Summary
Rep. Dan Crenshaw criticized Apple Maps for not renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America, as mandated by Trump’s recent executive order titled “Restoring Names that Honor American Greatness.”
Crenshaw’s complaint reflects broader conservative frustration, as tech platforms and the global community continue to use the original name.
Critics compare the move to past nationalist gestures like renaming french fries “freedom fries,” accusing conservatives of embracing identity politics and culture wars despite their political dominance.
The name change is unlikely to gain international traction.
For people always calling the others “snowflakes” and “easily triggered”, they sure do have a thin skin.
Every accusation
It’s always projection with these people.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were so sensitive” is my response to these types IRL.
what’s funny is Trump didn’t directly change the name. that takes time. the relevant naming-people have to take it up and formally do it. All Trump did was order them to, and, uh, that only affects goverment things.
Everybody else, Apple included, are going to be using the familiar name. because Trump is a moron.
I don’t know… Isn’t naming (and even country boundaries) already localized based on where the users are? Isn’t a possible scenario that Apple and others could show Gulf of America to US users and Gulf of Mexico to everyone else without even spending too much effort?
Yeah there’s already support to name things differently based on your locale. If you have an English locale you see “Germany”. Inside German it’s called Deutschland and if you’re in a Spanish speaking place it’s Alemania.
You could probably distinguish between en-us and en-gb to have different names in the USA and UK.
So yeah I totally think it’s possible.
I meant something even more radical than translating language. This is Google maps changing borders for disputed territories depending on what side of the dispute the user is: https://theweek.com/speedreads/451127/google-maps-changes-chinas-borders-based-viewers-locations .
I imagine Apple has similar policies too where they adhere to local regulations or just don’t want to piss their users in any country, so they just show everyone what the want to see.
So yes, they do have the tools to do it and on top of that they also have a consolidate tradition of doing it.
They’ll follow suit. Apple is not the company people think it is. Tim was at the information along with all the other oligarchy. I know people well make excuses like he had to and blah blah blah. But no he did not. This a a openly gay man who chose to go support people who hate him why because he loves money more.
Well yeah, you don’t get into his position by not loving money more than anything else. Hell, even the infamous George Soros if you actually look at his philanthropy it’s basically “a more tolerant and open society is better for capital”
Don’t count on it, Apple and Google were both at inauguration
Maybe, but this is all a distraction from the actions that matter. They don’t want to debate the anti-trans stuff or the immigration stuff, which is objectively bad. They want to debate people not going with a made up name for a thing, which has no objectivity. The longer they can argue about this the less time there is to discuss anything important.
Its not just being thin skinned. It’s a strategy of distraction.
As someone who worked in mapping, many people don’t realize how much this kind of BS actually comes up.
The map you see in Google / Apple maps isn’t the map the whole world sees. What you see is what’s culturally / legally appropriate for viewers in your region.
For example, in parts of India it’s legally required that Jammu and Kashmir be displayed as being part of India on their maps. On Pakistan’s maps it’s legally required to be weirdly ambiguous, with a strange open border that doesn’t properly close. The rest of the world gets dotted lines indicating it’s complicated.
For most of the world the body of water between Korea, Japan and Vladivostok is labeled as “The Sea of Japan”, but users in Korea will see “The East Sea”. Is the body of water around Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, UAE, etc. the Persian Gulf or the Arabian Gulf? Depends on where you are when you ask that question.
This even has a strange effect when all the countries involved agree that a certain geographic feature is the border, but that geographic feature is a river. Some rivers, especially ones like the Amazon river keep shifting. Sediment piles up, erosion happens, and the river shifts. The river is still the border, but now someone has to go in and adjust the political border to match the river’s new position.
So, if Trump does do something official to rename the Gulf of Mexico, the online mapping companies (and any offline ones that are left) will probably follow the rule and rename it… for their American users. The rest of the world will still see it as the Gulf of Mexico. It will just be yet another one of those funny exceptions the companies have to keep track of while displaying maps for a certain subset of users.
The rest of the world will still see it as the Gulf of America.
of Mexico** I guess?
Er, yeah, that.
Thanks btw, really informative!
Sorry if this has been asked elsewhere, but who even has the legal right to rename the gulf? It doesn’t belong to USA, right? So we can’t just rename it, right? If we did, everybody else in the world would keep calling it The Gulf of Mexico, right?
If we did, everybody else in the world would keep calling it The Gulf of Mexico, right?
Most countries don’t call it “The Gulf of Mexico”. For example in my country it’s “Mexický záliv”.
Did you know that Confucius was one of the rudest people to ever live? He never said “thank you” or “please” in his entire life.
Point is this is just Golf of Mexico in another language. Maybe not 100% literal, but it associates the site with the country Mexico, not America (which Mexico is a part of, but I’m not sure MAGAts understand or want to understand the nuance).
The point is that the Czech name for the gulf has nothing to do with how Americans are calling it, it’s not even the same language. Why should be care Trump calls it different? He’s not our president, you know.
Yeah, it’s not like we English speakers call Germany Deutschland. And it’s not like we call the Persian Gulf the Iranian gulf after Iran changed it’s name.
To a certain degree countries respect other countries’ rights to nominative self determination. It’s actually pretty similar to how we respect people’s nominative self determination. When a country we interact with regularly significantly changes their name we generally adapt, but we typically do so in our own language, and we often don’t bother if they don’t mind the nickname we use.
Geographic features on the other hand, we usually need a good reason. There’s a reason they’re typically officially called whatever they’re actually called. The back and forth over the naming of Denali is weird in part because most Americans barely remembered it’s existence between name changes.
Mexico is a part of the continent of America. Not the country. Devil’s in the details and all.
I never claimed otherwise 😉 a country named “America” doesn’t exist to my knowledge.
In the US, it’s the Board on Geographic Names.
I just checked there, and they have not renamed it, nor have they listed the new name as a recognized alternate name.
Whether of not an executive order can override the government agency specifically granted that authority by congress is of no concern to them. By law, the Board of Geographic Names is the final authority on geographic names. If they don’t go along with this change, then the Trump admin would have to file an inter-government lawsuit about it.
Every sovereign state can publish maps require everyone to use it as reference for further publication in its own territory. Hence you’ll see different maps on Google for different regions. There’s a UN committee to coordinate these and also to publish international water area names.
Should rename it the Persian gulf or the Arab gulf and watch as people get even more confused.
Wait, that really happened? I thought the gulf of Mexico renamed shit was just memeing. Google maps still shows the proper name instead of the tantrum name.
The president ordered it. There is no legal mechanism to compel private companies to use the new name.
Technically can I name it Gulf of Trump can kiss my ass?
I’ll cosign
Edit: co-sign? Fuck it…I’m going to bed
I’d cosine, but I’d probably find myself on a tangent
Uuuuuuugh…happens to me alllll the time…
There is no legal mechanism to compel private companies to use the new name.
There is also no legal mechanism to require any other country on the planet to pay attention to Trump’s stupid and pointless attempt at renaming it.
If anything they’ll just show the new name to people in the US.
Google Maps does a lot of regional fuckery to comply with local lunatics. Indians see Kashmir as part of India, for example.
I mean, that’s every multinational company.
My job has international offices and during stand-ups, we get things like “Hey EU needs this thing. So figure it out engineers.” And we do the bare minimum to meet the requirements because bro I’m just trying to code and make a paycheck.
Have u ever been to Kashmir?
Nope.
I do vaguely remember seeing the bonkers border ceremony in a Michael Palin travel show from about 30 years ago. Seemed competitive, yet oddly friendly.
Not familiar with the show but that was definitely the Atari border ceremony at wagah in Amritsar, Punjab and not Kashmir.
Either way, don’t try to equate anything happening near Kashmir to what is happening here. Those are land borders with people living on either side with very real tangible “everyday” problems to whatever pax Americana you have going on in the US.
I thought “we’ll build a wall and have Mexico pay for it” was just shit-talking, too.
Trump has the habit of saying shit like this. His opponents will say “Oh god the cringe, it hurts”. His supporters will say “Oh shit, I didn’t think that we have to actually implement this? This will cause all sorts of expensive problems.”
To be fair, that was just shit talking. He may have started building the wall, but Mexico didn’t pay for it
It will be interesting to see what openstreetmap do - they have an “on the ground principle” that says to look at what the local signs say when naming something, but the data is tagged with a load of references to NOAA pages on historical treaties that the US signed (which obviously used the normal name for that area)
Fuck, is he actually trying to null out some treaties?
Pretty sure he’s going after all of them.
I thought the gulf of Mexico renamed shit was just memeing.
I have a feeling we’re going to be seeing a lot of “I didn’t think he would really do ____” in the coming weeks and months.
I was under no such illusions. He has no one to stop him this time around.
I mean, in this case, he has the rest of the English-speaking world to stop him with stupid renaming. If everyone just refuses to call it anything other than the Gulf of Mexico, it’s not like he can do anything about it, especially if they’re outside of the US.
It never will happen. We all keep calling it what it is, the gulf of Mexico. Easy.
Anyone else remember “freedom fries”? That’s what we were supposed to call french fries when conservatives were upset that the French were not supporting the US invasion of Iraq.
Remember all the white flag and surrender jokes? Yep, the exact same starting point.
It’s even stupider when you remember that fries are from Belgium.
And that “frenched” is the way they’re cut, not that they have anything to do with the country.
“Mission Accomplished” might be one of the greatest all time. And to think I thought that would be as low as it could get for our country.
Holy shit yes. I remember making fun of the doofus Bush Jr. But holy fuck do I wish him back compared to the current shit show.
Yeah, it started in WWI.
From a 1976 interview with German-American T. Max Kniesche, who moved to San Francisco in 1907, and worked in restaurants and cafes there:
Teiser: What was it like in San Francisco for Germans during the first world war? You were working at a clearly German restaurant. […]
Teiser: Did you change the kind of food that you served, or the decorations?
Kniesche: Well, the hamburger steak was Liberty Steak. French-fried potatoes were Liberty Potatoes. [laughter] We called it Liberty, but the liberty wasn’t there. Anyhow, everything went to “Liberty.” [laughter]
But I don’t remember our government wasting time and official action on that. It was just a “popular” movement supported by propaganda
Remember how if you didn’t want our boys coming home in flag draped coffins then you “Didn’t support out troops?”
They were right as well
Yes, and sauerkraut was “liberty cabbage” before that.
“Liberty cabbage” sounds very Orwellian. I guess “freedom fries” does too.
It predates 1984 by over 30 years!
Hey everyone, I just signed a lemmy order changing the name of maralago to gaping jizz hole. Enjoy!
I feel like an OSM edit is in order.
Please don’t vandalise OSM.
Time for everyone to start burner Open Street Maps accounts!
Thank you for your service, sir/madam. You’re already a better executive than some presidents I can think of, thinking of what the people want.
As the first matter of business I need to immediately address, my resignation. No one man is equipped to weild the power of the lemexcutive for much longer than I have.
Farewell lemmings. Until we shit post together again.
Good night, sweet prince(ss)! Though your reign in this (lemmy.) world was short, your reign in our hearts will last at least a few more minutes!
Pretty sure it’s called “Gulf of How The Fuck Does This Lower Grocery Prices”
If Apple changed the name to “Gulf of How The Fuck Does This Lower Grocery Prices” for a day in response I’d start using Apple Maps.
I’ll be happy with companies ignoring this to set the precedent that these executive orders are toothless.
With all the other bullshit, I missed this EO being made. Jesus fuck.
Wait, this is an official thing, not a joke? Is it a law thing?..
What???
Executive Orders are more like a corporate memo to the government. It’s not a law passed by congress, but it can direct the government in how to administer existing laws or regulations.
Executive Orders are closer to press releases than they are to law. They can say pretty much anything - whether those things are enforceable or even consistent with reality is up to the courts.
Government employees and institutions are bound to act according to executive orders. They are binding. You’re correct they can be challenged in court. EO need to fit under existing laws. EO are often instructions on how to implement an existing law.
Press releases are not binding and might even be outright lies.
Only binding to the federal government though, states, private organizations, and individuals can wipd their ass with them.
Probably a good time to try and sell maps and globes to red school districts.
You know some friend of the administration already took that spot. It was probably their idea in the first place.
Only about a third of the Gulf of Mexico is US territory, so how can the US president unilaterally rename it? Seems Mexico has the larger claim to naming rights.
Small dick energy.
Who’s gonna tell him?
The earliest known use of the name America dates to April 25, 1507, when it was applied to what is now known as South America. It is generally accepted that the name derives from Amerigo Vespucci, the Italian explorer, who explored the new continents in the following years on behalf of Spain and Portugal, with the name given by German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller.
Brazilians also Americans.
Venezuelans also Americans.
Canadians? Yep Americans
Having a step dad from Buenos Aires, I’m offended you forgot Argentina. But they have their own kind of crazy MAGA there, currently…
I remember Buenos Aires! I’m doing my part!
Waldseemüller
It’s a good thing the continent wasn’t named after him instead!
Then again, having a swim in the Gulf of Waldseemüller sounds kind of nice.
For all the non-Germans, Herr Waldseemüller or one of his ancestors probably was a miller at a lake in the forest. That’s what the components of his name say, and we already have a body of water here.
That’s a whole debate people from the US are not ready for
So it should really be “Ameriga”?
Apple is not beholden to executive orders… No private company is.
I mean yes they could be if the order affected them. I mean as everyone famously says they are beholden to the rules of the country they are in.
EOs are not laws and can only direct the federal government’s actions. The President has no authority to unilaterally control a company, except for scenarios where it is interacting with the federal government. Just like the “two genders” EO, it only applies to the federal government. States and companies can continue to support non-binary and other options for sex and gender identity.
One can more or less envision the President as the CEO of Federal Government, Inc. and executive orders as internal memos to the employees.
If you don’t work there, following the memo is not your problem.
But if you do any kind of business with someone who does work there, you can be hit by the secondhand effects.
No, executive orders are not laws, and they apply only to the federal government. The reason for that is the president is not a king, and so their word cannot be law. That requires congress to make the law, and the Supreme Court to uphold it, if that law is challenged.
The government can fuck right off with their Newspeak.
This is a huge distraction to get you worked up about a meaningless name change. Elon is heiling on stage like an edgy teen for further drama. Meanwhile EO are signed en masse and action is taken by the new administration. This time Trump and his cronies came well prepared with a plan.
Who says I’m worked up? You wrote a whole paragraph, I wrote a quip.
This is not about you.
Just because something has a purpose doesn’t mean it has succeeded at it. 👍
It’s one of the most upvoted posts on Lemmy at the moment. This is getting attention.
