And when the last Dave falls, who will man the barbecue?
A shepherd named Dave slew Goliath and became King of Israel. Michelangelo’s Dave has the most gazed-upon wang in history. Sir Dave Attenborough whispered to us about turtles, and now we sip from paper straws. Daves have ruled nations, entertained millions, and shaped history. But now? We’re witnessing the great Dave Die-Off.
I know this from lived experience. My name is Dave, and statistically speaking, if you’re a middle-aged white man, so is yours.
At school, I was never the Dave in a class. There was always at least one other Dave – usually more. In high school, I played volleyball. Eight players on the team. Six of them were Daves. Even the coach was a Dave. If you yelled “Dave!” in the middle of a game, the entire team would turn around. It was less of a name, more of a roll call.
My son’s high school, though? 900 students. Zero Daves. Not a single one.
What happened to the Daves? During the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s, Dave was in the top five male baby names in most English-speaking countries every year, often at #1 or #2. It was once so popular that if you threw a rock into a crowd, you’d hit three Daves – one of whom would be your uncle.
Then, like landlines and mixtapes, Dave went from everywhere to nowhere. And now, Dave is a name almost exclusively for men whose knees make a noise when they stand up.
Dave will soon no longer be a middle-aged man’s name; it will just be an old man’s name. We won’t be coaching kids’ sports anymore – we’ll only be standing for political office, writing strongly worded letters to the council about bin collection schedules, and loudly refusing to use self-checkouts because “they took our jobs.”
No baby Daves. No teenage Daves. No young adult Daves. We’re like pandas in captivity: aging, declining in numbers, and completely uninterested in making more Daves.
But just when all seemed lost, a beacon of hope appeared… from an unexpected source. Not from nostalgic millennials, but from Chinese parents. The number of Daves with Chinese heritage is increasing! I don’t know how or why this is happening, but I do know one thing: Cultural Daveversity might be the thing that saves us.
So let’s join together and keep the momentum going. Without your intervention, Daves will soon be extinct – like video cassettes, phone books, and people who know what a carburetor does.
Talk to your friends. Petition the government. If we can put a man on the moon, we can put a Dave in a nursery. Let’s get #SaveTheDave trending. Let’s start Dave Awareness Month. Let’s introduce baby-naming Daversion officers in hospitals and offer tax breaks for new parents who choose wisely.
Because Dave is more than just a name. It’s a barbecue waiting to be lit. A gutter waiting to be fixed. A lawn waiting to be aggressively watered. This isn’t just a plea: this is how we prevent the Davepocalypse.