes Dyl.
Tara becomes Tars.
Sara, Sars.
Brian, Bri.
Laura, Lau.

Not okay.

'Dyl & Lau's Big Day!' scream the album names.
'Love you Tars!'
'Happy birthday Bri!'

Perfectly decent short manageable names abbreviated away to mulch.

Call me Mother Grundy, or Mommy-G, or just Mo-G, but I think it's not okay.

I think it's l-a-z-y.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

I tend to agree there is a certain laziness and manners. Don't get me started!

kathleen xx

Unknown said...

That is an interesting thought. And I can respect your opinion. But I'm guilty of the "laziness" you state in your post. I call my sister, Angela, who goes by Angie, Ang. I call my kids nicknames that are their names shortened. I don't think that's lazy at all, but a mere nickname that shows closeness. I am very close with my sister and I call her Ang, and she's has always liked being call that. Nicknames shows your closeness with a person. I can't walk up to some Tom, Dick, or Harry and shorten it because I want to be "lazy". I'm sure they people on facebook feel the same way. Name shorten is just a way to show you are close to a person, and that you are comfortable with him and call them by a nickname. And of course this is just my opinion, and we are all aloud one!

DB Stewart said...

I love nicknames but not boring or cliche nicknames and certainly not shortened nicknames. That totally lacks imagination. I like to develop nicknames that are mildly offensive and mostly goofy. I only do this to people I love (like my poor 14 year old son whom I sometimes, lately, refer to as "Flappy." For some reason that just makes me laugh every time.) I'm told this is a guy thing. And yup, I'm kind of a pea-brain.

Lynne said...

when my first son was born, I was determined to choose a name that would not be shortened. I rejected all kinds of suggestions because my son was going to be known only by his full name!

Today, a week shy of 29 years later, I am the only one who calls him 'Si'... to the rest of the world he is Simon or Sky-man.

Not sure how that happened!

sunshine said...

I kind of agree, some short names do not need to be shorten even more... But also to my nicknames are a way to feel closer to somebody because not only you can call them by their first name but u also have a special nickname for them, but I have to agree with dbs, I also love to give random nicknames to people!