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Help[Opinions] What if this happened in real life?
I was reading the scriptures (I am a Christian) and I stumbled upon this scene: the prophet just had a child, and then God told him to name the newborn child with a highly negative name that reflects the historical background at that time. Not a mild name like Dolores or Cecilia, but something on par with (or even worse than) naming your child Corona right now (and let’s assume the worst case scenario, covid would still be around after a decade). What would you do if you know someone is planning to do similar things, claiming God told them so?
If you want to come up with your solution, or are afraid of long texts, please don’t read it anymore. The paragraphs below contain my entire (super lengthy) thought process.
For me, I am struggling between the child’s benefit and “God’s calling”, as (in hindsight you can say) they are good people who have a mission and a passion, kinda like the activists today, albeit a lot less supported. As someone who also wants to make an impact on the society and right our wrongs, I feel highly empathetic (although I think it is quite robotic as I usually remind myself how I was passionate about something and force myself to transplant(?) it to them and say “they are just like me”) towards them. They are willing to sacrifice great amounts that I could never dream of, and I don’t want to be the “bad guy” (again, in hindsight) in the story. Also, I believe that God would only choose people who can stand this challenge so it would be alright.
On the other hand, I am the few people who actually knows exactly what is happening so I have to stop this madness. There is no excuse for such inappropriate and irresponsible behaviour. On top of that, as a good citizen it is my duty to make sure this illegal act do not happen (there are cases which parents named their children “Nutella” and “Akuma” (“demon” in Japanese) and got sued and scolded by the judge). No personal agenda, however noble or “holy”, should be placed above the future of this newborn child. Another (less major) problem is such names are almost certain to not age well. Also, it is almost impossible to confirm if the claim is true, so maybe he is using my soft spot on purpose to manipulate me to support his wrong decision.
The action I would do would be starting to devise a plan to mitigate the potential trauma that name would bring to the child, for example, coming with slightly more acceptable nicknames and diminutives (if allowed), search for advice on the internet like crazy, and pray (because I am a Christian of course I am going to pray) - something like “Dear God I can foresee this name may bring a lot of trouble to this child, for example, bullying, weird questions, judgement from people around, inconveniences in form filling and legal procedures because character number exceeds the maximum, the name being censored on social media and the kid’s/the friends’ accounts often get banned for apparently no reason, etc. Please make sure the child won’t be unhappy or get hurt or lose certain rights because of the name, and one day the kid can understand his father’s reasons behind this seemingly absurd decision. But of course you have the final say, if you want to be a jerk and this is exactly what you intended, then never mind. Amen.”
I would decide to do so because I would be one of the few neutral-ish people who knows clear enough. But even my actions can be considered hypocritical because the prophets are already notorious enough for their children to get bullied solely because of it, and the weird name doesn’t change that much. But it catches my mind because I am interested by naming, and maybe I wouldn’t care to do the same if the child got a somewhat more “usual” name.
If you want to come up with your solution, or are afraid of long texts, please don’t read it anymore. The paragraphs below contain my entire (super lengthy) thought process.
For me, I am struggling between the child’s benefit and “God’s calling”, as (in hindsight you can say) they are good people who have a mission and a passion, kinda like the activists today, albeit a lot less supported. As someone who also wants to make an impact on the society and right our wrongs, I feel highly empathetic (although I think it is quite robotic as I usually remind myself how I was passionate about something and force myself to transplant(?) it to them and say “they are just like me”) towards them. They are willing to sacrifice great amounts that I could never dream of, and I don’t want to be the “bad guy” (again, in hindsight) in the story. Also, I believe that God would only choose people who can stand this challenge so it would be alright.
On the other hand, I am the few people who actually knows exactly what is happening so I have to stop this madness. There is no excuse for such inappropriate and irresponsible behaviour. On top of that, as a good citizen it is my duty to make sure this illegal act do not happen (there are cases which parents named their children “Nutella” and “Akuma” (“demon” in Japanese) and got sued and scolded by the judge). No personal agenda, however noble or “holy”, should be placed above the future of this newborn child. Another (less major) problem is such names are almost certain to not age well. Also, it is almost impossible to confirm if the claim is true, so maybe he is using my soft spot on purpose to manipulate me to support his wrong decision.
The action I would do would be starting to devise a plan to mitigate the potential trauma that name would bring to the child, for example, coming with slightly more acceptable nicknames and diminutives (if allowed), search for advice on the internet like crazy, and pray (because I am a Christian of course I am going to pray) - something like “Dear God I can foresee this name may bring a lot of trouble to this child, for example, bullying, weird questions, judgement from people around, inconveniences in form filling and legal procedures because character number exceeds the maximum, the name being censored on social media and the kid’s/the friends’ accounts often get banned for apparently no reason, etc. Please make sure the child won’t be unhappy or get hurt or lose certain rights because of the name, and one day the kid can understand his father’s reasons behind this seemingly absurd decision. But of course you have the final say, if you want to be a jerk and this is exactly what you intended, then never mind. Amen.”
I would decide to do so because I would be one of the few neutral-ish people who knows clear enough. But even my actions can be considered hypocritical because the prophets are already notorious enough for their children to get bullied solely because of it, and the weird name doesn’t change that much. But it catches my mind because I am interested by naming, and maybe I wouldn’t care to do the same if the child got a somewhat more “usual” name.
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