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- Hacker News
- The clown show will continue until geopolitical goals are achieved.
- This is an improvement on starting a war on oil markets and getting I've-lost-count-how-many innocents killed in the Middle East. So in many ways this could be considered a step up for US foreign policy. If Trump can stick to low-stakes pettiness that would be a real win for us all.by roenxi
- He's doing this as well as all the wars.by Steve16384
- What high stakes stuff stopped when he did this, specifically?
- This feels like the right-wing equivalent of pronoun policing lol. Crazy how the extremes of the political spectrum are so close to each other (like a horseshoe), yet hate each other so much. Doesn't seem like the polarization is near to ratcheting down though, at least not by judging from the comments in this thread.by bufbupa
- “If you can be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you can be told what to say or think.”by morkalork
- > This feels like the right-wing equivalent of pronoun policing lol.
Nothing about it feels "right-wing" at all -- actual conservatism is all about maintaining continuity and avoiding forced changes to traditional conventions and established social norms.
Trump and his followers are a competing faction of the extreme left, as should be readily evidenced by his economic policies, and it's not at all surprising that he shares the same mentality of inserting political shibboleths into mundane aspects of everyday life.
by Gormo - How much till Planet America?by gmuslera
- Simple policy (Apple, Google, etc, can adopt):
Changes to major landmarks require a 5-year grace period (wait 5 years).
by JKCalhoun - I am Italian, and we get quite pissed when the government issues executive orders (the head of state can't do it), although it happens relatively often. I live in France, and when the president resorted to using them it felt like he was threatening democracy.
The US mechanism seems the strongest of the three, and people have considered this a normal thing in a democracy long enough for this to happen.
by butokai - Executive Orders really aren't that powerful. They can only command the executive branch to do something and are not legislature at all. Trump is certainly proving you can get pretty creative with enforcement to enact terror though, I'd agree to that.by bakies
- See: https://www.openstreetmap.org/relation/1206310
name:en=Lake Ontario
vs.
official_name:en-US=Lake America
by karussell - Makes me wonder, has North Korea or Iran made an equivalent declaration about naming the USA "사탄의 겨드랑이" or "زیر بغل شیطان"?
(Google Translate from "Satan's armpit").
I mean, if temper tantrums by the supreme executive are allowed and all.
by ben_w - Not sure it's really valid to call this "official". Trump can issue an executive order to the USGS to change names in the GNIS, but the use of USGS/GNIS data as the "official" name of things outside of the federal executive's own activities is itself just a matter of convention.by Gormo
- Lots of countries change the names of things, even countries themselves.. Bombay to Mumbai, Ceylon to Sri Lanka, Turkey to Türkiye etc. Yes, some of those are specific to a name in a particular language and all have precedents rather than being entirely new. However, it is a precedent for governments deciding the names of things.
This, as its just made up, reminds me a lot of political/nationalist renaming of things like roads which is very common in parts of South Asia.
by graemep - Worse than made up, it's the sort of thing an angry 6 year old would come up with.
Totally unserious behavior, and it's ridiculous that Americans and the rest of the world have to put up with this nonsense.
A small number of Republican representatives and senators could end it all today by publicly supporting impeachment.
- I feel like instances of this kind of decision (also from your examples) fall into two groups: replacing names from colonization with local names, and... Second group name left as an exercise to the reader.by butokai
- Attempts to rename a body of water that is shared by two countries with the name of one of the countries, unilaterally, is 1) impolite, 2) pretty rare, and 3) completely ineffective and just makes you look weak.by AnimalMuppet
- Another HN thread made be look up a place name to find out where it was. This is somewhere I have actually been to!by graemep
- > However, it is a precedent for governments deciding the names of things.
??? that's not true at all
> reminds me a lot of political/nationalist renaming of things like roads which is very common in parts of South Asia
Isn't that very common in... Canada?
It's not like the current US admin is the first in North America to decide to rename things for political reasons.Ottawa, Sir John A. Macdonald Parkway -> Kichi Zībī Mīkan (2023) Winnipeg, Bishop Grandin Boulevard -> Abinojii Mikanah (2023–24) Halifax, Cornwallis Street -> Nora Bernard Street (2023) Montreal, Rue Amherst -> Rue Atateken (2019) Vancouver, Trutch Street -> šxʷməθkʷəy̓əmasəm Street (2025) Victoria, Trutch Street -> Su'it Street (2022) Calgary, Langevin Bridge -> Reconciliation Bridge (2017)by simonsarris - Attempts by political states to attempt to nationalize the vernacular should be ignored and rejected in all cases.
The examples you're citing are less ridiculous than these recent stunts, but still should be considered in terms of their intentions and effects.
What's the motivation for trying to detatch the name of something from its existing understanding and historical context?
Why should the attempts to "rebrand" an entire country or geographical feature made by a government -- a particular instituion within society, usually under the control of one narrow faction in opposition to others -- be respected by the whole of society within that country, let alone by people in foreign countries speaking a different language?
Why should, for example, the Turkish government -- which operates in the Turkish language, where "Türkiye" already was the standard name of their country -- be respected in its attempt to get English speakers to write the country's name in orthography that is not readily pronounceable by English speakers, and using characters that aren't standard on our keyboard layouts?
by Gormo - Pretty sure lake Ontario was named after the native people who lived on its shores, not after the Canadian province. I suppose, lake Michigan and lake Huron are the same. Perhaps we can name them all lake America.by fallingfrog
- Actually for "lake Michigan and lake Huron" I am pushing for Canada to rename it to: "Greater Lake of Obama Nobel Prize" :)by jmclnx
- The United Lakes of Americaby layer8
- It comes from a Iroquoian word meaning "great lake."
And yeah, the name predates the Canadian province.
by astura - As a Canadian, I have to admit: Trump is very, very talented in manipulating the discourse in the public arena.
Gradually, he is steering away the public discussion from what matters: the Iran War, inflation, the abusive police state created by ICE, the rise of China and weakening of international standing of US... We're making a lot of noise about what doesn't matter: what's the name of a lake.
It is like when I admonish my 4 year old son about something he did and he replies: "Look over there!". I think the name of this trick is "non-sequitur".
And you know the funniest part? It has been working for years and will keep working! Remember the "immigrants eat our cats and dogs"?
This low-level debating is exactly what Neil Postman described in "Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business", in 1985. The entertainment industry makes everyone stupid.
by diego_moita - >And you know the funniest part? It has been working for years and will keep!
On Canadians too. Remember what party was leading the polls before Trump started mean tweets?
by drstewart - > Gradually, he is steering away the public discussion from what matters: the Iran War, inflation, the abusive police state created by ICE, the rise of China and weakening of international standing of US...
The Epstein Files.
by throw0101a - I apologize to my Canadian friends. This is embarrassing.by cebert
- Why not choose to feel patriotic about the decision. It gives us recognition for what we've done with the body of water. Arguably the fact that you feel embarrassed or need to apologize shows the lack of patriotism you feel over the body of water, so I think this new name can help future people feel patriotic over it. There is a lot of power in a name.by charcircuit