Sometimes I think about the fact that most people have only one name, and it TERRIFIES me.

[thetransintransgenic]

I just... why would they DO that to themselves??

Comments

[ilzolende]

I mean, I think there's something nice and grounding about having one canonical name, even if you don't use all of it at the same time, or you have other names you also use. And the easiest way to have one name that is definitively the name which is most your name and could not be more 'your name' than it is is to have one name?

[deusvulture]

Having a single permanent inescapable name is one of the cages of how (American) society has worked for the past 50 years or so. The prospect of someday somehow escaping the tyranny of one's permanent name is probably the most easily comprehensible motive for gender transition to me.

So I guess I don't know the answer to your question. In a world where there are excuses for shedding part of one's identity that at least some people would accept, what excuse do I have for not doing so?

[isaacsapphire]

What do you mean? Most women get married at least once, and most married women change their names. A decent percentage of the population goes by a nick name subtly different from their legal name, like "Jamie" or "Donnie" or "Manny" instead of "James" or "Donald" or "Manuel". Come to think about it, a lot more men seem to go by nicknames than women. Not sure if that's because most female nicknames just became female given names, or because men are more likely to have their legal name drawn from a smaller pool than women, requiring nicknames to differentiate between friends or co-workers who share a legal given name.

[thetransintransgenic]

By "a name" I meant, like, a place of interaction-with-other-people that is You. The category that includes both IRL personalities you might have, and also "pseudonymous" identities online.

I could have said "a face" and that might have been clearer, but I think at the time I was thinking of "different faces" having a slightly stronger meaning that "different names".

[sonata_green]

at first i thought this was about mononyms

[thetransintransgenic]

Plato And His Posse Bullied Me When I Was A Child And It Scarred Me For Life.