Thursday, January 12, 2012

Blue Ivy: Plant, Paint Sample, or Stripper?


As all of you have heard by now, Beyonce and Jay-Z have had their baby girl and have named her Blue Ivy. I believe I speak for most of the western world when I say: What the fuck?
That name doesn’t sound like the daughter of two music industry powerhouses. It sounds like a teal paint sample, a hound dog, or a plant nobody likes. It also fails the name test I have for people who are having daughters. The test involves testing the name in the following scenarios:
1) Now announcing Supreme Court Justice nominee...
2) Now coming up on stage number 3...
Congrats Beyonce and Jay-Z! Your daughter is less than a week old and she already sounds more like a stripper than anyone of political importance.
Most of my office though it was Ivy Blue which has a nice ring to it. I have always liked the name Ivy so I’m biased but switch the names around and go back to the test above. Ivy Blue sounds a little silly for number one but doesn’t work nearly as well in scenario number two which is really what you should be going for here.
Ivy also works better because naming little girls after plants is fairly common: Rose, Lily, Daisy, Willow, Violet, Bluebell (I wish I was kidding on that one). While Violet works both ways, I really don’t see Yellow, Green, or Chartreuse getting hollered at preschools.
From what I’ve heard, Ivy was based on the roman numeral for four which has played a big part in the lives of Jay-Z and Beyonce. If the middle name is the one with big significance, why isn’t it front and center? If I’m not mistaken, Blue is after one of their albums. If I was a kid, I’d be pissed I was named after something as fleeting as an album.
I believe that names should have some strength and meaning behind them. Give the kid a name they have to live up to and fill out. Our names are one of the first things the world knows about us. Blue is a color and an album. It has no depth or history. I would expect so much less from a Blue than I would from an Ivy.
I know celebrities want to give their kids names that are unique and different but sometimes they seriously end up with a unique name that means less than a common name (Apple anyone?). My name is very common but I think I’ve become more memorable because of that. Better to be a memorable Sarah than the only Purple Haven. (None are my real name BTW.)

Current Music: Dark Blue - Jack's Mannequin

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