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.
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.
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 about the ttrypo.
I forgot that apple was a department under the president
I feel sorry for Wozniak… Watching the company he helped build turn into what it has.
Tim Apple personally donated 1 million dollars to Trump
I couldn’t care less what the name of that gulf is, however, Trump is right when he says that the US is the ONLY country that pumps money into that entire region. We protect it, monitor it, and it all comes out of American tax dollars. Mexico is just riding our coat tails. I can see why he’d want to change it. Also, the name “Gulf of America” technically includes Mexico…
We freeload off of Mexico. They give us about $160 billion more dollars in goods and services than we give them. They give us about $467 billion worth of stuff, and in return we give them about $309 billion in stuff. In exchange we mostly give them IOUs and other pieces of paper.
Oh, and that’s before we talk about the billions of dollars we steal from the Mexican government. Think of all the talented workers that move from Mexico to the US. That’s millions of people raised and educated on the backs of Mexican taxpayers, who come to the US and never contribute a penny to the Mexican economy.
The US is a giant leech sucking the Mexican economy dry.
Oh brother… sounds like you’re either
A: Ashamed to be in this country, so when are you leaving somewhere else?
B: Don’t live in this country and have spent too much time on Lemmy/Reddit where the USA is constantly attacked as the big bad wolf… until someone needs us, like Ukraine…
For people always calling the others “snowflakes” and “easily triggered”, they sure do have a thin skin.
Wait until iOS Auto Corrects them typing Gulf of America to Gulf of Mexico but only after they hit send.
“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.
Don’t count on it, Apple and Google were both at inauguration
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”
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.
Great, now I have to chose between correct geographical names and the reasonable spelling words.
No
“Facts don’t care about your feelings snowflake.”
It’s always projection with these people.
Always. Especially the pedo stuff.
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.
I call them hypocrites, but they don’t care.
Every accusation
They want an efficient government not wasting time and resources on unnecessary things …
They get a government crying over the name of a body of water.
They say they want an efficient government not wasting time and resources on unnecessary things. What they actually want is a government that makes them feel superior to all the people they’ve been convinced to hate, in this case Mexicans and Leftists. Trump knows this, and gives them what they want so that he can get what he wants, which is free reign to exploit his position and his country for profit while his loyal voter base blindly supports his efforts to usher in their demise.
Exactly. They just want to feel superior without actually doing anything to be better than anyone. Nobody is stopping them from self improvement. Nobody is stopping them from volunteering in ways that are really meaningful. But that’s hard and takes time and effort. It feels more immediately satisfying to hate. It’s just that it makes you feel emptier bit by bit as you do it. It’s like using casual sex to cope with romantic loneliness, except lust actually has its place jn a healthy life.
Their job is to do nothing and cede power and influence to unregulated, uncontrolled private interests of billionaires. It is now, was last week, and was years back. It is the merging and takeover of state power by corporate power.
And, as you no doubt already know, that merger has a name. But maybe it’s Roman inspired…
It’s a very important body of water, ok?!
Indeed. It is the hurricane class five generating hot tub. How else could nature teach the most boneheaded MAGA-brains that climate change and global warming is real but by depopulating the coastal states…
Rename to gulf of Huracán to better represent what it does and the local storm god.
Oh, no, it doesn’t work that way for them. See, if a natural disaster strikes a blue city/area, it’s god doling out punishment for their wickedness. If a natural disaster strikes a red city/area, it’s god testing their faith because he loves them so much.
Their God sounds like a dick
You don’t say?
They’ll be blaming the gays anyway.
It will be a body of oil soon enough. Then the world will probably get on board with the new name.
This is one of the worst things of this asshole’s term.
We’re living in a climatic emergency that is going to affect the world forever, reaching a tipping point, and this bastard and his voters are working to accelerate the proccess while the rest of the world tries to fight it. At this point, my only wish is that things like the Los Angeles fires spread in that shithole of a country until there’s nothing left.
Innocents will pay, but so are we, who couldn’t even vote there and will be “enjoying” his actions as if we did.
Fuck is he going to rename Lake Ontario too?! Lol
Ahem. Umm, conservatives are angry that others are not calling something what THEY want it to be called?
Hmm. So… I just feel like… perhaps, there’s a similarity here. Some people… want to be referred to a specific way… but usually conservatives have a problem with that.
How about the rest of the world rename it to the “Gulf of Snowflakes” and see what America does
Well that just wouldn’t make any sense, they hardly get any snow down there!
New Orleans, Louisiana is currently covered in snow, I think Gulf of Snowflakes might actually be accurate right now.
I stand corrected
The three foot snow drift against my back door here in New Orleans would beg to differ.
Tbf, nothing like that has ever happened here before. I wonder if any kind of change is causing this? Hmmm.
What are the odds that a snowflake would rename the Gulf of Mexico and then it immediately actually snows on the Gulf of Mexico?!
On a serious note, hope you all are doing OK down there and it will melt ASAP.
Thanks, I think everything will be alright if people just stay off the roads for a few days. We’re used to driving through water but not on ice.
As someone up north we used to get those all the time, but they’ve gotten rare. I miss them
I used to live up north too. Don’t really miss them, ha. But I lived in the city so it just made everything a pain. Nothing fun like sledding or snow forts.
Its just nice to look out the windows and see a beautiful snowy landscape. Unlike a week later when everything is a gray haze and it’s something like -10c
Probably a freak tilting of the Earth’s disc. Nothing to worry about.
They currently have blizzard warnings, or they did yesterday.
That’s literally what the headline is. “Deadnaming” is a term for referring to transgender people by their previous names, rather than their current names.
So, the Gulf of They/Them is what the rest of the world should call it? I can get behind that.
We need to ask them what the Gulf’s pronouns are.
Hey everyone, I just signed a lemmy order changing the name of maralago to gaping jizz hole. Enjoy!
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!
Time for everyone to start burner Open Street Maps accounts!
I feel like an OSM edit is in order.
Please don’t vandalise OSM.
Are eggs cheaper because of this?
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.
How does this lower the cost of housing?
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.
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.
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]
“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.
Remember how if you didn’t want our boys coming home in flag draped coffins then you “Didn’t support out troops?”
Remember all the white flag and surrender jokes? Yep, the exact same starting point.
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!
But I don’t remember our government wasting time and official action on that. It was just a “popular” movement supported by propaganda
They were right as well
Real question here: It is titled “Restoring Names that Honor American Greatness.” - Has the Gulf of Mexico ever been named “Gulf of America” in any reasonable historical context, or is this just the usual made-up “fact” from Donald the Jester?
Nope. But Donzo the clown runs the circus now
Actually, the Gulf of Mexico appears called like that around 1500 AD, when the United States were not even an idea of a nation. So no, it never was called like that because it was named centuries before the US existed.
In this vein, I’m ok with calling it Gulf of America, the (super)continent, so long as the denonym for people of the USA also changes, since it’s a continent.
Agreed. We should no longer be referred to as Americans, and instead let’s call ourselves the Shitholes.
Alright folks, time to pick a demonym! Cast your votes on USAians or Absolute Unit[ed State]s.
We can just be called usasians or Americans. Africa, Europe, and Australia, watch out we’re gunning for ways to name ourselves after yall too.
I vote for Usan, pronounced YOO-sn.
Just call the whole thing Washington to make things even more confusing.
USAn people?
Maybe Gulf of (Central) America
Agreed, I’ve been trying to move away from the terms “America” and “American” when discussing specifically The United States or it’s people.
Not doing so is often at insult to the majority of people living in the Americas.
It’s weird how people seem to think that demonyms should match the name of the country exactly…
Should we also say “united kingdomer”?
No. We say English, for England, and Irish for Ireland, and Scottish for Scotland, and Welsh for Wales. French for France. German, Germany. Italian, Italy. Japanese, Japan. Canadian, Canada. Australian, Australia. Brazilian, Brazil. Mexican, Mexico.
I mean come on.
“British” isn’t a thing?
How colonial of you to determine that you get to tell other people what they should be called.
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British does refer to the English blokes though. Don’t call a proud Scotsman that you think him to be British.
Arguably the Welsh and Scots are British, the English are filthy fucking Saxons.
“British” isn’t a thing?
Not really, no.
A Scott wouldn’t because it would associate them with England, a Welshman wouldn’t, because it would associate them with England.
And I wouldn’t, because someone might think I’m Welsh or Scottish. 🤷
"Well I’m going to call you british because you’re from the british isles. "
This is my point - you don’t get to define how others refer to themselves.
America is not “The United States” in the context of naming global features on a map. We have two continents call that, for example.
Sure, but the name Gulf of Mexico, actually named Golfo de México since it was a Spaniard who named it, doesn’t come from the country of Mexico, but of the Mexica civilization (aztecs for many but called mexihkah in nahuatl), the name comes from the even older name “seno mexicano” (seno meaning gulf or bay).
If any, the other known name was Gulf of New Spain, but I suppose Turd would rather die than call it such name.
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.
Fuck, I honestly thought this was the Onion. Somebody get me out of this timeline. I withdraw consent for this simulation!
