People Share Their Unfortunate Name Stories After Amy Schumer Changes Her Baby’s Name Because It Sounded Like “Genital”
The names our parents give us can define what kind of people we become. Some kids are given very unfortunate names that can lead to a lot of bullying in the future. And the sad thing is, some parents don’t even realize it until it’s too late. Fortunately, some correct their mistakes early on.
Comedian and actor Amy Schumer and her husband Chris Fischer had their first child in May 2019 and named him Gene Attell Fischer. A very interesting name, don’t you think? Well, the parents eventually realized that their son’s name sounds like the word “genital” when said out loud and officially changed it to Gene David.
Schumer’s story inspired others to share their own unfortunate name stories. As it turns out, lots of people have run into problems because of their names! Read on, dear Pandas, and let us know in the comments if you’ve ever had any issues with your own names. Bored Panda reached out to celebrity expert Mike Sington to hear his opinion about Schumer’s situation, so be sure to scroll down for our interview with him!
More info: AmySchumer.com | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter | Spotify
This is comedian Amy Schumer. She had her first child in May 2019
Image credits: amyschumer
Here’s her husband Chris Fischer holding their son who they named Gene Attell Fischer
Image credits: amyschumer
Schumer named her son in tribute of her close friend Dave Attell
Image credits: amyschumer
However, the couple eventually realized that their son’s name sounds like the word “genital” when you say it out loud
Image credits: amyschumer
The parents thought it was best to protect their son from future embarrassment…
Image credits: amyschumer
…so they officially changed his name to Gene David Fischer
Image credits: amyschumer
Schumer openly joked about her mistake and took things in stride
Image credits: amyschumer
Comedian Schumer gave her son his unusual middle name “Attell” as a tribute to her close friend, fellow comedian Dave Attell.
38-year-old Schumer announced that she and her husband changed their kid’s name on the latest episode of her Spotify podcast Amy Schumer Presents: 3 Girls, 1 Keith.
“So do you guys know that Gene, our baby’s name is officially changed? It’s now Gene David Fischer. It was Gene Attell Fischer but we realized that, by accident, we named our son ‘genital,’” Schumer told her cohosts on the podcast.
A guest on the show, actor and comedian Claudia O’Doherty added that her mom had noticed that earlier: “My mom was like, ‘Amy’s called her son genital.’ And I was like, ‘What are you talking about?’ And then, she was right.”
Meanwhile, Schumer’s friend Attell seemed to take the news pretty well. He was happy that the toddler now has his first name, even if “Attell” is now off the table.
“She may have prevented her son from years of suffering”
Celebrity expert Mike told us that he thinks Schumer made the right decision to change her son’s name. “The kid would have been teased and bullied in school if classmates had found out his middle name,” he said.
“Amy meant well by naming her son after a friend, but she didn’t think it through when the first name was considered with the middle name. By making the change, she may have prevented her son from years of suffering. Changing her son’s name was a bold move, and I admire Amy for doing it,” Mike told us that Schumer helped her child avoid a lot of potential pain in the future.
After learning about Schumer’s kid’s name, lots of people shared their own unfortunate name stories
Celebrities change their names to make them more memorable or to simplify them
There are plenty of celebrities out there who have changed their names to make it big. For instance, music legend Freddie Mercury was born Farrokh Bulsara, wrestler Randy Savage was originally Randall Mario Poffo while actress Olivia Wilde had the unfortunate last name, Cockburn. By why do celebs change their names?
“Historically, celebrities have changed their names for one of two reasons: to make them memorable, by selecting a unique name, or to make them easier to remember, by simplifying a complicated or hard to spell name,” Mike told Bored Panda.
“The practice is much less common today, when uniqueness seems to prevail—look at all the wacky celebrity baby names like Apple, Blue Ivy, North West, Saint, Chicago, Cricket, and Birdie. Occasionally, a celebrity has no choice. The Screen Actors Guild does not allow two actors to have the same name. So if your name is already ‘taken,’ you have to change it to something different!”
As someone who grew up with a surname that is also a colloquialism for genitalia, I thank Amy on her sons behalf. It's not just kids that are brutal, adults can be too.
When I got married my initials changed to HRM , I fairly often get called 'Her Royal Majesty' at work
I have a colleague too, from France, whose surname happens to coincide with the king Saejong 세종대왕, when transcribed in Korean.
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A couple of decades ago, at a mum’s group where we all hung together with our babies/toddlers, we were talking about first names and surnames etc. A good friend of mine asked a mum her surname, she said Hunt. My friend said “Lucky you didn’t name him Mike” and the mum goes “oh, my older son is named Michael” (she was serious) and we were holding our breath, waiting for her to walk away, before we almost went our pants with laughter
I personally don't see the point of middle names, so neither of my kids have one. I never use mine except for on government forms, so why bother.
It's mostly about recognition and sentiment. If two people in one household share the same initials, that can become quite a problem with mail for instance. But in today's world, getting a unique emailaddress can be quite a challenge too. Sentiment plays an even bigger role. If you want to have a sweet reminder to someone you love who has passed for instance. But if you do love the person, but wouldn't use the name as a first name, this might work. I don't have a middle name myself, my husband doesn't either, but we really wanted to have our kids to have a middle name for practical and sentimental purposes :)
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I used to work in a pathology lab and we once had a sample from a girl named Chanel but her mum had spelled it wrong so it was actually Channel. I also had a sample from an African lady who married an English gentleman and her name was Baby Fiddler. I couldn't stop laughing for about ten minutes. We also had a D**k Grayson, who's one of the Robins from Batman, so swings and roundabouts :-D
One of the bands I was in during my 90's heyday had a drummer named Mike Kok. True. I also recall a news story from the UK about a Mr and Mrs Peacock who named their newborn son Drew. Heartless bastards.
Worst one I’ve EVER seen, I was in a middle school and saw the kids name listed as Vagina, and thought oh my gosh no way.... and the teacher said “yep, but her mom tells us it’s pronounced “Va-Shin-Aye”...... WHHHYYYY
That's why I like languages that have strict grammar rules. There is no "oh but it is pronounced thiiisss waaaay" it's pronounced the way grammatical rules tell you to pronounce it, period.
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A few months after I was married I realized my new initials are the equivalent of ObGyn in my language. I was used to signing my arts and crafts with my initials, but I don't do that any more.
I used to work for a non-profit where we tracked baby's development for the first 3 years & provide education and support to parents, so I would get paperwork on every baby born in the tri-county area. There were 2 baby names I will never forget: 1. Shmily (mom said it was an acronym meaning So Help Me I Love You) 2. Shithead (pronounced Sha-Theed)
My name used to be Borntrager. Kids would take out the tra and replace it with insulting word i.e. Borndumber and worse. When I became an adult I changed it leaglly.
I have a female friend whose surname is Cockin. I can't believe she chose to keep it when she married a guy with the surname Raven. I have another female friend whose married surname is Cund. That's just too close for my liking.
I named my daughter Dasha, which in Russian is a short version of Daria. Dasha is not really an official name, but I really hated Daria, so Dasha it was. Now that she's a teen her friends say that it's good I picked the short version, because Daria sounds like diarrhea. It never occurred to me!
A woman's genital area is sometimes referred to as a "bush" in slang.
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If we'd had a girl she was going to be called Scarlet Ella, until a work colleague pointed out it sounded like a disease..... luckily wer had a boy.
My last name (before getting married) is Fry. It's now Fry-Bru********. But all through school I was only called Fry. And all the jokes with it. I just stopped responding to it until they said my first name and then they learned. I also called the kids back by their last names as if it was a game. But one of my ex's last names was Caisse (said Case) and I joked if we had a kid I would name him/her Justine/Justin.
I met a guy in Vegas named Richard Cummings. We had a good laugh over screwed up names. Mine isn't so bad, I just get called Duane all the time (it sounds like Dawn, spelled Daune)
A friend was telling me about her new nephew, Richard Peter. Me: They named him D**k Peter? What's his last name, W**g? Her: No, Johnson. Me: Oh good god!
I grew up next to Mike Lansbury. His mom remarried when he was 7 and Mike's last name became "Hunt." He was 12 before he realized why people chuckled when he said his name. He never changed it, but he did take martial arts.
My mum named one of my sisters after a stepson she really liked. His name was roger. So, my sister got the middle name Rogette. Making her initials ARS (British/Australian spell a**e for bum). She detested the name and initials. Must've convinced friends during her senior years at school to give her a better nickname. She would often eat these sort of hotdog buns shaped fruit breads with pink icing on top. We call them finger-buns. So, that was her nickname for the rest of highschool. Finger-buns.
I worked with a guy and his first name was Dusty and his last name was Hood.
If only all parents were so thoughtful. Kids may suffer their whole life from an unfortunate name.
Had a friend with the last name Schattenkerk. Some people (the nice ones) called him Captain Kirk, some called him Chewbacca because he was super furry, but most of us called him Sh*t n Squirt.
Yeah, it's a Dutch name and would literaly translate to "to estimate church". Schatten could also be loved ones or treasures. Where the former is a derivative from treasure and treasure is probably related to the meaning of to estimate value or something. But what I really wanted to say is, don't be a d**k to your friend. The fun in jokes like that wear off very quickly and he probably laughs at them "als een boer met kiespijn". Google translate that ;)
Load More Replies... So she was going to put a friend's surname (as a "middle name", which is not part of someone's legal name in US) then her husband's surname, but not her own surname? Sorry most of other cultures but I don't get this thing of only having one (usually the father's) surname. Makes no sense to me (besides is usually due to historical mysogeny).
Spreading fake information. Middle names are apart of your legal name in the USA. I've had to deal with this registering 2 births abroad.
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My two youngest boys last name is crabb. I didn't marry their dad so I dodged that bullet. Also my mom knows someone named Forrest sapp.
If you don't like it why didn't you put yours instead then???
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I was named after a Canadian Football player..I roll my eyes at strange names! But, now it's the norm.
Because they thought it would be nice and it has meaning to them and after realizing what they did, they reconsidered. So. Yeah. They're good. Also Lucy and Judy would be very inconvenient for a boy ;)
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As someone who grew up with a surname that is also a colloquialism for genitalia, I thank Amy on her sons behalf. It's not just kids that are brutal, adults can be too.
When I got married my initials changed to HRM , I fairly often get called 'Her Royal Majesty' at work
I have a colleague too, from France, whose surname happens to coincide with the king Saejong 세종대왕, when transcribed in Korean.
Load More Replies... A couple of decades ago, at a mum’s group where we all hung together with our babies/toddlers, we were talking about first names and surnames etc. A good friend of mine asked a mum her surname, she said Hunt. My friend said “Lucky you didn’t name him Mike” and the mum goes “oh, my older son is named Michael” (she was serious) and we were holding our breath, waiting for her to walk away, before we almost went our pants with laughter
I personally don't see the point of middle names, so neither of my kids have one. I never use mine except for on government forms, so why bother.
It's mostly about recognition and sentiment. If two people in one household share the same initials, that can become quite a problem with mail for instance. But in today's world, getting a unique emailaddress can be quite a challenge too. Sentiment plays an even bigger role. If you want to have a sweet reminder to someone you love who has passed for instance. But if you do love the person, but wouldn't use the name as a first name, this might work. I don't have a middle name myself, my husband doesn't either, but we really wanted to have our kids to have a middle name for practical and sentimental purposes :)
Load More Replies... I used to work in a pathology lab and we once had a sample from a girl named Chanel but her mum had spelled it wrong so it was actually Channel. I also had a sample from an African lady who married an English gentleman and her name was Baby Fiddler. I couldn't stop laughing for about ten minutes. We also had a D**k Grayson, who's one of the Robins from Batman, so swings and roundabouts :-D
One of the bands I was in during my 90's heyday had a drummer named Mike Kok. True. I also recall a news story from the UK about a Mr and Mrs Peacock who named their newborn son Drew. Heartless bastards.
Worst one I’ve EVER seen, I was in a middle school and saw the kids name listed as Vagina, and thought oh my gosh no way.... and the teacher said “yep, but her mom tells us it’s pronounced “Va-Shin-Aye”...... WHHHYYYY
That's why I like languages that have strict grammar rules. There is no "oh but it is pronounced thiiisss waaaay" it's pronounced the way grammatical rules tell you to pronounce it, period.
Load More Replies... A few months after I was married I realized my new initials are the equivalent of ObGyn in my language. I was used to signing my arts and crafts with my initials, but I don't do that any more.
I used to work for a non-profit where we tracked baby's development for the first 3 years & provide education and support to parents, so I would get paperwork on every baby born in the tri-county area. There were 2 baby names I will never forget: 1. Shmily (mom said it was an acronym meaning So Help Me I Love You) 2. Shithead (pronounced Sha-Theed)
My name used to be Borntrager. Kids would take out the tra and replace it with insulting word i.e. Borndumber and worse. When I became an adult I changed it leaglly.
I have a female friend whose surname is Cockin. I can't believe she chose to keep it when she married a guy with the surname Raven. I have another female friend whose married surname is Cund. That's just too close for my liking.
I named my daughter Dasha, which in Russian is a short version of Daria. Dasha is not really an official name, but I really hated Daria, so Dasha it was. Now that she's a teen her friends say that it's good I picked the short version, because Daria sounds like diarrhea. It never occurred to me!
A woman's genital area is sometimes referred to as a "bush" in slang.
Load More Replies... If we'd had a girl she was going to be called Scarlet Ella, until a work colleague pointed out it sounded like a disease..... luckily wer had a boy.
My last name (before getting married) is Fry. It's now Fry-Bru********. But all through school I was only called Fry. And all the jokes with it. I just stopped responding to it until they said my first name and then they learned. I also called the kids back by their last names as if it was a game. But one of my ex's last names was Caisse (said Case) and I joked if we had a kid I would name him/her Justine/Justin.
I met a guy in Vegas named Richard Cummings. We had a good laugh over screwed up names. Mine isn't so bad, I just get called Duane all the time (it sounds like Dawn, spelled Daune)
A friend was telling me about her new nephew, Richard Peter. Me: They named him D**k Peter? What's his last name, W**g? Her: No, Johnson. Me: Oh good god!
I grew up next to Mike Lansbury. His mom remarried when he was 7 and Mike's last name became "Hunt." He was 12 before he realized why people chuckled when he said his name. He never changed it, but he did take martial arts.
My mum named one of my sisters after a stepson she really liked. His name was roger. So, my sister got the middle name Rogette. Making her initials ARS (British/Australian spell a**e for bum). She detested the name and initials. Must've convinced friends during her senior years at school to give her a better nickname. She would often eat these sort of hotdog buns shaped fruit breads with pink icing on top. We call them finger-buns. So, that was her nickname for the rest of highschool. Finger-buns.
I worked with a guy and his first name was Dusty and his last name was Hood.
If only all parents were so thoughtful. Kids may suffer their whole life from an unfortunate name.
Had a friend with the last name Schattenkerk. Some people (the nice ones) called him Captain Kirk, some called him Chewbacca because he was super furry, but most of us called him Sh*t n Squirt.
Yeah, it's a Dutch name and would literaly translate to "to estimate church". Schatten could also be loved ones or treasures. Where the former is a derivative from treasure and treasure is probably related to the meaning of to estimate value or something. But what I really wanted to say is, don't be a d**k to your friend. The fun in jokes like that wear off very quickly and he probably laughs at them "als een boer met kiespijn". Google translate that ;)
Load More Replies... So she was going to put a friend's surname (as a "middle name", which is not part of someone's legal name in US) then her husband's surname, but not her own surname? Sorry most of other cultures but I don't get this thing of only having one (usually the father's) surname. Makes no sense to me (besides is usually due to historical mysogeny).
Spreading fake information. Middle names are apart of your legal name in the USA. I've had to deal with this registering 2 births abroad.
Load More Replies... My two youngest boys last name is crabb. I didn't marry their dad so I dodged that bullet. Also my mom knows someone named Forrest sapp.
If you don't like it why didn't you put yours instead then???
Load More Replies... I was named after a Canadian Football player..I roll my eyes at strange names! But, now it's the norm.
Because they thought it would be nice and it has meaning to them and after realizing what they did, they reconsidered. So. Yeah. They're good. Also Lucy and Judy would be very inconvenient for a boy ;)
Load More Replies... 
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