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A journalist here in Australia just named her baby "Methamphetamine Rules" because she assumed it would be rejected and was writing a story trying to find out w

by prawn 3y ago

A journalist here in Australia just named her baby "Methamphetamine Rules" because she assumed it would be rejected and was writing a story trying to find out what the default assigned name was. Only it wasn't rejected and she received a birth certificate with that name. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/sep/19/can-you-name-your-baby-methamphetamine-rules-in-australia https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/sep/19/can-y...

pests 3y ago
Lovely, on record for life. Turns out she got her answer to her original question via a phone call. Maybe she should have tried that route first.
- NolF 3y ago
  Nah, because there was a failure with the policy implementation the kid got a proper name and no record that it had changed.
  - TheHappyOddish 3y ago
    > Under the rules, the registrar will not approve a name if it is offensive and not in the public interest. It also will not approve given names that are more than 50 characters, include symbols, or an official title or rank such as princess, Queen, or goddess. Shame, it doesn't seem to violate policy. They should have been forced to do a full legal name change, and a welfare check on the other kids wouldn't be out of line either.
  - pests 3y ago
    That directly contradicts the article saying it will be on record for life.
- prawn 3y ago
  The articles I read about it suggested she had tried that. Agencies indicated that the registrar would provide a name in the event that the chosen one was rejected, but wouldn't tell her what that might be.
Piraty 3y ago
https://xkcd.com/327/ https://xkcd.com/327/
tyingq 3y ago
“We chose methamphetamine thinking there’s no way that anyone will see that word and think it’s OK,” "Drysdale said she was under the impression that if a name was rejected by the registry, they choose one for you." Surely this person is just some sort of attention seeker. Nobody is this dumb.
- sokoloff 3y ago
  I used to think that way. Decades of experience have led me to conclude that there really are an incredibly large number of people who are that <pick your descriptor from among clueless, dumb, self-centered, delusional, …>
- ovi256 3y ago
  > just some sort of attention seeker That's redundant, we already know she was a journalist.
- op00to 3y ago
  Reading the entire article often prevents you from looking like a fool.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - tyingq 3y ago
    Do you mean "they choose one for you" happens to be true? Does depending on that, or hoping what they choose is okay make her not dumb and not attention-seeking?
- gumby 3y ago
  > Surely this person is just some sort of attention seeker. Nobody is this dumb. In some countries it does work this way. Luckily for the kid, when you change your name in Australia you are issued an entirely new birth certificate (I know because I changed my name!) so this child won't go through life with this name on its birth certificate and then a "change of name" certificate like in some countries. More generally though, dome countries have a list of permitted names and whatever the registrar writes down (which might not be what you asked for) is the child's name. Most of the European countries that had such rules have relaxed or given them up, though they sometimes remain on the books to keep parents from doing this kind of thing, but they remain in some countries in other regions of the globe. This "whatever the registrar writes down is authoritative" applied to immigrants to the US in the late 19th and early 20th century which is why there are many common names spelled differently (Schmidt, Shmitt, and so forth). Also applied to family names when they were made mandatory (Prussia in mid 19th century, Turkey in the 1920s). In this case they often simply made the decisions with no option to appeal, which you can see Jewish family names that are joke names made up and assigned by antisemitic officials. Most of those people's descendants now live in other countries where the meaning is thankfully lost.
hiatus 3y ago
It's ridiculous that the government could even reject a name in the first place.
- petesergeant 3y ago
  Why? The state takes all sorts of other actions to protect children from their parents
  - hiatus 3y ago
    Do they only regulate names of children or of adults too? I don't it is limited to children. What business does the state have in deciding how they will address me?
RoyalHenOil 3y ago
No joke, the mother of one of my friends changed her name to...just her first name. She eliminated her last name. This is also in Australia. Not having a last name has caused her all kinds of problems. Australia may not officially require you to have a last name, but passports, driver's licenses, credit cards, utilities, etc., still require there to be something in that space. She kinda-sorta gets by using "[first name] [firstname]" or "[first name] NoLastName", but it is still a bureaucratic nightmare -- as I think anyone but her could have predicted.
- petesergeant 3y ago
  I changed one of my cards to have just my surname on it, 'cuz I thought it looked cool, and there are a _lot_ of CC forms on the internet that don't like it.
- seanmcdirmid 3y ago
  Many countries don’t allow name changes at all, so if you are a named- hanged foreigner living in that country, a lot of systems won’t be able to handle you, and you’ll be asking for exceptions for your entire stay (not to mention needing to carry around your birth certificate, proof of name change, and translations). And I think changing your maiden name in marriage is still common in the west, so many foreigners run into this in a country like China. Many Indonesians don’t have last names, I wonder how immigration is handled. Wiki has a whole section on how other countries handle this, since Indonesia isn’t a small country: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_names#:~:text=by%20his%20friends.-,Indonesian%20naming%20traditions,father%20as%20a%20last%20name https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_names#:~:text=by%....
- Damogran6 3y ago
  When I worked for State government, we had an employee: Crystalynn One name, not first, not last. And it wreaked havoc with all of our IAM processes as a result. Which brought up all the other issues with IAM...for a minute we had an issue with names like O'Malley
- resolutebat 3y ago
  If she ever goes to the US, she will join the large and ever-growing Fnu clan. https://uxdesign.cc/what-the-fnu-fa72cf4ad5bd https://uxdesign.cc/what-the-fnu-fa72cf4ad5bd

by prawn 3y ago

pests 3y ago

Lovely, on record for life. Turns out she got her answer to her original question via a phone call. Maybe she should have tried that route first.

NolF 3y ago
Nah, because there was a failure with the policy implementation the kid got a proper name and no record that it had changed.
- TheHappyOddish 3y ago
  > Under the rules, the registrar will not approve a name if it is offensive and not in the public interest. It also will not approve given names that are more than 50 characters, include symbols, or an official title or rank such as princess, Queen, or goddess. Shame, it doesn't seem to violate policy. They should have been forced to do a full legal name change, and a welfare check on the other kids wouldn't be out of line either.
- pests 3y ago
  That directly contradicts the article saying it will be on record for life.
prawn 3y ago
The articles I read about it suggested she had tried that. Agencies indicated that the registrar would provide a name in the event that the chosen one was rejected, but wouldn't tell her what that might be.

Piraty 3y ago

https://xkcd.com/327/ https://xkcd.com/327/

tyingq 3y ago

“We chose methamphetamine thinking there’s no way that anyone will see that word and think it’s OK,” "Drysdale said she was under the impression that if a name was rejected by the registry, they choose one for you." Surely this person is just some sort of attention seeker. Nobody is this dumb.

sokoloff 3y ago
I used to think that way. Decades of experience have led me to conclude that there really are an incredibly large number of people who are that <pick your descriptor from among clueless, dumb, self-centered, delusional, …>
ovi256 3y ago
> just some sort of attention seeker That's redundant, we already know she was a journalist.
op00to 3y ago
Reading the entire article often prevents you from looking like a fool.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- tyingq 3y ago
  Do you mean "they choose one for you" happens to be true? Does depending on that, or hoping what they choose is okay make her not dumb and not attention-seeking?
gumby 3y ago
> Surely this person is just some sort of attention seeker. Nobody is this dumb. In some countries it does work this way. Luckily for the kid, when you change your name in Australia you are issued an entirely new birth certificate (I know because I changed my name!) so this child won't go through life with this name on its birth certificate and then a "change of name" certificate like in some countries. More generally though, dome countries have a list of permitted names and whatever the registrar writes down (which might not be what you asked for) is the child's name. Most of the European countries that had such rules have relaxed or given them up, though they sometimes remain on the books to keep parents from doing this kind of thing, but they remain in some countries in other regions of the globe. This "whatever the registrar writes down is authoritative" applied to immigrants to the US in the late 19th and early 20th century which is why there are many common names spelled differently (Schmidt, Shmitt, and so forth). Also applied to family names when they were made mandatory (Prussia in mid 19th century, Turkey in the 1920s). In this case they often simply made the decisions with no option to appeal, which you can see Jewish family names that are joke names made up and assigned by antisemitic officials. Most of those people's descendants now live in other countries where the meaning is thankfully lost.

hiatus 3y ago

It's ridiculous that the government could even reject a name in the first place.

petesergeant 3y ago
Why? The state takes all sorts of other actions to protect children from their parents
- hiatus 3y ago
  Do they only regulate names of children or of adults too? I don't it is limited to children. What business does the state have in deciding how they will address me?

RoyalHenOil 3y ago

No joke, the mother of one of my friends changed her name to...just her first name. She eliminated her last name. This is also in Australia. Not having a last name has caused her all kinds of problems. Australia may not officially require you to have a last name, but passports, driver's licenses, credit cards, utilities, etc., still require there to be something in that space. She kinda-sorta gets by using "[first name] [firstname]" or "[first name] NoLastName", but it is still a bureaucratic nightmare -- as I think anyone but her could have predicted.

petesergeant 3y ago
I changed one of my cards to have just my surname on it, 'cuz I thought it looked cool, and there are a _lot_ of CC forms on the internet that don't like it.
seanmcdirmid 3y ago
Many countries don’t allow name changes at all, so if you are a named- hanged foreigner living in that country, a lot of systems won’t be able to handle you, and you’ll be asking for exceptions for your entire stay (not to mention needing to carry around your birth certificate, proof of name change, and translations). And I think changing your maiden name in marriage is still common in the west, so many foreigners run into this in a country like China. Many Indonesians don’t have last names, I wonder how immigration is handled. Wiki has a whole section on how other countries handle this, since Indonesia isn’t a small country: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_names#:~:text=by%20his%20friends.-,Indonesian%20naming%20traditions,father%20as%20a%20last%20name https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_names#:~:text=by%....
Damogran6 3y ago
When I worked for State government, we had an employee: Crystalynn One name, not first, not last. And it wreaked havoc with all of our IAM processes as a result. Which brought up all the other issues with IAM...for a minute we had an issue with names like O'Malley
resolutebat 3y ago
If she ever goes to the US, she will join the large and ever-growing Fnu clan. https://uxdesign.cc/what-the-fnu-fa72cf4ad5bd https://uxdesign.cc/what-the-fnu-fa72cf4ad5bd