Judicial activism rescues child
Child abuse takes many forms...
Italy’s top court has overruled a couple’s decision in naming their newborn son, labelling their choice “ridiculous”. The couple named their son Venerdi, which in Italian means Friday.
Italy’s Cassation Court has banned the couple from using the name saying it was a ridiculous name that would expose the boy to mockery. The Judges ruled that the name Friday — taken from Daniel Defoe’s famous novel Robinson Crusoe — was associated with “subservience and inferiority”.
Clearly, the poor child would have been at severe risk of taunts from literary critics. The judges did good.
The judges also ordered that the boy be renamed Gregorio, after the saint’s day on which he was born.
The problem now becomes that every child named Gregorio who was born on a Friday will be subject to taunts from literary people of “nerdy Venerdi...”
The couple, known only as Mara O and Roberto G, told the court that they are considering calling their next child Mercoledi, which means Wednesday.
Obviously they haven’t considered the risk to their unborn child of mockery from enthusiasts for ’Sixties sitcoms.
Memo to Cassation Court Judges: These people want flogging...
Labels: child abuse, culture, Italy, legal issues, literature, society
posted by Jacob A. Stam at 10/24/2008 01:30:00 PM
10 Comments:
I suppose it's ok as long as the son is not named Pugsley.
A couple we know over here named their daughter 'Sixteen'. They are both French and liked the sound of the word in English so that's what they called her.
Not sure if days of the week would work the same way, though wasn't there a Wednesday in the Addams Family?
Yes there was Dylan. Hence the boy's name: "Pugsly".
The Adams famaliy....click. click.
Dylan, I suspect your friends' kid might be pretty tired of hearing 'Happy Birthday Sweet Sixteen' by the time she turns sixteen.
(That's a Neil Sedaka song, by the way. Please Dylan, don't ask "Who's Neil Sedaka?" No Dylan, nooooo...)
There was an actress named Tuesday Weld. Nothing to do with any of this, but there was a Tuesday Weld. (Still is, too...)
Interesting Dylan.
Now, if an English speaking couple were to consider calling their child "Merda," because they liked the sound of it in English, I would most certainly advise against it.
It's a shit name!
Wonder how the judge would have reacted to "Sunday"?
Or a friend of a friend of a friend, who have named their little girl "Ocean".
Dunno, Caz, it'd be a terrible burden to go through life having people confuse you with a current affairs program.
But 'Ocean' is gorgeous. I'd give her the middle name 'Azure'. Oceans can be azure, the colour of the sky, right?
It's 3 in the morning in Fribourg, Switzerland and my friend is the mother of a candidate for Mr Fribourg 2008. I was told my said candidate that I would make an entry in my diary about this evening. This space shall serve as my diary right as church bells ring at 3 on this foggy Fribourg morn. Given that DST is ending, perhaps it is only 2. Who can tell? I don't speak French.
The mother of the potential Mr Fribourg for 2008 is a wonderful woman. Good night and amen. Just as a catty aside, the Mr Fribourg for 2007 was there. Full of himself of course. What a joke! The night of nights! The night when Fribourg became Hollywood on Swiss.
Thanks for sharing, Anon. Trust you and your friend wiped that smug grin off of Mr Fribourg 2007's face. Took him down a peg or two, eh?
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