Licence plate has been banned for obscene language – can you guess why?

[Jazzy]

He’s managed to get away with it for three years.

But finally someone has worked out what Safer Hassan’s personalized number plate means.

The 370H55V plate has now been banned by authorities after it was deemed offensive.

Texas Department of Motor Vehicles has said it must now be swapped within 30 days before it becomes invalid.

Source

Questions:

1) What does the license plate say that makes it offensive?

2) What do think of the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles banning the license plate?

 

[mrldii]

Written out and flipped upside down, it says "Asshole". Yeah...that would be deemed offensive, I'm sure.

At first glance, no...but if he ever flipped his vehicle, it would be obvious. Personally, I wouldn't have thought twice about it, had I seen it UPRIGHT on a vehicle.

 

[Jazzy]

I wouldn't have thought twice if the car was upright or turned upside down. There's a big visual difference between an A and a V.

 

[mrldii]

@Jazzy

Agreed. But, rather than turn my computer screen upside-down or stand on my head while viewing it, because I couldn't see anything wrong with it, I wrote it out on a piece of scratch paper and flipped it over.

It became extremely obvious what it was saying as soon as I did that. Surprised it took Texas DMV so long to figure it out...one would think they'd have a pre-printed cheat-sheet of all the "unacceptable" combinations, ready to go and to be immediately referenced...and denied.

 

[Jazzy]

@mrldii

I see what you're saying by writing it down on paper and flipping it over. I was merely saying that if I saw the plate, I wouldn't give it a second thought as to it spelling an obscene word.

Here's a picture of the vehicle (pretty hard to miss this on the road)

And a statement from the article:
"A spokesman from the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles said bans are enforced, ‘if a plate evokes a response from other drivers passing that vehicle’."

So, it took three years to evoke a response from other drivers? Plus,who the hell is going to read a license plate upside down? Methinks someone wishes they could be driving this car instead of the owner.

 

[Dee]