Naming your kids after a popular meme or bit of folklore isn’t exactly a new phenomenon—there was the Egyptian guy who named his kid Facebook after the 2011 revolution in Cairo, and in Latin American countries where U.S. Navy destroyers often float by the horizon the name “Usnavy” (pronounced oos-nah-vee) is apparently a thing.
But one region in India with deep ties to its former Imperial boss is notorious for taking this to a whole new level and incorporating some pretty crazy English words into its name roster. The practice can be seen in a local election, where candidate Adolf Hitler is running neck-and-neck with Frankenstein. Third-party contenders in the race include Highlander, Predecessor, Process and Fairly Bert.
If you’re going to name your kid after a piece of folklore you’d think that Adolf Hitler might be frowned upon. Except in India the name Hitler doesn’t carry the stigma it does elsewhere. In December we reported on the odd phenomenon that Adolf Hitler seems to be on the rise as a folk character in India with Mein Kampf topping bestseller lists, prominently displayed in bookstore windows and used in business school syllabi. The explanation seems to be that India, having been out of the fray during World War II, doesn’t recognize just how shitty a guy Hitler was.
But the Adolf Hitler running for state election in India seems to know. But he’s not sweating it. First of all, he’s already won 3 elections. Second, he’s technically Adolph Lu Hitler. Which is totally different.
“I am aware at one point of time Adolf Hitler was the most hated person on Earth for the genocide of the Jews. But my father added ‘Lu’ in between, naming me Adolf Lu Hitler, and that’s why I am different,” Hitler said.
Another theory chalks Hitler’s local popularity not up to Indians’ naivete about World War II, but just the opposite—that he’s celebrated as having socked it to India’s former Imperial oppressor, England.
Either way, Adolph Lu Hitler can’t be blamed for his own name. As he said, “I possibly didn’t have a role in my naming.”
