How important is a name for an individual?
My name has the meaning of happiness and joy, and that's a nice asset to me. But I do not call myself happiness or joy going out on the street.
A name is almost never an individual thing. Some names have a biblical background, other are quite popular during certain times and therefor a lot of my friends have names starting with an M. You can buy nice cups, namebooks and name-horoscopes to tell you who you are. An individual can enjoy these things but does not have the association that a corporate brand or a collective has.
The name of these two does identify them and calls on associastions of image and ideology. Those names are normally handpicked and well thought about. Where as for me, my name does not tell that much about me, the name of a company tells you so much more. Not the letters that make up the name, but the thoughts you have with it.
Having a number instead of a name would be more individual because two people would not get the same number. In that way, I don't think a number is that much different from a name, only that the latter sounds nicer then the former.
In the Netherlands we do not have a number system, but a Dig-ID. All offical governemental websites use this to store and adjust your information. So by entering a website like that they can all see all information about me. But, it saves me a lot of work because I can fill out offical papers online.
I do understand the feeling of paranoia that can come to exsistence when these informationstreams become heavily used.
To respond to the first posts, I would find it rather confusing to work as an individual under a collective name with individual work. because I do not nescissaryly have to support the work of the other individuals in this collective. Loesje on the other hand is a collective that works for me because we create our work togheter and even though we not always agree, in the Loesje texts we find a consencus of opinion.
So does my name define me? No, it does not, but I like it. But if I would sign a paper with my name or my number, what's the difference.
Joined: 2006-06-16