How does this plate get approved?
 

Amazingly, there doesn't seem to be a way to report inappropriate license plates online in CA.

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1995-bmw-850csi-7/

https://cdn.bringatrailer.com/wp-con...d208495d81.jpg

Euro Fever for a European car?

Yellow Fever for a yellow car?

Double entendre for a yellow european car?

What outrage am I missing?

Yellow is derogatory slang for Asian/Chinese. Native Chinese speakers also have a hard time pronouncing the English "L", which often comes out as a soft "R".

I am surprised that got through on a CA plate… Looks like a letter has to be sent (really surprising there isn't at least an email address). This seems to be a violation of one of the CA rules -- personalized plates cannot have a "negative connotation to a specific group" per this Sacramento Bee article (which also has the address to send a complaint to…):

https://www.sacbee.com/site-services...151671922.html

I still don't get it... Somebody help me out so I can be offended too

And yellow fever, specifically, is a fairly derogatory and dehumanizing term for an Asian fetish.

A license plate reference to yellow fever by itself would maybe just be gross and in poor taste, but with the Mickey Rooney-in-Breakfast-at-Tiffany’s accent (that ZBB explained) it’s just flat out racist. Like, by a lot.

I thought the first E was an f. Now I see where youre coming from

On something other than a European yellow car, I can buy it. On a yellow European car, that's an outrage looking for a reason. A cigar is just a cigar, sometimes. Especially when it's old white dudes living on the other side of the country from where the car is getting outraged. But, whatever.

I’m confused about what it being on a European car has to do with anything.

I’m also confused about why I shouldn’t call out racist bullshit. But whatever.

I don't get the outrage.

Replace the first 4 letters with a similar derivative of the N-word. Would you be outraged then?

This is just as bad, and is racist term derogatory to Asians. I may send a letter to the CA DMV also.

Yeah, I was trying to come up with an equivalent and something like JUNGL FVR on a Land Rover might be it, but even that doesn’t get at the accent issue.

To me, if it just had an L instead of an R, I could see it being OK (barely). The R is what takes it over the line -- just since the accent issue is what makes it clear that its being racist...

What if the owner is of Asian descent?

I mean, how would the DMV know? And we're cool with a rule that says offensive speech on license plates is OK depending on the race of the car's owner?

I think that the gov't should steer clear of controlling what people can or can't say. If this is such a big problem, maybe the best option would be to eliminate vanity plates, and instead everyone just gets a random set of alphanumerics.

I was just wondering if you'd still find it offensive if the owner was poking fun at him/her self. :dunno:

If it were on a yellow 5-series, would you still find it offensive? "Euro Fever?" "Euro 5er?"

I do find it a little bit amusing that the only people I've ever known to use the pejorative "yellow fever" were people of Asian descent. :lol:

I don't know. Different hypos are hard to parse. I just think the accent thing here is really over the line.

As far as license plates and governments, there's a fairly rich seam of First Amendment law on all of that. As with a lot of First Amendment law, the cases are sort of all over the map.

I tend to agree that the easiest/best thing to do is just get rid of vanity plates, because 99 percent of them are dumb, even if they aren't dumb and racist.

To replace the revenue lost, you should pay able to pay extra for a) a European sized plate, or b) no front plate.

Yeah that's over the line. Especially when plates like "ATHEIST" get rejected by multiple states. Admittedly, I don't think that particular one happened in CA.

Agree, get rid of em. Stupid anyway.

I'd pay for a simple white-on-black old school Delaware style plate.

NJ still defaults to caucasian skin color plates with mismatched bad fonts. Though you can elect to enhance them with heinous 1996 Microsoft Clip Art-esque graphics for special causes. So annoying.

That's irritating, particularly when many (all?) states have a standard plate option that includes the text "In God We Trust". I wonder if they'd allow a vanity plate that says "RELIGIOUS"?

a guy that several of us know used to have the plate "FKRZFST" (or similar) on his Z06. I recall that he got a notification in the mail telling him his plate was being revoked... after having the plate on the car for some time. and the car mostly lived on a trailer :lol:

To be clear, I totally get how someone could find "YERO FVR" to be offensive.

As for vanity plates… I had one for about 6-8 months once on the Boxster. It was also on a university special plate for my MBA program, and referenced one of the capstone courses called FORAD. The plate was "FORAD1" -- and the team I was on won the competition in that class our graduating semester (so was an inside joke).

I honestly felt like a tool whenever I drove the car. Only because of the vanity plate.

So when I got the first Tesla, I just went with the random plate assignment. Even though I really wanted to get "COALPWR" on the Arizona "Blue Skies" alternate fuel plate that allowed HOV access for the Tesla, I never did. Eventually that plate was taken (probably by some ass in a diesel pickup that like to do coal roll'n)...

A big part of the problem with vanity tag censorship is that the censorship is not applied evenly. I don't know about other states, but I do know that Maryland follows its own rules on an arbitrary and selective basis. My understanding is that many states makes exceptions to their rules depending on the context even if some may still get offended.

Some thing son their face are patently obscene. When there's a good faith reason to believe a tag was chosen for something that is plain and visible when viewing the tag and you have to explain to aware and reasonable people why someone might think it's offensive, I think it would be wise to reevaluate. But, really, I don't want to stop anyone from getting their internet ire up.

+1

Alex

On the second point, I might agree with you, but my standard for "good faith reason to believe" there was an innocent explanation is clearly different from yours. The idea that this guy has "Euro Fever," spelled yero, on a yellow car, and did not in any way intend it to be a double entendre, is...not plausible on its face.

Stole this picture today

Today I saw SKDMRK, which isn’t really offensive but does seem like kind of a self-own.

Vagina life? :eeps: sorry.

That's how I read it! :lol::lol:

I confess I did, too.