I hate mentioning stories like this, but at the same time I’m sort of fascinated with the weird stuff people put their kids through.
A Pennsylvania couple recently got in a tizzy because the local ShopRite wouldn’t print their kid’s name on a cake. Because the three-year old in question is named Adolf Hitler. Adolf Hitler Campbell, to be precise.
Parents Heath and Deborah Campbell scoffed when employees of the grocery store offered a blank cake, so they went to WalMart instead. Insisting to reporters that they aren’t racists, the Campbells are apparently a little naive about the experience of growing up:
The Campbells said they wanted their children to have unique names and didn’t expect the names to cause problems. Despite the cake refusal, the Campbells said they don’t expect the names to cause problems later, such as when the children start school.
“I just figured that they’re just names,” Deborah Campbell said. “They’re just kids. They’re not going to hurt anybody.”
Heath Campbell said some people like the names but others are shocked to hear them. “They say, ‘He (Hitler) killed all those people.’ I say, ‘You’re living in the wrong decade. That Hitler’s gone,’” he said.
“They’re just names, you know,” he said. “Yeah, they (Nazis) were bad people back then. But my kids are little. They’re not going to grow up like that.
There’s no explanation about why the family home is covered with swastikas, or any mention of whether it was the family or the ShopRite that called the reporters in on this one. I wonder what the family plans to do when it’s time for little JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell’s birthday. I’m not kidding, that’s really her name.
I read about this and remember someone being quoted that the parents are displaying some kind of mental illness for doing this to their kids. It’s been three years since they dumbly named their kid AH, but they are trying to be provocative by insisting on the full first/middle name and not just “Adolph” or a nickname (“Dolph?”). They are so totally clamoring for attention. (And, as a former bakery worker who wrote my share of long messages, I can promise the Campbells that if they insist on the full “JoyceLynn Aryan Nation” for Poor Kid #2, they will have to spring for at least a half-sheet.)