The Case Of The Poofter Plate

David Phillips, whom you may recall for telling the world about his scatified encounter with Larry Craig, is in the news again. Phillips has been told by the Virginia DMV that he must surrender his POOFTER vanity plate.

For 11 years, over nearly 200,000 miles, with the blessing of the state of Virginia, David Phillips has driven his Tracker with the "POOFTER" license plate, and nobody has complained -- not even when he parked at the British Embassy, where everybody knows "poofter" is British slang for a gay man.

"It's always a rolling good laugh for them," says Phillips, who is gay and chose his tags' message because "it's just an amusing word that I self-identify with."

The commonwealth of Virginia is not amused. It gave Phillips his vanity plates in error, Carolyn Easley, coordinator of the special license plates office, wrote in a recent letter. "You may have grown fond of your personalized plates," but they are "socially, racially or ethnically offensive or disparaging" and "you must return them." There was no explanation for why it took Virginia 11 years to figure out what "poofter" means.

I knew a gay guy in Fort Lauderdale whose Jeep sported "NO FISH" plates, something a feminist or two probably had a problem with, had they known what he meant. So few Americans know what "poofter" means, I can see why it took Virginia so long to object. Still, knowing that the word is insulting overseas would make me think twice about using it on a license plate. Phillips plans on fighting for his POOFTER plate. What do you think? How far can we go with even a self-mocking plate?