MERLIN, Oregon (Map, News) - The state of Oregon has ordered a family to turn in the vanity license plates on its cars because their Dutch last name, which is written on the plates, is similar to an offensive word.
The plates, UDINK1 UDINK2 and UDINK3 are on the vehicles of Mike and Shelly Udink and their son Kalei. Two of the plates are five and seven years old. One was issued last year.
Last summer, Kawika Udink's application for UDINK4 was rejected and the state ordered that the other three plates be returned.
"DINK has several derogatory meanings," Yvonne Bell, who sits on the Department of Motorvehicles panel that approves vanity plates, told the Daily Courier newspaper.
DMV spokesman David House and Bell said the word can be treated as a verb, which gives it a sexual reference, and also can be a racial slur targeted at the Vietnamese.
House said the "U" in the front could be construed as "You."
The DMV denies requests for any combination of letters and numbers that may be viewed as objectionable, in any language, by use of phonetic, numeric or reverse spelling, or when viewed as a mirror image, or that would alarm or offend a reasonable person.
The panel's ruling surprised Mike Udink, whose name is Dutch. He says it is a common last name in The Netherlands.
"Since when can a panel dictate whether your name's offensive or not?" asked Udink, a lineman for Pacific Power.
House said the state has the right to censor license plates, because the state owns them.
3 comments:
People who get offended by shit like that irritate me so. I wouldn't care if someone had a plate that said IHTFATGRLZ. Who cares.
I heard about one guy that someone wrote the DMV about--the writer wanted the guy to have to change his plates because it said STROKIN. He had to write a long letter explaining that his truck has a well known 4 stroke engine and that is all he is referring to. In the end, he got to keep his plates.
Ridiculous. Live and let live, EVERYBODY!!! Do you all hear me????
Yeah we hear you, but do they?
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