Google Maps now shows the 'Gulf of America'
theverge.comThe real news here is that GNIS has been updated with the name. It doesn't seem that Google made an independent decision to change the name. Resistance to this change would really have to happen at the government level, not the tech level. Which really seems to be the point that's being made with this whole ordeal. It's a symbolic move to demonstrate to everyone that what they say goes and that the system isn't resisting their power.
Where does it end though? If he decides tomorrow to start calling Canada "Beaverland," will all our maps change again?
Many people are currently desperately trying to figure out where it will all end, with possible outcomes much worse than renaming places on maps.
Look at all the third world countries in latin america that have been through a coup, that's where it ends.
Indeed. While I was surprised by the name, I quickly noticed that this was a vibes-based reaction.
I'm British by birth, I grew up with news stories about the IRA, and the second-largest city in Northern Ireland is either "Derry" or "Londonderry" depending on if you're a Republican* or a Unionist.
The English Channel, if you're French, is La Manche.
The country I currently live in is Saksa in Finish, Tyskland in Danish, Allemagne in French, Niemcy in Polish, or Germany in English, none of which is close to the endonym of Deutschland: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Germany_Name_European_Lan...
* i.e. "not a monarchist" — this has nothing to do with the US political party.
It's only Londonderry to a minority of loyalists who aren't actually even from the place. Everyone else calls it Derry, even the loyalists in Derry.
I think it's actually a rule in BBC articles that the first mention has to be "Londonderry" and thereafter "Derry".
Thanks; that's somewhat… ironic, I think is the correct word?
And if Germany was "renamed" by another country, it would signify a shift of something. Just like the difference you mentioned are based on massively important historical events.
> If he decides tomorrow to start calling Canada "Beaverland," will all our maps change again?
The guy got enough votes without needing to promise to do this as well.
why waste time and energy discussing silly things he might do when he is literally doing silly things now, for real?
> Where does it end though? If he decides tomorrow to start calling Canada "Beaverland," will all our maps change again? reply
> why waste time and energy discussing silly things he might do when he is literally doing silly things now, for real?
The example used was making a larger point than, oh no, "Canada -> Beaverstan", for laughs.
The point is: What line would be too far for industry to resist presidential renaming by fiat. A kind of power with known risks. Renaming by fiat has a name, "Newspeak", a term coined in the not very silly book, 1984, by George Orwell.
Trump has a history of doing lots of "silly" things just to see if he can. It is a low risk way for him to pre-test, or pre-expand, any barriers to more serious expressions of his power. Such as renaming things in a way that undermines or alters the impact of laws.
Again, there’s no need for hypotheticals. Trump is doing plenty of crazy stuff in reality.
And this is a representative democracy, if the representative does those things, so be it. If we don’t like, we get another to revert.
Again. The specific hypothetical wasn’t the point.
It is what is called an“illustrative” or “hypothetical exemplar”. Ignore the specific example, focus on the point being made:
What limit is there to Trump taking things further? Because Trump has a track record of taking things further.
It is not a randomly improbable premature neurotic conjecture actually about Canada or “Beaverland”. Those are stand-ins for a larger point.
—
Also, a democracy is supposed to decentralize power. The more decentralized, the more each citizen has equal power.
But the US Constitution, with all its checks and balances, managed not to limit the power of political parties.
So the US system degenerates into only two viable national parties, with highly centralized power within each. Only two nationally viable candidates, neither chosen by an actual democratic process.
Just one more candidate, chosen by the powerful, than an autocracy.
We could call this “Minimal Viable Democracy”, as any less democratic would not be democratic at all.
Without experience with a better system, most US citizens are in a Stockholm situation. They talk about their “great” system because at one time it was a big improvement. But 250 years later it is just the flawed system they are stuck in. Better to keep calling it “great”, no matter how many re-centralizing-of-power dysfunctions accumulate without resolution, than get too depressed.
> Also, a democracy is supposed to decentralize power. The more decentralized, the more each citizen has equal power.
There’s no way you can guarantee that! India have everything to decentralise power, but still ended up currently as an autocratic state
If I remember correctly the US system doesn’t really take parties into consideration because parties were an afterthought and not really supposed to be a thing.
If you don’t like it, there are more options than sitting around for four years hoping another bought and paid for candidate in the two party state will be better.
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants”.
If you don’t wish to commit violence, there are other effective methods to enact change, although in the US the chances appear small.
Personally I believe in direct democracy.
Well, the "Gulf of America" nonsense is also shown here, in brackets after "Gulf of Mexico." So it seems like they're not content with just keeping it to the US as originally stated.
As far as I can tell, there was no such original statement. There was, however, a statement saying the opposite:
https://x.com/NewsFromGoogle/status/1884012872768053467
> Also longstanding practice: When official names vary between countries, Maps users see their official local name. Everyone in the rest of the world sees both names. That applies here too.
Whoops, I stand corrected. I thought I had read it elsewhere (news, I assume) that most countries would not see the change. Looking back... sigh.
Probably not, as polls show that it was his second worst decision in his voter group.
He is polling quite well with his voters, this was more just a power play.
A great idea! I rather like beaver-land it sounds like such a wonderful place.
In all seriousness this started in trumps first term when he insisted on changing NAFTA to USMCA while canada calls it CUSMA and Mexico calls it T-MEC … so it’s the no one agrees on anything agreement
> canada calls it CUSMA and Mexico calls it T-MEC
Huh, Tratado entre México, Estados Unidos y Canadá, TIL!
(Honestly, kind of genius.)
I had that reaction when I first saw the French name for NATO and thought it was an accidental mirror image: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:NATO_OTAN_landscape_logo....
("Organisation du traité de l'Atlantique nord")
> Where does it end
Same way every naming fight does. Each side requires its own labels.
Maybe Trump's plan to make Canada part of the United States, just rename Canada to the "United States" in the GNIS database and they appear part of the same country (at least within the real "United States" borders, Google implements names based on a Geo fence for each country).
What's wrong with Beaverland ? /s
> It doesn't seem that Google made an independent decision to change the name.
Isn't GNIS a US-only thing? I am not in the US, yet I am seeing "Gulf of America" in brackets after the correct name. Doesn't that suggest the decision is a bit less "independent" than you're implying?
When a border or name is disputed, this is shown with the "given names" in the countries on each side of the dispute, and with both names (one in brackets) everywhere else.
I was under the impression the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) defines the naming of international waters.
Like I said, loyalty test.
Good.
Which part of this happening do you consider desirable, and why?
I'm unhappy with and afraid of "the system". I'm glad to see that the elected president can still effect change in it, no matter how inconsequential or petty.
Interesting perspective, thank you.
One detail I've not seen mentioned in these discussions is that the EO specifically identifies "the U.S. Continental Shelf area bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the States of Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida and extending to the seaward boundary with Mexico and Cuba". I'm not sure exactly what that looks like on a map, but it's clearly focused on US coastal waters. (Which kind of makes sense, because GNIS has no naming authority outside of US borders.) But it also makes the implementation by Google Maps wrong, since a large part (a majority, I think) of the gulf is still the Gulf of Mexico. It seems like the area should be drawn as two adjacent gulfs, the Gulf of America to the North and East, and the Gulf of Mexico to the South and West.
(Not debating the merits, just pondering mapping details.)
This depends on whether it's a regional name applied to the body of water or a specific name applied to the territorial waters within the greater region encompassed by the original name. Google has chosen to regard it as a regional name applied to the entire body rather than as a specific name for territorial waters implied by the EO. They do this for other regionalized names like "South China Sea" (e.g. "East Sea" in Vietnam).
I was surprised to learn when living in Bahrain that what I knew of as the "Persian Gulf", is there known as the "Arabian Gulf". Only tangentially relevant, but kind of interesting.
I get "Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America)" on a Japanese connection.
This stuff is obviously pointless and silly but it's nothing new. I'm sure Google Maps shows UK and French users different names for what I would call the English Channel.
> obviously pointless and silly
Ironically, it’s the same language policing that got the left in trouble. We have better things to do with our lives than keep a running tally of the right and wrong names for things.
It's not the same language policing that got the left in trouble until you're worried about being fired from your job for calling it the Gulf of Mexico.
> It's not the same language policing that got the left in trouble until you're worried about being fired from your job for calling it the Gulf of Mexico
Would you really feel confident in your job at X if you called it the Gulf of Mexico?
I don't think anyone feels confident in their job at Twitter because it's run at the whim of a shithead.
An idiot who called a rescue diver a "pedo" because the diver was a hero who rescued trapped children and everyone laughed at the stupid mini-submarine idea.
You'd probably be fired just for bringing that up, and laughing at it again, never mind your language use.
The difference is that enough Alaskans had always called Mt. McKinley “Denali” that the State of Alaska petitioned the U.S. government to change the federal name in 1975.
Who asked to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico?
I left a comment that was flagged for clarifying what was actually being discussed, and I'm not going to take that sitting down this time:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43012859
Left and right are both off their rockers right now, and it's really frustrating for the majority of us stuck in the middle, getting shouted down and silenced from both sides.
I see Gulf of America when it's zoomed in, but Gulf of Mexico when zoomed very out or very very in.
Probably a caching issue
I see "Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America)" when zoomed in all the way. "Gulf of America" when zoomed out.
Likely cached tiles either on your end or Google's servers
France tends to be oblivious to name changes. Beijing is still "Pekin", Turkiye is still "Turquie", "Kyiv" is "Kiev", etc. because "this is how it's called in French" and they don't care what other countries/languages do.
That’s most other languages though. English has the disadvantage that it’s the global lingua Franca so everybody has an opinion. In German, Beijing is Pekin, Turkey is Türkei, Kyiv is Kiew, Czechia has always been Tschechien even when you still said Czech Republic in English.
And also, to be fair, most names in other languages have a long history. I wouldn’t want people to call Germany anything but what it is called in their local language because for most European languages that’s a millennia of history packed into that name.
Every language does that, including and especially English.
You should go and look up what Croatia is really called. Or Japan, Germany, Korea, China, Hungary, Greece, Finland...
Like another poster on this topic said, it's not pointless or silly. It's a demonstration of power.
As well as an example of the "flood the zone" strategy designed to overwhelm and distract.
You misspelled "demonstration of small dick energy".
The demo is not for us
> I'm sure Google Maps shows UK and French users different names for what I would call the English Channel.
It would be interesting to see what it shows people outside of UK and France.
It should just vary based on language. In English it's "English Channel", in French it's "La Manche", in Italian it's "La Manica" etc. etc.
It's not a UK vs France thing, it's just English vs French (vs every other language).
Things get complicated when governments make things "official", though. For example, the Welsh government decided to make the "official" names for some places Welsh, which English speakers have no idea how to pronounce. So the Brecon Beacons is "officially" Bannau Brycheiniog, even in English, apparently.
It still says "Brecon Beacons" for me. Doesn't even include the official name in brackets.
That is due to differences in language.
In Ireland, for example, it's called the English Channel.
It's more or less a loyalty test. Are you going to use the correct term, or Trump's term. Which side are you on?
I think every country should call it "Gulf of country", in France they direct all map providers to call it the Gulf of France, in Australia, they call it the Gulf of Australia, and so on.
That's actually hilarious, but America also stands for North America and South America. Gulf of The United States doesn't quite ring the same.
This is a nice interpretation of it, and maybe if this sticks we can reinterpret it that way, but this is coming from the guy who coined MAGA, the title of the order is "RESTORING NAMES THAT HONOR AMERICAN GREATNESS", and the text makes it very clear that it's about the US:
> It is in the national interest to promote the extraordinary heritage of our Nation and ensure future generations of American citizens celebrate the legacy of our American heroes. ... in recognition of this flourishing economic resource and its critical importance to our Nation’s economy and its people, I am directing that it officially be renamed the Gulf of America.
I saw a "Gulf of the Americas" suggestion which makes the second-most sense, after not changing it at all.
It’s absolutely pointless, but Gulf of the Americas almost has a nice bonding tone.
Honestly, this would be the funniest possible outcome.
Discussion of this issue on OpenStreetMap forum: https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/gulf-of-america-gulf-o...
I really enjoyed the "joke" the other day where some standup guy said that we have the tech now to make everyone happy: just show this part on Google Maps as China to this set of people and Taiwan to this other set of people etc etc
Related:
Just searched Google Maps for Mt. Denali, Alaska only for it to return results for Mount McKinley immediately. Note I'm not really sure if that's anything to do with an executive order or that it was Alaskans wanting it called Denali while many elsewhere in the country incl at the Federal level called it McKinley.
I think if you're bragging to your buddies you summited Denali it has a much more air of mystery than "I climbed McKinley".
I think the gulf of America is in Washington right now.
I was wanting a graphic t shirt with a skull in be style of a topographic map, with the empty space between the ears labeled as the Gulf of America. Alas, I have art skills and didn’t want to fuss with midjourney for a result half way there only to realize I wasn’t ever goiing to pull the trigger.
Washingtonians prefer we use Washington for the state and DC for the Federal District of Columbia.
Are Washingtonians from the state or the district?
Washingtonians are from Washington .
Whatever you do, don't right click on the map and select "Report a data problem".
Someone's already made a chrome extension to search+replace "Gulf of America" to "Gulf of Mexico" in online text I don't think it works for google maps place titles but no doubt someone will fix that.
It's a new level of public-but-divided space when we all start running client side software to reinforce our world view. I'm certainly not criticizing that chrome extension I think that is funny, but it's also something to think on.
It's not a new level at all, these extensions have existed since shortly after extensions started existing.
A few examples:
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/trump-dog/bdhcfpbga...
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/tralalump/epclgaegl...
https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/cloud-to-butt-plus/...
Just refreshed Apple Maps on my phone, and it also shows Gulf of America where over the weekend it was still Gulf of Mexico.
refresh on Canada too, it’ll shown North American 51st State :)
My phone says "Canada (52nd State)", while Greenland is marked "(51st State)" -- not sure who decided the order there. Gaza just says "(US Territory)" -- too poor to warrant statehood.
A question, does the executive order (if it was actually signed by the President) have the "law power" to actually oblige Google Maps to make this change?
If not, is this correct following USA law? Also is this matter being questioned in superior Justice instances?
Growing up I was told of the fable of "The Emperor's New Clothes" on occasion. I always found it ridiculous, but in the last decade it has been quite relevant. As a kid, I thought it was about the ridiculousness of the Emperor, but I've come around to the understanding that it's about how power creates its own reality.
Thank you, that makes a lot of sense.
Google’s policy of not playing individualised politics is to treat these things consistently and not apply its own judgement.
> A question, does the executive order (if it was actually signed by the President) have the "law power" to actually oblige Google Maps to make this change?
Coercion isn't required when sycophants are eager to cooperate.
> If not, is this correct following USA law?
Why wouldn’t it be? What’s stopping them from calling it Gulf of Google if they want to?
Trump isn’t forcing Google to do anything. They use a database for their place names and use what is in that database.
The assumption is there’s a global body that registers place names and regional borders that Google would vet against.
There is not. See the whole Taiwan thing.
I mean this is all dumb chest thumping. But, doesn’t it make us look smaller to name the gulf after us?
When it was the Gulf of Mexico, it was named from our point of view. It was the gulf, among our many gulfs, that we share with Mexico. Now, by the same logic it is named from their point of view.
It's not named after 'us'.
All those in America (South, North, Central) are called Americans.
I spent several years in Paraguay where I met a lot of South Americans.
Mexicans are North Americans and the 'Gulf of America' is more inclusive considering 1/2 of the land mass touching it belongs to the US.
Except, no part of Central nor South America touches the Gulf of Mexico. The only three countries which coasts on the Gulf are the US, Mexico, and Cuba. All of these are in North America, and I'm pretty the latter two are not going to go along with the idea.
I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that "inclusion" wasn't Trump's intent here.
> it was named from our point of view.
Actually it was named from the perspective of Spanish explorers. Originally Gulf of New Spain but by 1569 had become Gulf of Mexico.
In Sweden it shows both. "Mexikanska Golfen(Amerikanska Golfen)"
Well that's Google Maps deleted off my phone then.
To be fair to Google, they are simply following a policy they've had since 2008. There is a similar issue with the Sea of Japan/East Sea.
Seems a little harsh. What app do you plan on switching to?
Personally, I’ve been using Apple Maps for over 8 years without issue. I just checked the gulf, it’s of mexico and I am in the US.
I have bad news for you if you think Apple is not going to fall in line.
Well they haven't. Neither has MapQuest, and weirdly Waze..
Give it time. If they still haven't renamed after a year, that's something. But even then, maybe just some lag.
OpenStreetMap? They don't show ocean names on the map, and didn't change the primary name of the GoM POI, but instead added the new name as an official en-US name (and the official name used by Poland too).
https://community.openstreetmap.org/t/gulf-of-america-gulf-o...
My phone's been having shit battery life lately so I've been keeping a paper map in my bag. Maybe I'll just go back to using that.
I personally don't feel strongly enough to move off Google Maps, but, harsh? It's an app.
I downgraded my apps for domains plan. I’m not sure it was inevitable, and even so, Google seemed to be in a rush to do it.
What have you used it for, and what do you migrate to?
It shows "Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America)" in Canada (aka The soon-to-be 51st State).
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Considering the relative populations of states, shouldn't Canada be at least 10-20 states?
Approximately the same population as the existing state of California. I suspect giving Canadians 40 senators and proportionally more representatives by splitting it up would be a political concern for annexation-hawks.
Giving it two senators, and as many representatives as California, would be of massive concern to annexation-hawks - to the point that they have to not be thinking to even consider it.
Didn't think about this, but a new state would lead to a reduction in representatives for high population states like California because of the cap on the house of representatives. California would go from 52 -> 46 reps if my math is right, which is also how many the megastate of Canada would also get.
They have 10 provinces and 3 territories. I think that would map to 10 states. Yes it's ridiculous to give that many people 2 senators. The House redistricting will be super interesting.
And the master of moving the Overton Window has struck again. Here we are discussing the proper apportionment of Canada's new representatives.
We like thought exercises like this. Across everyone I interact with, the window hasn't shifted. He's the master of stirring things up. I don't think he'll get the military involved, but who knows what he will leverage a compliant Congress for economically. Especially if the midterms swing his way. Lots of talk turns out to just be talk and some of it turns out to be heartfelt, just part of the circus.
>Across everyone I interact with, the window hasn't shifted.
That is called selection bias.
And more land, a north pole (for now), Blackberry, Bieber, Java.
Greenland and Gaza are next. Canada has to wait in line.
Unlike the others, Trump is really doubling down on the Gaza statements. Just insane.
It's showing up in parentheses outside of the US.
How about if we all compromise on Gulf of Donald Trump Can your-favorite-letters-here?
What's next? Will New Mexico be called New America? /s
So many points of interest have been renamed in the past 20 years. I'm expecting the same level of endorsement for those renamings to carry over to this one.
Tell us a few, let's see what we think.
Gulf of America is a more inclusive name anyway since both USA and Mexico are part of North America, but since it's Trump everyone hates it. People can't really even articulate what's wrong with it in a vacuum without mentioning Trump.
I don't even like Trump, but this "renaming" is neutral at worst, inclusive at best.
If you read the executive order, it's not about inclusivity and the term America does not refer to the continent. Quoting the order, it's to "honor the contributions of visionary and patriotic Americans in our Nation’s rich past".
The term "Gulf of Mexico" has been in common use for over 400 years, long before the US was even a thing. No one had a legitimate problem with the name.
>it's not about inclusivity and the term America does not refer to the continent.
The last five to ten years of activist similarly told us these things don't matter though. Doesn't matter that "blacklist" or "master" has nothing to do with Black people or slavery. We had to change them to more inclusive terms anyway.
>The term "Gulf of Mexico" has been in common use for over 400 years, long before the US was even a thing.
The exact same was said about "blacklist" and "master", among others.
>No one had a legitimate problem with the name.
Someone did, evidenced by the change. Or are you saying we shouldn't give in to the activists pushing this change? How ironic.
I also think blacklist and master are silly terminology changes, so I'm not sure what's ironic here.
Luckily in America if someone has serious grievances about this they can choose to vote for a candidate that will revert it. Given the other things Trump is up to, this is a non-issue. The collective time spent discussing it is sad.
Wasn't your point that "America" is an inclusive term for all of North America? Many of those Americans can't vote in the US even if we accept the absurdity of voting based on naming preferences.
> Gulf of America is a more inclusive name anyway since both USA and Mexico are part of North America
gulf of america is not more inclusive. the "renaming" was not meant to be inclusive, it was very clearly meant to be divisive.
this is a similar argument to one often used when people call canadians americans: "umm, ackshully, canada is in north america, so it's correct to call them americans"
and of course the flaw in that argument is that literally nobody on earth considers canadians to be americans except people on the internet trying to sound smart.
>gulf of america is not more inclusive.
Sure it is. Mexico is not the only country in the Americas that has a maritime border on this body of water.
you make up some argument no one actually makes and point out its flaw? congrats I guess.
"People hate it" because the motivation for it is xenophobia
I don't care about accusations of xenophobia. I don't like it because I don't like pointless historical revisionism. It's been called Gulf of Mexico since the 17th century, before there was a USA.
And I don't like the stink of arbitrary dictators renaming things for ego or propaganda reasons. This is the sort of thing North Korea or Turkmenbashi would do, and I think that's pathetic for America.
There are two other countries which have coastlines on the Gulf of Mexico. They are Cuba and Mexico. Neither of them call it the Gulf of America. The name is not inclusive, even when you leave out Trump's intentions.
>The name is not inclusive
Sure it is. Mexico is not the only country in the Americas that has a maritime border on this body of water. Gulf of America is a more accurate and inclusive name. In the spirit of inclusivity we should keep it, just like we should keep "blocklist" and "main."
I'm not sure what "(North) America" means and what Trump thinks "America" means are the same thing.
why does it matter?
Motive matters, this principle is long-established in most Western countries legislatures.
It’s annoying. It was annoying when San Francisco school boards were doing it. It’s annoying when Trump does it. The illiberal left and right need to just create their own maps and dictionaries and leave the rest of us alone.
The counter reaction is strong as well. I don't agree with this so I must just hate Trump, right? It's a feedback loop in both directions.
Frankly I just think it's a waste of time and energy. I'm referring both to the original action, as well as the continuing ramp up of divisiveness.
TIL that when Trump was saying "make america great again" he was actually talking about mexico
I find the reaction to this to be interesting, because it's obviously arbitrary, and there are thousands of geographical features whose names vary widely between countries, and not only for the obvious language reasons. So, each country clearly has the right to call international water bodies whatever they want. Personally, I don't care what it's called, but the new name is fine.
But because Trump did it, some Americans find this inherently problematic, in a way I doubt anyone would have if that had happened to be the name given 300 years ago. And I doubt any Mexican ever felt the old name was inappropriate.
If anyone has an argument that I'm missing something in this assessment, I'm happy to listen.
The rational take is to understand it within the context of recent expansionist rhetoric which includes the annexation of Canada, strong-arm purchase of Greenland, and conquest of Gaza and Panama.
You don't have to go that far back in a history book to understand the dangers of expansionist rhetoric in a globalist world and how it is directly against American interests to threaten war with our neighbors and allies.
Threatening war with neighbors and allies is not a Christian thing to do.
I think there's a habit amongst people who didn't vote for trump to catastrophize his every move, which helps him by distracting people from maybe the more consequential decisions he makes. Interestingly he didn't name it the Gulf of USA, the Gulf of the United States, the Gulf of Florida or The Gulf of Freedom and Bald Eagles, but after the continent itself, which Mexico is in fact a part of.
What's the expression... "don't take the bait"? There are far worse things happening in the White House for people on both sides of the aisle right now.
Yes, it seems that the #1 lesson he learned from his first term wasn't that you have to have appoint only intense loyalists who will never turn on you, but rather that flooding the channel helps tremendously to cause the important things to blow over more quickly. And the American Left, with their tendency to explode over anything mildly 'offensive,' is absolutely the perfect target for this trolling, since they can be easily trolled with things like this that have zero significance, and are free and legal to do. So that his opponents spend about 90% of their energy fighting the 90% of things that don't matter.
Gulf of America just makes more sense. Calling this the "Gulf of Mexico" would be like calling The Black Sea "The Gulf of Turkey".
Gulf of Mexico is what it has been called so it makes no sense to rename it. Names often dont make sense plus spain and later mexico used to control more territory along the Gulf coatline. Unless you want to piss of one of our most important allies for no reason
I agree, the coastline is mostly shared between the two.
Since you brought up Turkey, they renamed themselves recently. Practically a lot of people just can't keep up every countries nuances and just use the old names. It's fine. It seems like a lot of people still use Bombay over Mumbai too ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
A funny thing: I’ve spent a considerable amount of time in Mumbai, and there definitely seems to be a significant number of native residents who still call it Bombay. It was to the point where we briefly wondered if this was referring to two different parts of the same city (south of the Sea Link bridge is Bombay, the rest is Mumbai, maybe).
Names are complicated! Germany/Deutschland, Holland/The Netherlands etc.
Interesting that Wikipedia keeps “Turkey”: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey
They also keep Gulf of Mexico.
As a programmer: localization is a PITA.
Indian government tried giving things 'post-colonial' names but not all of them stuck equally. I do think Bengaluru is a slightly cooler name than Bangalore though!
I just want Istanbul to go back to being called Constantinople.
Why did it get the works, anyway?
There isn’t a continent called America. It could have been called the Gulf of North America if we wanted to go that way.
I think we can acknowledge that this is just kind of stupid and rude but mostly petty without catastrophizing about the whole thing.
Meanwhile people will actually keep calling it whatever they want. Let’s switch it back and forth every time the White House changes teams, the minor confusion will remind us that the US government is only changing what it calls things. The actual name comes from what the majority of people call it.
Not sure if this works as an argument, but in this case Google added the new US name even in international versions of Maps as a secondary name. That does feel a bit odd.
It is definitely odd. It seems as if Google wants to cozy up to Trump like other tech companies are trying to do.
I believe it is Google’s policy to show users official map labels based on the geolocation data of the user. If you compare maps between countries with border disputes, the one you’re “in” always shows all of the disputed territory as belonging to that nation.
But this thread is talking about how the label appears to third countries. In this case, we're seeing two names: a) a localised version of the 500-year-old, internationally established name b) another name that someone made up 5 minutes ago.
What was the rationale to do it. Was it in the name of accuracy? Does it further US national interests or have any other benefit?
shock-and-awe presidency. Create just enough chaos over meaningless things to help distract people from higher impact legislation (and to slow down court opposition to them, by keeping the courts busy dealing with other nonsense)
And it has the benefit (depending on perspective) of further weakening the US by harming diplomatic relationships with the two nations with contiguous borders.
Canadian statehood and renaming the Gulf of Mexico were never brought up during the campaign. These actions serve no interest other than to antagonize American allies. They weaken the security posture of the United States, and that is ultimately the point, like soon to be DNI Gabbard.
I personally think ALL of his Canada BS is mental, so, no arguments there. But what right does Mexico have to object to what we call a body of water? He's not renaming what we'll call Mexico itself.
These things serve a real purpose which is to troll the easily offended. In that, it's a huge success, as every breath wasted whingeing about this harmless renaming is one that isn't used to ask good questions like "Why fight a trade war with Canada instead of asking why we even have free trade with a country (Mexico) whose wages are so low that it promotes the gutting of American industry." That would be a good question to ask Trump.
We should have a bilateral trade deal with Canada, which would strengthen both countries, and cut Mexico out of it. But all this has distracted from how poorly he's executing his tariff strategy.
So, no, no national security benefits, no other benefits.
I'm just here hoping that the billionaires can get a little richer while no one's paying attention.
If they were doing something cool with the money, great! But seems like it just gets funneled into yachts and converting perfectly good Hawaiian real estate to doomsday bunkers
At least one guy is/was trying to get to Mars or something, potentially spending us all in the process…
so far as I can tell, nobody here has stated the real reason that I've heard from conservative circles. Which makes sense, probably very few on this site would ever encounter them.
but anyway, what i heard was that former president passed a bunch of EO's banning all future oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. I guess the easiest way to invalidate them was the rename the Gulf.
Vanity of course. Same reason we want Canada and Greenland. Makes us look bigger on a map. Some people think it is because of minerals or national security and so on. But to a narcissist, vanity trumps everything.
Red meat for Trump’s base.
> each country clearly has the right to call international water bodies whatever they want
Sure, but the USA has no more right than any other country to enforce its name on the rest of us, and no right at all to enforce a name for space it does not own.
> If anyone has an argument that I'm missing something in this assessment, I'm happy to listen.
Hi, British person here. Yeah, we have a bit of, ahem, experience, of showing up to places and just changing place names and stuff because "it's just better that way... according to us". Generally speaking, people didn't like it. Factor in the statements about taking over Canada/Greenland/Palestine/Panama for USA's own personal gains, regardless of whether they are negotiating positions or not, and it sure seems similar to what we used to do "back in the day". You didn't like it when we did it to you. I'm not surprised other people aren't liking it when it either is being done by the USA, or even just appears to be being done as a result of some "negotiating position".
> I doubt any Mexican ever felt the old name was inappropriate.
There's at least one Mexican who believes the old name was appropriate. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/cvg6gndgl1ro
> it's obviously arbitrary
If it's arbitrary, why is there a need to change it in the first place? it doesn't matter. it's a body of water. who cares what the name is. we could call it 75928ajfh3845.
so why the need to change it in the first place? (cough see first point cough)
Note: I'm not making any defense of the idiotic Canada/Greenland stuff. I don't approve of it and I won't defend it.
> showing up to places and just changing place names and stuff because
> You didn't like it when we did it to you.
My whole argument was only that international waters between multiple countries is a special case where nobody can claim to be the "rightful" namers, except maybe for an argument that say, Australia or Japan couldn't be taken seriously at naming the Gulf since it doesn't touch any of them.
My point was only that it's a troll that we shouldn't care about.
We should care that we're being trolled by .... * the POTUS *
> since it doesn't touch any of them
I mean, technically, ...
>But because Trump did it, some Americans find this inherently problematic,
It's not "because Trump did it".
It's very unusual for geographic place names to be renamed at the whim of a single politician. It's extremely unusual for it to happen by fiat, so quickly. It's absolutely unheard of for a feature so large, and shared by more than one country, to be renamed in this way in the modern era.
Wasn’t it Obama who renamed Mt. McKinley by fiat after 100 years, also for political reasons? This is no more important than that decision. Both Presidents had the authority. And while the Gulf itself is shared, there’s no reason both countries automatically call it the same thing. After all, the name actually used by Mexico is in Spanish anyway.
> The name of the highest mountain in North America became a subject of dispute in 1975, when the Alaska Legislature asked the U.S. federal government to officially change its name from "Mount McKinley" to "Denali".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denali%E2%80%93Mount_McKinley_...
Excellent example of what a typical high profile name change looks like: the culmination of decades of effort in renaming. Not a few weeks.
Besides already being the original indigenous name for the mountain, "Denali" was also the name already in use by many locals and outdoor enthusiasts elsewhere. It was already the name officially used by the Alaska state government, and the state had formally requested the federal government do that same way back in the 70s. Accepting that request is far from changing the name "by fiat" – especially not to a newly invented name that no one was using or asking for.
And that's before you even get into the difference between choosing a name out of respect for an original indigenous name vs. an intentionally jingoistic and self-aggrandizing name chosen to represent a new area of imperial possessiveness.
> intentionally jingoistic and self-aggrandizing name chosen to represent a new area of imperial possessiveness.
It already had such a name, just one probably named by Mexico if I had to guess.
Considering the word "Mexico" comes from the indigenous people of the region while "America" was a name brought by European colonists... I'm not sure you can really say both of those share the same air of imperial possessiveness.
I hate it, it represents the ugly stupid jingoism of the times … but it is the “official” name now, so I can hardly fault Google for updating the name. Myself, I’m calling it the Gulf of Fuck Trump, but a lot of things are going to get that name in my house.
I won't say what I've named after certain regimes, but it involves dietary fiber.
> because Trump did it, some Americans find this inherently problematic
Paired with the tariffs on Mexico and Canada, I think it’s more a reaction to what it says about America’s view towards its neighbours.
American power is overwhelming. Theoretically, it should have been balanced by now. It hasn’t because we’ve been a good steward of our alliances. “Gulf of America,” Mare Nostrum; at what point does it become rational for Mexico to seek a security guarantor against America?
“Speak softly, and carry a big stick.” Xi forgot the first part and may have squandered what ought to have been China’s century on account of it. The pushback to a needlessly-provocative imperialesque renaming is American society doing what China’s couldn’t.
(Broadly, I agree with your point. A lot of people are perpetually on Defcon 1. The renaming is dumb. But it isn’t going to undermine America.)