Personalized license plates are often pure cringe. A “Z3RO G4S” personalized Tesla plate isn’t clever, it’s just annoying. But to be fair, most state DMVs are pretty strict about what’s actually allowed on personalized plates, which doesn’t leave a lot of room for genuinely clever jokes. That hasn’t stopped people from trying, and these personalized license plate requests that were denied by the California DMV are pure comedic gold.
There’s a Twitter bot that randomly posts rejected license plate applications from 2015-2016 that are now public following a Los Angeles Magazine story on how the DMV sorts out such requests. Each rejected request features the potential customer’s notes and the DMV’s reason for rejection and reading them has been the highlight of my day so far. Seeing the fake reasons for many of the requests is funny, like watching a toddler trying to trick their parents. But seeing the DMV’s reasons for denial (or sometimes acceptance) is even funnier. I’m imagining a tightly wound DMV employee learning about dirty jokes for the first time and having to type them out.
For example, one Californian requested the plate “2 DEEZ.” The customer’s supposed reasoning was that both their and their spouse’s names start with the letter “D” but the DMV’s reason for denial was “AS IN THE NUTS.”
This almost makes me want to apply for a personalized plate with something I know will get rejected, just so I can make a DMV worker have to write out a hilariously awkward denial explanation, like “BUTT STUFF” for the real request of “BTTSTUF.”
I also love the reverse-engineered acronym meanings people come up with to try and legitimize their jokes. For instance, this request for the “INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIST FOR THE SACRAMENTO CHAPTER OF THE CALIFORNIA AUTOMATIC COLLECTORS ASSOCIATION” or “ITSCACA” for short. Now I’m not above toilet humor but that isn’t that funny on its own. However, what almost gave me a genuine spit take on my afternoon espresso was the DMV response. “ITS CACA… POOP.” That’s one of the funniest ellipses I’ve ever seen.
While these sorts of license plates would be funny to see on the road, I’m sort of glad there were denied because then it spares me from explaining to my five year old why I’m laughing at a license plate and his mom is slapping my arm, telling me to grow up.
There are obviously too many to list but here are some of my favorites, almost exclusively because of the DMV responses.
Damn, DMV, it was just a request, no need to get hostile.
“Does have a ’54 Ford…”
C’mon, that one could be legit!
I actually thought this was for Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi …
How was this one denied …
… but this one was accepted?!