I'm Hyphenating My Baby's Last Name. Here's Why Everyone Needs to Shut Up About That.

My husband and I are hyphenating our baby's last name. A couple of years ago, I arrived at what I thought was a great solution to the ongoing feminist baby name debate. My way hasn't caught on, though, so this seems like the best option.

Thing is, when you're pregnant, your choices suddenly become matters of public consumption. People who will never meet my baby, who have no investment in me or in my family, have very strong feelings about what Jeff and I should name our child. Reactions to our announcement have ranged from crying (yes, seriously) to threats of violence. I am a terrible monster who is destroying the world, as are thousands of other feminist men and women who choose to share both of their family names with their offspring.

Here's the thing: if you are not pushing my child out of your vagina, paying the full costs of raising my child through the age of 18, or offering to provide us with 24/7 childcare, you get no say in what our baby is named. If you want to name a baby, have your own.

Don't like my baby's name? That's cool. I'm sure there's something I don't like about you or your name. We're all entitled to our opinions. Basic human decency requires us to keep hurtful opinions to ourselves, and to remain silent on issues that do not affect us.

Why We're Hyphenating

I kept my last name when Jeff and I got married, for one simple reason: he kept his. I have never understood why women must change their names, while men unquestioningly get to keep theirs. I've built a life, career, and identity around my name. Those things enrich my marriage, and I wasn't about to abandon them just because Jeff and I got married. This is not something he “let” me do. We are equals, and Jeff never questioned my decision. I wouldn't be with someone who did.

So for me, the decision was really quite simple: I'm the one who gets to suffer through three months of morning sickness, nine months of pregnancy, hours or days of labor, and a year or more of breastfeeding. Like it or not, biology means I have to make many more sacrifices to have this child than my husband. It makes no sense to me that I would then have to give up my last name. Because we are equals, and will be equally involved in raising our child, I want both of our names as part of our child's identity.

I don't think I should have to defend my decision, and I'm chagrined that I am met with more questions about this than any other parenting decision I intend to make. Spank your child? You'll hear almost nothing. Give your child a hyphenated name? You're an inhumane monster. Nevertheless, brief answers to the most common critiques I hear are as follows:

• Yes, my child's last name will be very long. I hope this will help him or her learn more letters more quickly. Even if it doesn't, it's not like children with long last names are an anomaly. In cultures across the globe, children have two or more last names, and even in our own culture, children's last names are often way longer than the forms they must complete.
• Is it possible people will judge me for my decision? Sure. Try to imagine how little I care. Is it possible people will judge my child? Absolutely. Those people are what we call bad people, and if they judge my child for his or her name, there's an infinitely long list of other things for which they will judge my child.
• Sure, teachers might not be able to pronounced my child's name. And that's exactly how it would be if we gave our child either my husband's nightmare of a last name or mine.

The Ball-Stealing Feminist: Why it's All My Fault

The thing that is most striking about our decision to hyphenate isn't that people judge or object. It's that they universally blame me. My husband could not possibly want to raise our child in an egalitarian household! No man has ever willingly allowed his wife to share a last name with her child! I must have bullied him into it! What happened to his balls?

Thing is, Jeff's sufficiently secure in his masculinity that he doesn't need to take my name away or give only his to our child. He's smart enough to realize that our child will be his no matter what we name him or her. He also knows that feminist men have better relationships and more sex, and what manly guy is going to give that up? Not my husband.

How I Respond to Hurtful Comments

How you respond when someone questions your decision to hyphenate your child's name really depends on who the person is, what reaction you want, and how pissed off you are. Two responses that always work well: “Why do you ask?” because it puts the burden back on the asker; “Thank you for your opinion” because it shuts down conversation.

Some other, snarkier options I've tried for strangers:

• I don't like your name either. I think you should change it.
• Weird how you think my husband is a wuss for “letting” me play a role in naming the child I'm birthing. I've always thought you/your husband is a wuss because he doesn't seem to know he's a man without forcing his name on women and children. Guess we're all entitled to our opinions. It's just that some of us know better than to share them.
• We're giving naming rights to the first person who contributes $50,000 to the child's college fund. Would you like to write a check now or later?
• What a rude and hurtful thing to say.
• My mother might not have taught me to follow tradition, but yours sure didn't teach you any manners.
• This discussion is over.