puddingmouse wrote:
http://uk.lifestyle.yahoo.com/family-parenting/10-illegal-baby-names-blog-3-yahoo-lifestyles.html
What's the dumbest name you'eve ever come across? Mine would have to be Leyland (type of British car, it's really like calling your kid Skoda - not like calling them Mercedes or Porsche. Though a kid called Volkswagen would be funnier).
Would you give your child an 'unusual' name?
Also, the fact that Portugal has its own list of approved names is rather sad. That's going to the other extreme. I think there needs to be some intervention by the authorities, though not necessarily having a government department to deal with it (as in Germany). If it's an extremely stupid name it could be reported to the child protection services. I'm not sure what happens in the UK or in other countries not mentioned in that article.
In Denmark we have an approved list also. I don't see why that's sad. The American alternative looks far worse to me.
However, along the way new names can be added to that list.
We had a case some years ago where a mother wanted to name her son Christophpher. She won the case after 9 years.
Another thing is that there is fashion in names too. Thus some older names which never or hardly would be used in my generation, are used today, such as Amalie, Mathilde or Asta for girls, or Malthe, Laurids or Villads for boys.