I mean I'm sure every country has stuff named after people, but it feels like it's done to the extreme here in the US. Seems like every city has a "Jefferson Street" and a "Washington Avenue". Every school I attended was named after a person. I mentioned in the megathread how my nice local park named after a flower got a name change after a pig got shot near it, so they named it after him.

Just seems like God forbid we have generic names for our roads, schools, parks, bridges, etc. Nope, gotta name it after someone. Even then, it's almost always either a politician, capitalist, or cop. Never like, a good teacher that people liked or otherwise good person except MLK Jr.

I think it's reflective of our hyper-individualized culture. And then there's how everything else that isn't named after a person is "Veterans Memorial", but that's a different discussion.

  • an_engel_on_earth [he/him, they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    tbh I'd like to make the opposite complaint, I think the american street naming system is needlessly depersonalized. In my country every street is named after a public figure and I think that makes it very easy to remember. Where I lived in the states like boston and la it felt very difficult to navigate without a GPS cuz streets were either numbered or have some dumbass name like "pine creek" or plymouth or something else just completely generic. Idk that's just how I feel