falconerjack:

so I’ve seen about a gazillion headcanons about how exactly shitty got his nickname—whether it was in fic or just a random post floating around on tumblr dot com—and I have a lot of thoughts on this subject so we’re gonna talk about it.

a lot of the theories I have seen involve a very long, complicated backstory that was super hilarious, but also very specific. those headcanons are very fun and I enjoy them immensely, but consider this:

shitty got his nickname in the dumbest, most obvious way possible.

so we know that shitty comes from a wealthy, almost definitely conservative family (at least on his dad’s side). his mom is a professor and his dad was a higher up for a hedge fund. his paternal grandparents forced him to cut off his flow, were angry he chose to go to samwell (probs because it’s super liberal and not ivy league), and basically that whole side of the family are all uptight, pretentious assholes who go to smart people schools to become doctors and lawyers and whatever.

and we don’t know shitty’s first name either. we know it starts with a b. but that’s it. and based on what we know about his family, his name could very well be something stupid and pompous like barrington or bernard.

so shitty shows up at samwell, ready to start anew and not be confined by the restrictions his family put on him growing up. he’s gonna do whatever the fuck he wants. he’s gonna grow a mustache and swear and smoke a shit ton of weed and kick ass at hockey and also wear crop tops and be a floral feminist bro and befriend the art kids because why the hell not? 

and then some upperclassman on the hockey team asks him for his name, and giving away his pretentious ivy league-sounding first name totally ruins the effect shitty was going for, so their conversation goes something like this:

“yo, what’s your name again?”

“it’s knight.”

“nah, man. like, your first name.”

“oh, it’s shitty, man. don’t worry about it.”

“…what?”

“just call me knight. my first name is shitty so like, don’t worry about it.”

and the upperclassman just starts cracking up because he realizes that this guy’s name isn’t actually “Shitty” and that he’s is using the word as an adjective, but it sounded like that was what this guy was saying his first name was.

and that’s how shitty got his name. and somehow they never got his real name out of him and upon graduation he learns all his closest friends don’t even know what his real given name is.