- A Tesla Cybertruck owner in Cali just had his personalized license plate revoked for being offensive
- Complaints to the DMV said the ‘LOLOCT7’ tags mockingly referred to the October 7 attack on Israel
- The defence? It’s LOLO, a Tagalog term for “grandpa,” then CT for “Cybertruck”
The owner of a Tesla Cybertruck is in hot water with the California DMV over his choice of personalized license plate. The tag in question, “LOLOCT7,” was recalled by the state because, as pointed out in several complaints sent to the department, it appears to laugh at the October 7 attack on Israel that happened earlier this year—but a person claiming to be connected to the plate says it means something else entirely.
Complainants centred their ire on the apparent portmanteau of ‘LOL’ and ‘OCT7’ which, when mashed together, does seem to poke terrible fun at the events endured by Israeli people on that day last year. For anyone not familiar with internet abbreviations, LOL has for decades been generally understood to mean “laugh out loud.”
The California DMV posted a response about the plate on its Twitter (well, X) account, saying the incident has prompted it to strengthen the internal review processes through which personalized plates must pass before manufacture and issue. The DMV officially apologized the plates weren’t rejected before seeing the light of day.
But, as with most controversies, someone is claiming this is all just a giant misunderstanding. A person who spoke with local media but refused to publicly identify themselves relayed that they know the owner personally, and says the word ‘Lolo’ in the plate is supposed to mean “grandfather” in the Tagalog language spoken by residents of the Philippines. He went on to explain ‘CT’ was for “Cybertruck”; and the digit 7 for the number of grandchildren the person has in their family.
Okay. Taking all that at face value, we must observe there are approximately eleventy-four zillion ways for someone from the Philippines to express pride in both their stainless-steel truck and their seven grandkids. Also, the sudden appearance of another grandchild, not an uncommon occurrence in this world, would quickly make the plate obsolete. And then there’s the fact the plate defender is choosing to remain anonymous. Colour us skeptical.
Besides, even if the intent of this plate is benign, one must acknowledge certain words and phrases can change meaning over time — and not always for the better. Witness the clueless crusade of one resident in this writer’s very province who was dead-set on keeping his vanity plate, which read “GRABHER.”
Sure, that is the person’s surname, and I am sure they are very proud of it, but the words “grab” and “her” can paint a poor picture, especially after certain remarks uttered by a then-presidential candidate telling a boastful story surfaced in 2016 (not coincidentally, around when the complaints about that plate were made, by the way).
Words, and their context in the present era, are important. Think the DMV won’t think twice about issuing “YAY 911” to a Porsche owner enthused about their rear-engined sports car? Exactly. Claims of hypersensitivity in today’s world be damned, it helps to have a skiff of social awareness. Etymology can be a funny thing.
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