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| Why I’m glad no one wants to call their baby Nigel any more | Why I’m glad no one wants to call their baby Nigel any more |
| (4 months later) | |
| It was never a cool name, even before Farage helped consign it to the dustbin of history. It deserves to be no-platformed | |
| Thu 21 Sep 2017 16.08 BST | |
| Last modified on Fri 22 Sep 2017 15.09 BST | |
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| It’s kind of uplifting to find that in the last year, no one in the UK has named their child Nigel. This is possibly a first. There are plenty of baby Jeremys and a small increase in Borises. But no Nigels at all. We are looking at a whole Nigel-free generation. We Nigels are becoming extinct. Which is a good thing – it’s always been near the top of the list of crap names to give your kid, along with Cecil, Jolyon and Leslie. | It’s kind of uplifting to find that in the last year, no one in the UK has named their child Nigel. This is possibly a first. There are plenty of baby Jeremys and a small increase in Borises. But no Nigels at all. We are looking at a whole Nigel-free generation. We Nigels are becoming extinct. Which is a good thing – it’s always been near the top of the list of crap names to give your kid, along with Cecil, Jolyon and Leslie. |
| But this year is significant because it’s the first time ever there are no little Nigels. None. It’s clear what’s happened – fed-up with certain radio and TV stations, with Twitter and with most of the print papers giving our currently most famous Nigel oxygen, parents have taken the matter into their own hands. The name has been no-platformed, it’s no longer a safe place. | But this year is significant because it’s the first time ever there are no little Nigels. None. It’s clear what’s happened – fed-up with certain radio and TV stations, with Twitter and with most of the print papers giving our currently most famous Nigel oxygen, parents have taken the matter into their own hands. The name has been no-platformed, it’s no longer a safe place. |
| But it’s not as if Nigel has ever been a cool name. Even in an ironic, grime kind of way. It’s too posh and yet at the same time, too tacky. On the one hand, there’s Nigel the chinless hooray in tweed, whom Arabella is refusing to marry – “No, Mummy, not Naagel!” – and on the other, is Nigel the car salesman in tan jacket and knuckle-free gloves. | But it’s not as if Nigel has ever been a cool name. Even in an ironic, grime kind of way. It’s too posh and yet at the same time, too tacky. On the one hand, there’s Nigel the chinless hooray in tweed, whom Arabella is refusing to marry – “No, Mummy, not Naagel!” – and on the other, is Nigel the car salesman in tan jacket and knuckle-free gloves. |
| It was tough growing up a Nigel. It did not impress girls, it did not get you into clubs, or bands, or political meetings (well, not the sort I might have wanted to attend). It did not look good on a cast list, especially when playing the selection of junkies and no-hopers I started out with. | It was tough growing up a Nigel. It did not impress girls, it did not get you into clubs, or bands, or political meetings (well, not the sort I might have wanted to attend). It did not look good on a cast list, especially when playing the selection of junkies and no-hopers I started out with. |
| I don’t know what my mum and dad were thinking of, calling me Nigel. Well, I do, I suppose – they thought it might add a bit of class to our altogether dull surname. A soupçon of suavity, a bit à la continentale. Because Nigel is basically an attempt to sound French. It was brought over here by the Normans – who Latinised it from the Viking Njal, or Irish Niall. Nigel is meant to give one a bit of status, or at least it was in 1066. | I don’t know what my mum and dad were thinking of, calling me Nigel. Well, I do, I suppose – they thought it might add a bit of class to our altogether dull surname. A soupçon of suavity, a bit à la continentale. Because Nigel is basically an attempt to sound French. It was brought over here by the Normans – who Latinised it from the Viking Njal, or Irish Niall. Nigel is meant to give one a bit of status, or at least it was in 1066. |
| So it’s had a thousand years to fester into a kind of revanchist gentrification. I know that revanchist is not quite the right word there, but a bit of naff Frenchification is what being a Nigel is all about. It’s a name on a parr with Julian, for flaccid pretension. In this, the Assanges could be said to have shared similar aspirations for their son as did the Farages. Unlike Mr and Mrs Gascoigne or the Bonnevilles, who sensibly named their boys Paul and Hugh. When Nigel met Julian at the Ecuadorian embassy, I wondered what they talked about: vol-au-vents? Serviettes and servants? The Scarlet Putinelle? | So it’s had a thousand years to fester into a kind of revanchist gentrification. I know that revanchist is not quite the right word there, but a bit of naff Frenchification is what being a Nigel is all about. It’s a name on a parr with Julian, for flaccid pretension. In this, the Assanges could be said to have shared similar aspirations for their son as did the Farages. Unlike Mr and Mrs Gascoigne or the Bonnevilles, who sensibly named their boys Paul and Hugh. When Nigel met Julian at the Ecuadorian embassy, I wondered what they talked about: vol-au-vents? Serviettes and servants? The Scarlet Putinelle? |
| So all in all I’m glad that being a Nigel will no longer be inflicted on the young. It would be no exaggeration to say that it’s been a blight on my career. Imagine if I had been called Garry, Tom or Dan. Or Sam, or Jack. No years as a musical theatre chorine for Clint Planer. On the other hand, these days it could be worse, I could have been a Donald. I wonder how many baby Donalds there are in the UK, right now, having their nappies changed. Or Kims. | So all in all I’m glad that being a Nigel will no longer be inflicted on the young. It would be no exaggeration to say that it’s been a blight on my career. Imagine if I had been called Garry, Tom or Dan. Or Sam, or Jack. No years as a musical theatre chorine for Clint Planer. On the other hand, these days it could be worse, I could have been a Donald. I wonder how many baby Donalds there are in the UK, right now, having their nappies changed. Or Kims. |
| • Nigel Planer is an actor, comedian, novelist and playwright | • Nigel Planer is an actor, comedian, novelist and playwright |
| Baby names | |
| Opinion | |
| Nigel Farage | |
| Parents and parenting | |
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