From The Guardian, 27/5/99.
Clétoris is fine but Zebedee's going too far
Blame it on the Magic Roundabout. French parents no longer have to
consult a book of acceptable names before christening their children
and are free to call them - as indeed some have - Ratatouille, Michel-
Jacquesson, Lambada or (I promise) Clétoris. But, under the terms of a
1993 law, the public prosecutor must intervene if the chosen name is
likely to prove "contrary to the interests of the infant". And so it
is that Estelle and Pierre-Alain Renaudin have been denied the right
to call their boy Zébulon.
Zébulon, besides being the son of Jacob and Leah in the bible, and a
town in America with 10,000 inhabitants is also the bouncy little chap
from the Magic Roundabout better known in Britain as Zebedee. "The
attribution of this name, due to its televisual connotations, is
manifestly likely to provoke sarcasm and mockery from which the child
will not cease to suffer," ruled a judge in Besançon this week. French
bureaucracy. You just can't beat it.
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