“Moby Dick” is universally considered to be one of the great American novels. It’s on the assigned reading lists of schools across the country.
But in Vancouver, some real dicks are refusing to lease part of their building to a fish-and-chips restaurant by that name. The restaurant is now suing the building’s owners.
The fight has been going on since the middle of 2015, when the former tenants, a restaurant named “The Change,” went out of business. Since then, “Moby Dick’s” has been trying to take over the space. Strata, the building’s owners, have insisted “that the word ‘Dick’ in Moby Dick was an offensive term,” and wouldn’t be allowed.
Strata is also claiming that a “Moby Dick” sign would hurt the value of the other properties nearby and that the restaurant would cause “increased litter and violate city laws on odor.” Mengfa International, the restaurant’s owners, say those claims are ridiculous. They believe the name “isn’t offensive to the public, given its literary significance and fame.”
It’s not like this is the first “Moby Dick’s” restaurant either. The franchise started in White Rock, a small city within British Columbia. They planned on expanding into a larger market and this location in Vancouver was going to be the start of that. No one in White Rock has complained about the name, in fact the Yelp reviews are almost completely positive.