Posted on 03/06/2005 9:20:30 AM PST by Scenic Sounds
Last October, with the presidential election a month away, a letter arrived at the Sacramento headquarters of the state Department of Motor Vehicles.
"Recently I found out that the California personalized license plate 'F DUBYA' is in use," the letter said. "As an American that lives in California, I am offended that the DMV has allowed this plate to be used."
Offended? Hard at first glance to see what's wrong. But if you read "F" as an abbreviation for a certain four-letter word, and "DUBYA" as a nickname for a certain occupant of the White House, you can see how some might be offended, especially during a hotly contested election.
The DMV recalled the plate.
That happens about 10 times a year in California, a plate being pulled because the DMV decides it's inappropriate and shouldn't have been approved. The miracle is that it doesn't happen more often. Californians submit about 150,000 applications per year for personalized plates, and time has shown they are a creative bunch in trying to slip things past the DMV's censors.
Some configurations look harmless, until they're read backward. Perfect for the driver who wants to alarm or amuse a motorist who happens to glance at the plate through a rear-view mirror.
Others are abbreviations of little-known, foul-mouthed sayings. Or words that seem like nothing in English, but mean something in a different language – an increasing problem in the march of multiculturalism that is California.
How many people know that HADAKA means "naked" in Japanese? (The DMV does.)
Armando Botello, a spokesman for the DMV, said each application is reviewed by two screeners who ferret out the forbidden by using slang dictionaries, foreign-language dictionaries and lists of "unacceptable combinations" compiled in the 30 years since personalized plates were introduced.
Any group of words and letters that "may be considered offensive to good taste and decency" is rejected. Familiar cuss words are obvious no-nos, as are references to sexual acts. (The only way "69" is supposed to get through, for example, is if it's going on a vehicle made in 1969.)
Applicants are required to explain what the word they are submitting means, but the DMV knows that people lie. If the censors think a proposal should be rejected, it gets reviewed by at least three more screeners, Botello said.
As of Dec. 31, there were about 1 million personalized (also called vanity) plates in California, Botello said. That means about 1 in every 21 cars or trucks has one of the markers.
To some people, the plates are a way of standing out in a crowd, and they view any attempt to curtail what they say as an assault on freedom of expression or an example of political correctness run amok.
In our consumer culture, as pop culture expert Robert Thompson, a Syracuse University professor, has noted, we are what we own, and a vanity plate (or a T-shirt or a bumper sticker) becomes a way of saying something meaningful about us.
Of course, one person's message can be another person's insult. About 25 times a year, the DMV gets a letter complaining about a plate.
Last June, a motorist in Sacramento saw the plate "GOLIWOG" and protested. "Though not used as often in the United States, it is a very strong racial slur in Germany, England, Ireland, Greece and Australia," the letter writer said. (The DMV, in providing copies of several complaint letters to the Union-Tribune, excised all identifying information.)
The writer has a point. Webster's Dictionary identifies golliwog as "a grotesque black doll used in illustrations by Florence K. Upton for a series of children's books" published around 1900.
But there are people who collect the dolls – they even have their own international club – and they deny the word is inherently racist. They describe the golliwog as a "lovable, gallant character."
Whether the owner of the "GOLIWOG" plate is a collector is not known. But the DMV ordered the plate pulled.
If the agency recalls a plate, the owner can ask for an administrative hearing. The DMV usually wins, but not always. A lady in the Bay Area once fought to keep her plate, which read "A PUSSY." She'd had it for 20 years.
The judge ruled the plate was just fine for a longtime cat lover.
mine was eatme with the E's turned into 3's....
The jerk called in to the Larry Elder show bragging about his license plate. We sent letters to the DMV, and now he is without his vanity plate. He just couldn't shut up and enjoy it.
For instance: 4SSH013 (although the censors would catch that one, it's too obvious, and it's not nearly dirty enough)
DBSABZB
4NIC802
Four - nick - eight - O - R
Fornicator
Saw a random plate in New York. "L84 5EX"
The following pair of custom plates on back of a set of Husband and Wife Honda Goldwings: IATE ABUG
Back about 1980, a guy had the plate, MUF DVR on his yellow Corvette, used to see it all the time in Simi Valley.
Just think, somebody out there today is probably still driving around proclaiming, SKR 469.
My vanity plate says "TURGID".
I imagine my car would follow hers all over the place.
And, on the censor's car we see, BZY BDY
What it means is, if you 'f' her, you might get '69'.
Now if I could just figure out what I mean by that.
The license plate department turned it down, saying they don't allow question marks.
Just how is one supposed to know that the 3s are reversed to be Es? Oh, well, I guess you have to be creative.
FNADR. Touche'
From a former owner of a similar 1964 Corvair!
yeah...
no one told me, but it was the only thing that ended up making any sense...
I read somewhere years ago that a couple had complementary vanity plates: The man's read "Tab A;" the women's read "Slot B."
FAAAHQ
I followed for a couple minutes trying to figure it out, and when I did, I howled with laughter. What made it even sweeter was how picky the Virginia DMV people were about vanity plates. This guy made it past 'em.
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