In 2013, Holly Madison gave birth to her first child, a baby girl she named Rainbow Aurora. Many people snarked on the name, but Holly always defended her choice and swore up and down that she had loved the name Rainbow since she was a kid and one of her classmates was named Rainbow. It did feel like some of the snark was mean-spirited, especially since the name had special significance to Holly. I get the feeling that she had planned to name her daughter that for many, many years. Well, Holly gave a wonderful and funny interview to Yahoo about baby names, stripper names, Kim Kardashian’s pregnancy and much more. You can read the full piece here. Some highlights:
The criticism she received for naming her daughter Rainbow: “Oh, yeah. I got flooded with stupid commentary on social media. It’s definitely a unique name. I like unique names and I wouldn’t have picked it if were common. But, growing up, there was a girl in my class named Rainbow. I grew up in Oregon, where a lot of hippies went to start families. There was a girl at school named Rainbow, and I was so jealous and I wanted it to be my name. So it’s definitely unusual, but it’s a name. It’s not like I called her Coffee Table. People love to say, “That’s a stripper name.” But I’ve spent a lot of time in Vegas and strippers aren’t named Rainbow. They’re named Amber, Crystal and Jessica.”
On Kim Kardashian’s pregnancy: “Honestly, I think the judgment comes from people who are jealous. Everyone would love to have Kim Kardashian’s wardrobe, so if you see her in something ill-fitting once in her life, people feel the need to throw stones. Everyone should just calm down. Bodies change throughout our lives, not just in pregnancy.”
Whether Hugh Hefner is still in her life or Rainbow’s life: “Absolutely not. When I left the mansion we were cordial for a while but eventually I opened my eyes to what kind of person he was and we haven’t talked for years. [Parenting is] not something he would be involved in. There are others who have brought their babies to the mansions after they were born, but it’s not something I would do.”
Whether she would want Rainbow to ever be a Playboy bunny: “I would not be OK with it. When she is an adult, she will be able to do what she wants, but from Day One I’ve tried to raise her to know she has value, her body parts have value, and she doesn’t have to do something cheap or tawdry to get attention. If she wanted to do — and God forbid she did — I would tell her my whole experience with it and I’d be honest that it wasn’t what I thought it would be.
[Yahoo Parenting]
She also talks at length – and quite eloquently – about what she learned in the long-run about posing nude and how that changed people’s perceptions of her and how differently she’s treated because of being in Playboy. She said in part: “A woman’s body is her own, a man’s is his own, and when we feel okay being naked is different for everybody. Some might feel okay in a locker room but not in public, or in Playboy but not a different publication. It’s a choice and everyone is entitled to the choice. I feel like once you’ve posed nude, suddenly people assume your body is always fair game.” That’s very true, and I’m guilty of that too. I always assume that once a person has posed nude, the jig is up and what’s the big deal about doing it over and over?
As for the stripper name stuff…the #1 stripper name is Crystal, according to a completely unofficial listicle, which you can see here. They put Tiffany at #2, then Amber, then Brandy/Brandi. What else… Lola, Angel, Ginger, Candy, Charity and Anastasia. I personally don’t think Jessica is a stripper name, but yes, I do sort of think of Amber, Angel, Candy and Crystal as stripper names.
