RushTok theory on the popularity of the name Bella goes viral for hilarious reason

A TikToker has gone viral after getting to the bottom of why one demographic of girls all seem to have the same name and it turns out a particular book and film is to blame.

It all came about when TikTok user @shesgotmoxie21 noticed that many people participating in “RushTok” all seemed to have the name Bella.

RushTok refers to “rush”, the name of the recruitment process of sororities at US colleges, where potential new members (or PNMs) joining colleges hope to become the chosen ones.

In videos on TikTok, PNMs make videos that range from introducing themselves to their potential new sorority sisters to OOTD (outfit of the day) videos.

Realising that a lot of the girls in the videos seem to be named Bella, @shesgotmoxie21 made a video with screenshots of them all. Text overlaying the video read: “Been trying to figure out why Bella is such a popular name on RushTok this year…”

The next screenshot showed that the book Twilight was released 18 years ago in 2005, famously featuring a character with the same name.

The clip has been viewed almost 2 million times and other TikTokers commented with their experiences of names influenced by cultural phenomena.

One person wrote: “I’m a teacher and there are 3 siblings named after Twilight characters.”

Another said: “Yup my middle schoolers asked why there’s so many Bellas and Jacobs in their class. I had to tell them.”

“And the year before was Ella Enchanted so I had to be called Ella C for a while,” another person said.

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