Balls and Bottoms give way to Wangs in name game. "The number of people in Britain with surnames like Cockshott, Balls, Death and Shufflebottom -- likely the source of schoolroom laughter -- has declined by up to 75 percent in the last century." (contributed by Jerry McMurry—thanks!)
Great one! But the speculation on the cause of the pattern omits one obvious possibility: perhaps it is more difficult for men with laughable surnames to marry and pass on the family curse. Really, if Mrs. Cock could make it through the first date with Dick withouth convulsing on the floor with tears running down, surely she would also need to have no friends or family to restrain her from walking down the aisle.
Of course, in a few rare cases the beau might curtail the humor by quickly demonstrating assets outweighing the liability.
The article brings to mind a young lady I met in college. Her last name was always given as a mumbled Sechs, pronounced “sex.â€. I made the mistake of saying “pardon†twice — only because I couldn't hear — and the situation became very awkward. Needless to say, in the Seinfeld pattern, ….
While I was at university, a Dr. Suck was hired. After a couple of years, he legally changed his name to Dr. Salk, reportedly because of his kid's difficulties in public school.
Emmett
There's a fairly well-known Korean actor named Han Suk-kyu (or Suk-kyu Han, if you follow the Korean convention of placing the surname first like in Japanese). He's probably lucky that he didn't grow up in an English-speaking country.