So, your government’s being a big meanie, protecting their outdated nobility and dictating what you may or may not call your spawn, with, surprise, surprise, badly constructed legislation.
Sweden
This is the quandry that Swedish citizens find themselves in, with reference to the Naming Law [1982].
The part of the law referencing first names reads: “First names shall not be approved if they can cause offense or can be supposed to cause discomfort for the one using it, or names which for some obvious reason are not suitable as a first name.” If you later change your name, you must keep at least one of the names that you were originally given, and you can only change your name once.
Now you might think it ridiculous that such legislation would be necessary in the first place, but on a rock, home to such prestigious awards as The Darwin Awards, you need to remember that we’re catering to the lowest common denominator here.
Being an activist is a respectable pursuit. It’s progressive, constructive and healthy, but naming a person after a cause, is fraught with stupidity, a lack of foresight and plain ol’ sadism. Imagine Obama as Lenin, Mother Theresa as Helen of Troy or Kony as Einstein. A person shall be what a person shall be. Personalities aside, expecting your kid, labelled through a druggy fog, to make it through decades of life as Spongebob, Nutella or MacGuyver is a heinous sentence for crimes yet committed.
Perhaps the most unique name tendered to the Swedish selection committee for approval was “Brfxxccxxmnpcccclllmmnprxvclmnckssqlbb11116”. No sh*t.
To make things even more complicated, yet simpler at the same time, that ^ is pronounced “Albin”. I’m sure you knew that already though.
Unsurprisingly, it was rejected. The parents, ever an example of genius, later submitted “A” (also pronounced Albin) as the child’s name. It, too, was rejected.
If Angelina were to follow suit, she might be able fill the alphabet with her brood.
So, who has else has enacted daft naming laws. Rephrased, who has else has proven to need such daft naming laws?
Germany
In Germany, you must be able to tell the gender of the child by the first name, and the name chosen must not be negatively affect the well being of the child. Also, you can not use last names or the names of objects or products as first names. Whether or not your chosen name will be accepted is up to the office of vital statistics, the Standesamt, in the area in which the child was born. If the office rejects your proposed baby name, you may appeal the decision. But if you lose, you’ll have to think of a different name. Each time you submit a name you pay a fee, so it can get costly. When evaluating names, the Standesamt refers to a book which translates to “the international manual of the first names,” and they also consult foreign embassies for assistance with non-German names. Because of the hassle parents have to go through to name their children, many opt for traditional names such as Maximilian, Alexander, Marie, and Sophie.
Japan
In Japan, one given name and one surname are chosen for babies, except for the imperial family, who only receive given names. Except for a few examples, it is obvious which are the given names and which are the surnames, regardless of in what order the names have been given. There are a couple thousand “name kanji” and “commonly used characters” for use in naming babies, and only these official kanji may be used in babies’ given names. The purpose of this is to make sure that all names can be easily read and written by the Japanese. The Japanese also restrict names that might be deemed inappropriate.
Denmark
Denmark’s very strict Law on Personal Names is in place to protect children from having odd names that suit their parents’ fancy. To do this, parents can choose from a list of only 7,000 pre-approved names, some for girls, some for boys. If you want to name your child something that isn’t on the list, you have to get special permission from your local church, and the name is then reviewed by governmental officials. Creative spellings of more common names are often rejected. The law states that girls and boys must have names that indicate their gender, you can’t use a last name as a first name, and unusual names may be rejected. Of the approximately 1,100 names that are reviewed each year, 15–20% of the names are rejected. There are also laws in place to protect rare Danish last names.
Iceland
The Iceland Naming Committee, formed in 1991, is the group that decides whether a new given name will be acceptable. If parents want to name their child something that is not included on the National Register of Persons, they can apply for approval and pay a fee. A name has to pass a few tests to be approved. It must only contain letters in the Icelandic alphabet, and must fit grammatically with the language. Other considerations include whether it will embarrass the child in the future and how well aligned it is with Icelandic traditions. It must have a genitive ending or have been previously adopted. Also, names should be gender specific, and no one can have more than three personal names.
Surnames in Iceland usually follow an interesting tradition. They are not family names, but are rather patronymic, or occasionally matronymic, with part of a person’s last name including their father’s name. If a father’s name is Eric, then his son’s surname would be Ericsson (or Eric’s son), and his daughter’s surname would be Ericsdóttir (or Eric’s daughter). {note: According to one of our Icelandic _flossers, since ‘C’ is not an Icelandic letter, the correct spelling is ‘EirÃkur’ and his offspring would be EirÃksson/EirÃksdóttir, e.g. Leifur EirÃksson} Occasionally, there are true family names in Iceland, that are passed down to each generation. But they are usually in families originally from other countries, or in families where a family name was adopted at one point.
New Zealand
New Zealand’s Births, Deaths, and Marriages Registration Act of 1995 doesn’t allow people to name their children anything that “might cause offence to a reasonable person; or […] is unreasonably long; or without adequate justification, […] is, includes, or resembles, an official title or rank.” Officials at the registrar of births have successfully talked parents out of some more embarrassing names.
The drugs in New Zealand must be particularly strong, because some of the names there are alarming, to say the least.
Rejected names: Stallion, Yeah Detroit, Fish and Chips, Twisty Poi, Keenan Got Lucy, Sex Fruit, Satan, and Adolf Hitler
Approved names: Benson and Hedges (for a set of twins), Midnight Chardonnay, Number 16 Bus Shelter, Violence
Another New Zealand special, Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii (source.). No word on whether it was approved or rejected.
China
Most new babies in China are now basically required to be named based on the ability of computer scanners to read those names on national identification cards. The government recommends giving children names that are easily readable, and encourages Simplified characters over Traditional Chinese ones. Parents can technically choose the given name, but numbers and non-Chinese symbols and characters are not allowed. Also, now, Chinese characters that can not be represented on the computer are not allowed. There are over 70,000 Chinese characters, but only about 13,000 can be represented on the computer. Because this requirement is a new one, some citizens are having their name misrepresented, and some have to change their names to be accurately shown on the identification cards.
Norway
If you read this post earlier this morning, we said that first names, but not middle names, were governed by Norwegian law. Well, thanks to a Norwegian _flosser Solvi, who was kind enough to send over a Web site (written in Norwegian, of course), we now know that these laws were changed in 2002. Apparently, there used to be an official government list of all allowed names. Last names could not be used as first names, and foreign names that were religious in nature, such as Jesús, or that were insulting would not make the cut. Last names also used to adhere to certain rules. If you wanted to change your last name, you would have to show that you were very close to someone else with that last name, such as when you take your spouse’s last name or your mother’s maiden name. Last names that were shared by 500 or fewer people were also protected. It seems that one would have to get the permission of all of the people with that last name if one wanted to adopt the name.
Crux of the article sourced from mentalfloss.com
