I recently purchased a new laptop computer (Mac) and also bought something called ProCare, which gives the buyer numerous tutorial sessions, among other things. I tried signing up for my first session online like it told me to, but it would never accept my reservation. I informed the people at the store where I bought the laptop and they gave me another registration number. I tried again and the same thing happened so I informed the store again. The woman there went to work on it and found the answer. Apple has put into its database numerous words that will get rejected to weed out the folks who want to be offensive with their registration name. The woman informed me that part of my name got rejected. My immediate thought was, which one? Christian? Or Coon? I thought it would be really interesting if Christian would have been rejected, but, no, it was Coon, which, as I am sometimes reminded, has been used (and is still used) as a slur against blacks. As much pride as I take in my family, that fact about my last name is something I'm certainly not thrilled about.
The woman, though, had to put in a last name for me so, in Apple's records, I am known as Christian Christian. Now if that doesn't spur some self-reflection, I don't know what will.
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