The president of Mexico on Thursday expressed hope that Google “reconsiders” its decision to change its online maps to reflect U.S. President Donald Trump’s claim that he has the authority to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico.
Shortly after taking office, Trump issued an executive order announcing he was changing the name of the body of water to the Gulf of America.
For U.S. users of Google Maps, the gulf was listed as the Gulf of America as of Thursday. Google, whose CEO attended Trump’s inauguration along with other tech moguls, said last month it has “a long-standing practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources.”
But Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum warned Thursday that her government “will file a civil suit” against Google if it does not revert back to labeling the international body of water the Gulf of Mexico.
This is stupid. Google is doing it with their normal process, labeling the USA as a sensitive country in their system and changing the label only for the sensitive snowflakes. So there is no harm to Mexicans in Mexico.
What sort of damages would she assert anyway? That her country suffers in a significant way from a Google Maps label that can only be seen from the sensitive country? How so?
And if it’s a political move what is she hoping to achieve? Google will never cave to the USA before Mexico, they depend more on their US operations than their Mexican ones. So she can’t achieve anything politically. Does she want to draw even more attention to a losing fight? A losing fight over mere symbolism no less? Why?
The Gulf of America label can be seen worldwide as it’s Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America)
Oh, sorry. You’re right. I was wrong on that point. I didn’t realize it showed the sensitive label in parenthesis to others.
I would maintain the rest of the argument though, with the Mexican (and global) point of view being the more prominently displayed, there is no significant harm, and she doesn’t stand to gain anything from pursuing a civil case, nor politically.
It’s not about harm. It’s about kissing Trump’s ass on something he doesn’t actually get to decide to stay on his good side.
I’m not suggesting she should kiss ass, far be it from me. But I still don’t see a good motive for this move. A civil suit is not going to get her anything, she’s just highlighting Trumps symbolic bullshit even more.
And then when the suit either goes against her or goes for her but results in laughibly low compensation because the measureable harm is not significant, then it will look like a confirmation of the power of the convict in chief.
I was talking about Google kissing Trump’s ass. Which is why this is happening.
It takes an act of congress to rename a domestic post office. Google has taken his executive order and decided it’s true for everyone, at least parenthetically.