Aggressive Boy Names

Power is one of the new crop -- Justice, Liberty, Peace -- of strong, clear-cut, declarative choices, though this one carries more assertiveness than virtue.

Caliber belongs to the class of tough boy names — along with Shooter, Wesson, and Trigger — that are given to a small but notable number of boys each year. We generally discourage parents from using such violence-promoting names — there are better routes to the nickname Cal.

Stryker adds the trendy letter Y to Striker to join the new gang of boys' names that have two syllables, end in -er, spring from words, and have a macho meaning and image.

Bolt is more popular for dogs (a la the 2008 Disney movie of the same name) but debuted on the American charts as a boy name in 2023.

Chance has risen far on the baby-naming charts, but Hazard has a considerably more dangerous edge. It was the middle name of famed US naval commander Oliver Hazard Perry.

While patriot Thomas Paine is a worthy honoree, the mere association with the word 'pain' knocks this name out of bounds.

Gage we get. Cade we get. But Cage? Not really, and yet, it was given to about two dozen baby boys in one recent year.

Spelling it with a K doesn't do much to separate Kaliber from Caliber's violent image.

Coined in the 1940s: an acronym of "radio detection and ranging".

Spelling it with a K doesn't do much to distance Kartel from its drug lord affiliations.

Hurricane is a wild weather name. The best-known male named Hurricane is Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, a middleweight boxer wrongly imprisoned for murder and immortalized by the 1975 Bob Dylan song Hurricane.

Blunt. Stick to Hunter.

We're seeing lots of Bad Boy Names, and Menace fits right in with brothers Rocket, Rowdy, and Wilder. Menace can work for children of any gender.

A German occupational surname with links to justice and the legal system, but possibly more associated with the Richter Scale, used to measure the magnitude of earthquakes.

A surname-style word name, associated with the military in the UK, the police in the US, and more generally, with a supportive, dependable person who shows up without complaint. With the popularity of Cooper and with Truett and Tru rising up the ranks, sound wise, it fits current trends.

Sounds a bit like a nickname in a Dickens novel, but this short form was used in New England a few centuries ago, back when names like Micajah were popular. Both short and long forms are now ripe for revival.

Wrecker is a new entry to the newly trendy group of badass baby names -- names mostly for boys that sound wild (or Wilder) and summon the kind of kid that races around (Racer), breaking things (Breaker), and yeah, why not, being a Wrecker while he's at it. Actor Cam Gigandet introduced this one, with a more phonetic spelling, when he named his son Rekker.

Sheriff may sound law-abiding, but it also has a Wild West feel.