The former mayor of Reykjavik Jon Gnarr is refusing to give up his fight to have his name officially changed in his homeland despite the Icelandic Naming Committee’s ruling to turn his request down once again.
The eccentric comedian has been granted his name change in the US, where he lives at present, but the strict naming committee in Iceland refuses to allow him to officially change from Jon Gunnar Kristinsson to Jon Gnarr, meaning whenever he returns home he must go by the former.
Iceland’s National Broadcasting Service revealed that the former mayor had believed he would have been permitted to carry out the change, but the country’s naming laws state that names established as forenames by tradition, such as Gunnar, can only be used as such and are, therefore, not permitted to be family names.
Upon hearing the latest ruling, he tweeted that they would rather see him dead that allow him to legally change his name to Gnarr. He later said that because he was a citizen of Iceland, the country’s naming laws would continue to apply to him, but added that he would never give up in his fight for justice.