What's in A Name?

Have you ever heard a name and it made you cringe? The simple sound of it sent chills down your spine or caused you to tense up? Why is that? I suppose it is because many times we can attach soooo much meaning to a name. We meet someone and for instance their name is Karen. Things are going pretty good between you two in your friendship. Then something happens and you are wronged by Karen. You weren’t necessarily wronged by all girls named Karen, but this one particular one did something. All of the sudden you find yourself repulsed by the name Karen. There is an automatic refusal to ever name your children that name because all Karen’s seem bad now. The next time you meet a Karen you refuse to get to know them because she is gonna be just like the other Karen you knew. Is this really fair, you ask yourself? But you can’t help but have a bias even if it is just based on a name.

Is there any logical truth in this? Does the name you were given at birth really group you into the Karen’s or Steve’s of this world? Is it possible to determine certain characteristics of a person based on their name alone or are we being unfair bigots against people just because of their name?

Regardless of what is actually happens, I find it ironic when two people of the same name act in extremely similar ways. For example: The Story of Two Will’s. I tried my best to not compare the two. Sure the first one had royally screwed up with me then we just stopped talking, out of nowhere. Then I met the second Will. He got a fresh start with me. Then the same stuff started happening with this Will as the other one. It ended the same way too.

This has happened with a few other names as well. Such as my friendships with girls named Ashley usually work out really well, no matter what. I am not saying that actually act on these feelings of prejudice in a name, its more or less a correlation I have found lately. So more than anything this really makes me wonder…What’s in a name?