History Main / BabyNameTrendKiller

* [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/karen/top "Karen"]] may be the first name to be killed by an [[MemeticMutation internet meme]]. A Nordic variant of "Katherine", it was one of the top ten girls' names from 1951 through 1968 and remained in the top 100 through 1986. Afterwards, it fell off naturally in popularity but didn't become a truly rare name... at least until the late 2010s, when, like "Becky" before it, an unflattering meme emerged that associated the name with a particular type of [[EntitledBastard entitled]], reactionary, middle-aged, [[RichBitch upper-middle-class]], [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain racist]] [[ObnoxiousEntitledHousewife suburban mom]] who [[NiceToTheWaiter treats service workers with disrespect]]. With that, the popularity of Karen as a girl's name went off a cliff from its already-low position, falling out of the top 1000 by 2021.

* "Herbert" reached its peak in popularity around the same time UsefulNotes/HerbertHoover was campaigning for, and won, the presidency of the United States. After his name became synonymous with the Main/TheGreatDepression, [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/herbert/top its usage tumbled like the 1929 stock market]].

* Not that they were ever particularly popular names, but the names Bart, Homer, and Marge are so strongly associated with ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' that you are unlikely to meet anyone with either name who wasn't born before it aired (1987 for the shorts, 1989 for the series proper). The same is true with the name Barney after Barney Gumble, [[TheAlcoholic an alcoholic]] best known for his AlcoholInducedIdiocy (and it doesn't help that Gumble shares his given name with [[Series/BarneyAndFriends a certain loathed dinosaur]], as mentioned in the Live-Action TV folder).

[[folder:Films -- Animated]]

* Oddly enough, "Damien" spiked as a boy's name in the late '70s thanks to ''Film/TheOmen1976'', but the same can't be said of the similar-sounding [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/damon/top "Damon",]] which collapsed in popularity around the same time.

* In 1997, [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/austin/top "Austin"]] was one of the top ten boy's names in America. That year, however, ''Film/AustinPowers: International Man of Mystery'' premiered, starring as its titular protagonist an AffectionateParody of a TuxedoAndMartini super-spy who, while presented as a hero, is also presented as a sexist KavorkaMan who's [[DiscoDan stuck in the '60s]] and whose [[DeliberateValuesDissonance retrograde attitudes]] make him [[ButtMonkey the butt of the film's jokes]]. The name fell off quickly after that, though it remained in the top 100 boy's names until 2022.
* [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/annabelle/top "Annabelle"]] and [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/annabel/top its]] [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/anabelle/top variants]] had been quickly rising in popularity in the '00s and early '10s, until the release of ''Film/{{Annabelle}}'' in 2014 caused the name to be associated with a murderous CreepyDoll. The name fell off hard after that, slipping out of the top 200 in 2020 after peaking at #57 the year the film came out.
* Oddly enough, while ''Film/SuicideSquad2016'' gave a big (if short-lived) boost to the name [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/harley/top "Harley"]] in the US, it did the opposite [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/harley/top/england-wales?type=percent in the UK.]] In the US, Harley had been known as a girl's name ever since TheNineties when ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' created the character of ComicBook/HarleyQuinn. However, that show was never as popular in the UK as it was in the US, so over there, the character remained fairly obscure outside of comics fandom and her name was still mostly (though not exclusively) given to boys. As such, when the ''Suicide Squad'' movie premiered and the name Harley became associated with a MsFanservice VillainProtagonist who became the film's BreakoutCharacter, its popularity as a boy's name quickly fell, while the corresponding rise as a girl's name was too small to make up the difference.

* The name "Herbert" reached its peak in popularity around the same time UsefulNotes/HerbertHoover was campaigning for, and won, the presidency of the United States. After his name became synonymous with the Main/TheGreatDepression, [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/herbert/top its usage tumbled like the 1929 stock market]].

** "[[https://www.behindthename.com/name/eric/top Eric]]", although the name had been declining earlier in the decade. Still, Eric Cartman's racist, spoiled made many parents wary on naming their kids that.

* In 1997, [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/austin/top "Austin"]] was one of the top ten boy's names in America. That year, however, ''Film/AustinPowers: International Man of Mystery'' premiered, starring as its titular protagonist an AffectionateParody of a TuxedoAndMartini super-spy who, while presented as a hero, is also presented as a sexist KavorkaMan who's [[DiscoDan stuck in the '60s]] and whose [[DeliberateValuesDissonance retrograde attitudes]] make him [[ButtMonkey the butt of the film's jokes]]. The name fell off quickly after that, though it remains in the top 100 boy's names.

** The Kévin / Kevin case is mostly the same in France, minus the geographical element. Plus, the impact of basically [[ZergRush a whole generation of boys reaching teenagehood together]], several years in a row, with all of the unpleasant stereotypes associated with teenagers, worsened by the ones about the first generation to have always lived in a world with Internet, was akin to a MadScientist experiment bowling up. "Kevin" became a common name used with contempt when talking about any obnoxious, idiotic, loud, uncultured, reality-TV avid fan (among other things) person of this generation. Like in Germany, "kevinism" has been acknowledged as a real thing and the name has plummeted in the names' ranks.

* Similar to the Patrick example, the name [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/peter/top "Peter",]] another perennial favorite (coming from [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Peter Pope Saint Peter the Apostle]]), dropped the most it ever had in history in 2000, the year after the premiere of ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' (whose main character Peter Griffin is an overweight and dimwitted lout). It's had a steady decline since.

* In 1997, [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/austin/top "Austin"]] was one of the top ten boy's names in America, That year, however, ''Film/AustinPowers: International Man of Mystery'' premiered, starring as its titular protagonist an AffectionateParody of a TuxedoAndMartini super-spy who, while presented as a hero, is also presented as a sexist KavorkaMan who's [[DiscoDan stuck in the '60s]] and whose [[DeliberateValuesDissonance retrograde attitudes]] make him [[ButtMonkey the butt of the film's jokes]]. The name fell off quickly after that, though it remains in the top 100 boy's names.

* "Vidkun" was never a very popular Norwegian name, but it was [[https://themeaningofthename.com/vidkun/ completely killed]] after UsefulNotes/WorldWarII due to its association with [[TheQuisling Vidkun Quisling]], a Nazi collaborator who was executed after the war (note that Norway had ''abolished'' the death penalty before World War II, only to ''reinstate'' it ''solely'' so they could execute Quisling!). Most of the other names associated with executed collaborators were unscathed, but "Vidkun" had the misfortune of being associated with the ''leader'' of the puppet regime, who was both very visible and also responsible for the infamous 1940 coup attempt, and the name's low popularity before Quisling ensured that it would primarily be associated with him.

* "Vidkun" was never a very popular Norwegian name, but it was [[https://themeaningofthename.com/vidkun/ completely killed]] after UsefulNotes/WorldWarII due to its association with [[TheQuisling Vidkun Quisling]], a Nazi collaborator who was executed after the war. Most of the other names associated with executed collaborators were unscathed, but "Vidkun" had the misfortune of being associated with the ''leader'' of the puppet regime, who was both very visible and also responsible for the infamous 1940 coup attempt, and the name's low popularity before Quisling ensured that it would primarily be associated with him.

* PlayedWith in the case of the nickname "Vicky" for "Victoria", thanks to ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents''. [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/vicky/top/united-states?compare=victoria&type=percent While the name Victoria itself]] has oscillated in popularity in the 21st century, [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/vicky/top nowadays the diminutive Vicky]] has become rarer thanks to the series' resident BabysitterFromHell. This might have caused some women named Victoria (particularly those who were kids when the ''Fairly [=OddParents=]'' was on the air during the 2000s) to instead use "Vic" or "Tori" as nicknames, assuming if they use a nickname at all.

* Oddly enough, while ''Film/SuicideSquad2016'' gave a big boost to the name [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/harley/top "Harley"]] in the US, it did the opposite [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/harley/top/england-wales?type=percent in the UK.]] In the US, Harley had been known as a girl's name ever since TheNineties when ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' created the character of ComicBook/HarleyQuinn. However, that show was never as popular in the UK as it was in the US, so over there, the character remained fairly obscure outside of comics fandom and her name was still mostly (though not exclusively) given to boys. As such, when the ''Suicide Squad'' movie premiered and the name Harley became associated with a MsFanservice VillainProtagonist who became the film's BreakoutCharacter, its popularity as a boy's name quickly fell, while the corresponding rise as a girl's name was too small to make up the difference.

* "Heather" saw a decline in popularity thanks to the film {{Film/Heathers}} having a clique of mean girls all named "Heather". Soon after, "Heather" became seen as an "AlphaBitch" name.

* The boys' name (never especially common) "Nimrod", originally named after a mighty hunter from the Literature/BookOfGenesis, started falling out of popularity in the United States in the 1930s once it became a pejorative for a dimwitted or stupid person. This usage--at least according to some authorities--comes from the WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes, in which both WesternAnimation/BugsBunny and WesternAnimation/DaffyDuck sarcastically call WesternAnimation/ElmerFudd a "Nimrod" to belittle his hunting prowess. The reference flew over the heads of many[[note]]Unless they are associating Nimrod who rallied the people into building the TowerOfBabel as not in reverence to God but in glory to themselves to defy Him if He should flood the world again, they will save themselves within their tower they built so high that the floodwaters shall not drown them. God would then [[CurseOfBabel made humans unable to understand each other by making multiple languages]] so in the end, they never completely made the Tower of Babel. If so, then yes, the name Nimrod being associated with self-important stupid people whose {{pride}}ful actions [[PrideBeforeAFall lead to their own fall]] might be apt.[[/note]], and they just interpreted it as a straight insult (probably helped by aural similarity to terms like "nitwit" and "nincompoop"). The name still sees usage in other countries, however, most notably in [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/nimrod/top Hungary,]] where it started rising in the late '00s and entered the top 25 boys' names in 2017.

** Though this is mostly an Anglosphere ([[MyFriendsAndZoidberg and Netherlands]]) issue. In countries with Latin languages, the ISIS acronym is of minor use, well behind translations of its Arabic name in the local tongue (e.g. "État islamique en Irak et au Levant" ob French, which has exactly the same meaning that of ISIS. Almost systematically shortened to "(L') État islamique") or simply its Arabic name "Daesh". As a result, Isis, although always having been rare, stays firmly in the first 500th given names in France, ranging between around 430th / 390th rank. While in Lusophone countries, it has been steadily grown since decades.

** Similarly, if one goes back and looks at an NYC phone book from the late 1930s, there are dozens of people with the last name of "Hitler." Ten years later, the name was all but gone. Why? Almost everyone with that last name had changed it.

* The girls' name [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/isis/top "Isis"]] used to evoke AncientEgypt, but it was killed stone-dead in 2014 by the terrorist campaign of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, known in the West by its acronym ISIS. It was most pronounced in the Netherlands, where it had been in the top 100 girls' names in 2013 only to crash out of the rankings immediately after. The connotations were [[https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/parenting/isis-leskien-the-eightyearold-sydney-girl-whose-name-is-tearing-her-family-apart/news-story/a7d541f688d85e65db1ec27b77c5fe4d bad enough]] that some women and girls named Isis switched to using their middle names instead. Even fictional organizations got affected; on ''WesternAnimation/{{Archer}}'', the spy agency the protagonists work for had to be hastily retooled from a [[GovernmentAgencyOfFiction fictional one called the International Secret Intelligence Service]] to the UsefulNotes/{{CIA}}.

* [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/chad/top "Chad"]] can be seen as the SpearCounterpart to "Karen". A surprisingly ancient name (going back to a [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chad_of_Mercia 7th-century Anglo-Saxon bishop and saint]]), it was one of the top fifty boys' names from 1971 through 1983 and remained in the top 100 through 1990. But as of 2019, it has fallen out of the top one thousand names for boys. This is seemingly due to the increasing popularity of WebOriginal/VirginVsChad memes and the use of the name in the HeManWomanHater subculture, both of which associated it with a particular type of [[TestosteronePoisoning cartoonishly hyper-masculine]] JerkJock who serves as a PrivilegedRival to other men looking for love. Notably, there was no corresponding drop-off for the related names [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/charles/top Charles]] and [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/charlie/top Charlie,]] which have long been perennial favorites for boys' names and lack the association; Charlie, in fact, has both risen in popularity and become a GenderBlenderName popular for both boys and girls. (Stacey/Stacy, a name often associated with Chad in the meme as that of his AlphaBitch girlfriend and which peaked in popularity around the same time, had already fallen out of the top thousand in popularity by the 2010s, though the meme didn't necessarily help it either.)

* In Norway, the name "Anders" [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/anders/top/norway immediately disappeared from the rankings since 2011]] due to its association with Anders Behring Breivik, the far-right extremist who committed the terrorist attacks on 22 July 2011.

* While it was never an extremely popular name, "Ursula" used to have its fans, being a name of the saint and was associated with [[Franchise/JamesBond Bond girl]] Creator/UrsulaAndress. This all changed with the 1989 release of ''WesternAnimation/{{The Little Mermaid|1989}}'', which featured an heavyset, humanoid-octopus hybrid sea witch named Ursula as its main antagonist. Today, the name is usually thought of as "ugly" and is firmly associated with the Disney villain (though the plucky and relatably ordinary Ursula from ''Film/SpiderMan2'' provided some unexpected relief on that score).

* ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'' may have been responsible for the name [[https://www.behindthename.com/name/patrick/top "Patrick"]] steadily declining in popularity since the early 2000s. It used to be a perennial favorite, one of the top 50 most popular boy's names in the United States from 1948 through 1996, but it fell out of the top 200 by 2019, its lowest position since record-keeping began in ''1880''. Understandably, not many millennial parents want to name their sons after an overweight, dimwitted pink starfish.

* Not that they were ever particularly popular names, but the names Homer and Bart are so strongly associated with ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' that you are unlikely to meet anyone with either name who wasn't born before it aired (1987 for the shorts, 1989 for the series proper). The same is true with the name Barney after Barney Gumble, [[TheAlcoholic an alcoholic]] best known for his AlcoholInducedIdiocy (and it doesn't help that Gumble shares his given name with [[Series/BarneyAndFriends a certain loathed dinosaur]], as mentioned in the Live-Action TV folder).