In the US, you can give your baby pretty much any name you choose, but the very worst examples might draw the attention of Child Protective Services. In Australia, the regulations prohibit certain types of names, and each is judged individually. The one that gave me pause was a restriction against naming your child a title. In Kentucky, that would exclude a lot of Generals, Majors, Dukes, and Earls. But one rules was a restriction against a name "contrary to the public interest for some other reason." That's as ambiguous as you can get, and gives bureaucrats a lot of power over naming your child.
Kirsten Drysdale of the Australia Broadcasting Corporation decided to test the limits of the law by naming her child something pretty bad, but not specifically prohibited. Oh yeah, she really did. Let's see how that goes. This video does a good job of covering up the worst language, but it still has NSFW audio. (via reddit)
Australians are the Golden Retrievers of nationalities, friendly and fun, but not afraid to shit on the rug once in a while.
ReplyDeleteThis is also true in Iceland, however the vagaries of Icelandic grammar and tenses can cause some names to be rejected.
ReplyDeleteA lot of parents give their sprog names that sound normal but have weird spelling so they'll be unique online and in databases. They might as well tattoo a target on the kids forehead for the kids peers.
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