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submitted 5 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

For example, I was doing research for a blog article and found a paper by a guy named Christian Messenger. That man was definitely destined for missionary work, but the paper was about football.

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[-] [email protected] 92 points 5 months ago

I knew a guy who is called Gerard Menfroy. This is pronounced exactly the same as « J’ai rarement froid » in French, which means « I rarely feel cold ». He was Heating engineer.

[-] [email protected] 65 points 5 months ago

There's a name for that; nominative determinism

[-] [email protected] 16 points 5 months ago

I had to look up so.e examples using that, some of these are great!https://icon.ink/articles/nominative-determinism-examples-jobs/

[-] [email protected] 13 points 5 months ago

Like Yo-Yo Ma, who goes back and forth on strings.

[-] [email protected] 62 points 5 months ago
[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago

It can't be real.

[-] [email protected] 60 points 5 months ago

I used to work in a call center and had a notably irate customer named Mrs. Bitschy. I tried pronouncing it like "Beeshy", and she immediately snapped "It's Bitchy! Got a problem with that!?" Oof.

[-] [email protected] 51 points 5 months ago

My husband’s vasectomy was performed by Dr. Wiener.

[-] [email protected] 16 points 5 months ago

Was his first name Xavier? Dr. X Wiener?

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[-] [email protected] 41 points 5 months ago

The pilot on my plane a few years back was named Max Power

[-] [email protected] 39 points 5 months ago

I think he retired during Covid, but a nearby lasik clinic was run by Dr. Biglaiser. I don’t see how that could have been his real name.

[-] [email protected] 28 points 5 months ago
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[-] [email protected] 25 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

There was a trial against members of the NSU, a German extremist-right terrorist organisation, a few years ago and the lawyers representing them were named Sturm (storm), Heer (army) and Stahl (steel). In combination they sound like something a Nazi came up with to make them sound powerful and strong.

[-] [email protected] 23 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

I remember reading about a military guy, Staff Sergeant Max Fightmaster. I have no idea what he actually does (or did; guy's probably retired by now) but if he hasn't at least spent some time teaching martial arts he's doing it wrong.

Edit: apparently he's a computer technician and that's even better somehow.

[-] pastermil 4 points 5 months ago

Maybe he's big in Mortal Combat?

[-] [email protected] 21 points 5 months ago

Gay Hitler. Worst part is he was born before those were offensive names or terms but lived long enough for them to get there meaning. Wasn't even meant to have the last name Hitler, It was a misspelling of Hiddler or something like that.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago

Accidental Hitler. Ouch.

[-] [email protected] 20 points 5 months ago

This is gonna sound fake, but I knew a butcher named Butch Pig. He was Butch before he was a butcher

[-] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago

And soon he will become butchest.

[-] [email protected] 20 points 5 months ago

11 hours in and no Usain Bolt???

[-] [email protected] 17 points 5 months ago

There was a racing driver named Scott Speed. Unfortunately he's got no speed.

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[-] [email protected] 16 points 5 months ago

I work in dairy company, once I was checking SAP for something and saw a name-surname "Olgun Erkek" (Mature Male in Turkish). We are receiving his raw milk, it is like porn name when you picture it like that.

[-] [email protected] 16 points 5 months ago

Wolfgang Wolf was at some point manager of German club Wolfsburg!

[-] [email protected] 15 points 5 months ago

There is a doctor near us named Dr. Owi.

[-] [email protected] 15 points 5 months ago

Had a religious studies teach called Mrs Holyland

[-] [email protected] 13 points 5 months ago

I had a taxi driver once who's last name was snel. Which is Dutch for fast or quick or speed.

[-] [email protected] 13 points 5 months ago

Kid at school named Miles Long.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago

I just saw him on pornhub.

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[-] [email protected] 13 points 5 months ago

The original head of Teslas autopilot division is named Andrej Karpathy. car-path-y

[-] LopensLeftArm 13 points 5 months ago

I used to work in a call center and once took a call from a guy named Jacob J. Justice. Guy should've been a Marvel superhero.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 5 months ago

I work in a 911 dispatch center, we used to have a frequent caller in our area whose first name contained the word "trash," and, well, they were trashy. We had cops there pretty much every day for some dumb trashy domestic bullshit.

Also took a call from a guy who's name was very similar to "Roger Rogar." Not his actual name, given the nature of my job I don't want to give out any potentially identifiable information about my callers, but same basic pattern, first name exactly the same as his last name except for one letter and, at least as well as I could hear over the phone, pronounced exactly the same.

Also a truly dumbfounding amount of girls named things like princess and diamond.

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[-] [email protected] 12 points 5 months ago

Lots of nominative determinism in this thread.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 5 months ago

Dr Healey. Nice.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 5 months ago

There's the newspaper columnist with the world's record highest IQ, Marilyn vos Savant. In French, you can read her name as "your (plural) scholar/scientist." When I was a kid, I was sure that it was a pen name, but it turns out it's actually her mother's maiden name.

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[-] [email protected] 10 points 5 months ago

Not sure if this is what you were going for, but I had a high school teacher named Mr. Student.

[-] [email protected] 9 points 5 months ago

There's an HGTV person named Page Turner.

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[-] [email protected] 7 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

These are called "aptroynms" and Wikipedia has a great list of them and also inaptroyms. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aptronym

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[-] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago

There are several dentists in my area that have the last name of Beaver. They’re all related and it seems like the original one felt like that was too good of an opportunity to pass up on, and subsequent generations joined the family business.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago

There's a dental dam joke in there somewhere

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago

My daughter had to visit an allergist and his name was Dr. J. Doctor

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

A dude named Sobriety Promise (both words were his first name). That guy's parents were assholes to name their kid that. Bro had to announce that his parents used to be drunk losers every time he said his name lmao. He went by his middle name and changed it as soon as he could. Poor guy. It's no wonder he became an alcoholic later 😐

[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

There's a meme image of a screenshot of a news broadcast featuring a fireman named Les McBurney.

This sort of thing apparently happens enough that it has a name: an aptronym.

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

In Germany there was a couple therapist named Von Hinten, which translates to From Behind as in doggy style. Last I heard she perished in the Christmas tsunami.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago

When I was a kid, my parents were thinking about building a house. The name of the contractor who was helping them was named "Kari A Hammer." I might be spelling it wrong (I was eight), but that was his actual name.

I like to think he wanted to be a tattoo artist or something and hated carpentry, but was forced into it because of his name.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago

There is a AFL player called Patrick Dangerfield. Great player too.

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this post was submitted on 11 Feb 2024
127 points (97.0% liked)

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