Ryan Reynolds On Why We Should Name Our Babies Whatever The Heck We Want

Ryan Reynolds explains his daughter’s “unusual” name during a recent interview.

In the realm of celebrity baby names, it takes a lot for the general public to find it weird. After all, we live in a time where North and Saint West reign, so most names celebs choose are “normal” in comparison. Even still, everyone’s favorite celebrity dad took heat for choosing a “boy” name for his daughter. It’s ok, Ryan Reynolds. We love you no matter what.

During a recent appearance on Good Morning Britain, Ryan explained the meaning behind baby daughter James’ “boyish” name. And also, defended it after the show’s co-host Kate Garraway called it an “unusual” name choice. Reynolds said, “In the spectrum of weird celebrity baby names, I feel like we’re not really breaking any new ground here. I mean, I didn’t call her Summer Squash Meadow Lark, or something.”

Summer Squash Meadow Lark? Because obviously, we needed another reason to love him. Hilarious though his response was, it must have been irritating to basically be put on the defensive about the name he and wife, Blake Lively, selected for their daughter. He explained that they named her after Reynold’s father, who died last year after battling Parkinson’s disease.

He gamely continued to joke saying, “I also thought of all the letters being silent in her name, so it would be just be ‘Haa.'” Which again, was hilarious, but we can’t help but feel sad that he had to answer to this host at all about why he and Lively chose to name their daughter something slightly less than traditional. Of course, he’s on a TV show and being interviewed so they had to ask him questions, but it seems fair to make his daughter’s name off-limits if the question is going to be negative in tone.

The fact is, whether we find a name silly or stupid, it’s not up to us to judge or tell a parent why they’re wrong. Ryan and Blake had good, sentimental reason to name their baby girl James but honestly, did they need one? Isn’t just liking the name reason enough? They shouldn’t have to explain themselves anymore than us Normals would when it comes to naming our children. As long as we aren’t naming them “Hashtag”, it’s frankly not anyone else’s concern.

Baby names will always be a topic the world feels the need to weigh in on and to that end, it’s understandable that some couples refuse to discuss names before their baby is born. Family and friends always think their opinion is of the utmost importance but at the end of the day, all that really matters is what the parents think. Kudos to Ryan Reynolds for defending his daughter’s name, but we hope he knows he really shouldn’t have had to.