15 July 2011

Judge Forced to Name Child

The Daily Mail reports that a judge of the Family Court of Australia was put in the unenviable position of having to pick the name of a two year old child whose birth had yet to be registered as a result of her parents' squabble. Apparently, the child's parents split up before the child was born and couldn't agree on what name she should have. The father insisted on calling her by one name - and did - while the mother insisted on calling her by another - and did.

Having been forced to decide the matter, the court acted in the manner of all commonwealth family law courts and resolved the issue through a rigorous application common sense... after the father refused a proposal to simply hyphenate the two names. The court picked the name chosen by the mother as that was the name by which most people knew the child and because the root of the father's opposition to the name lay in his "determination to control the mother and her parenting" rather than some rational objection.