Yes, absolutely. And if a certain General Hospital in San Francisco were not named after the tackiest of billionaires then maybe it could honor, I dunno, Hugh Toland?
Instead of dedicating most of its "about us" page to shining a youngish oligarch's already controversial reputation?
When I moved to SF and saw signs for Zuckerberg SF General Hospital, I thought to myself "Surely, that must be just a coincidence and it's not named after Mark Zuckerberg."
I'm not sure what the actual name of the phenomenon is but I've heard it call 'wife-name-last name' syndrome.
Basically, the uber rich want to be seen as something more than just money. Guys like Anschutz and whatnot. There seems to be a pattern where they get a new shiny glass and steel building with a bunch of sick kids in it, and then they put the wife's name, an ampersand, his name, and the last name in big 3-D letters on the side. Likely it's a tax writeoff.
Also, not to be too cynical, but it's not a bad thing overall. The money could be sitting in the Caymans afterall.
You can take $1 and pay the taxes on it and end up with $0.60. Or you can give away a dollar and not have to pay $0.40 in taxes. But you still gave away a dollar, so you're sixty cents in the hole.
> or hidden away as art investments inside of storage containers.
That doesn't make any sense. They pay for that art, and the money goes to the people that owned the art previously. Either they stick it into an account in the Caymans, or a regular/investment account, or they just have it available, but purchasing assets with it is not money hidden away as an art investment.
A significant amount of wealth may be in assets, but that's the same for most people that's aren't poor (i.e. that own a house). The money used to purchase those assets is still circulating though.
Not doubting you for a second[0], but I didn’t see anything anti-Semitic in that post, so am I missing some internet meme or American cultural reference?
[0] Footnote in case it is necessary: antisemitism must be stamped out wherever it is found.
Many delis are Jewish. He's saying that whenever he sees buildings named after people, he's in a Jewish neighborhood. In context, it plays into nasty stereotypes about Jews being obsessed with money.
I don't think that was the meaning of the gp post. If you're traveling, names on buildings or businesses tend to reflect the population of that area. Thus, if you're in an area with a large Jewish population, you can expect to see buildings/businesses that reflect that too.
Antisemitism is a real issue, but this is just not it.
I am Jewish by the way, if that matters.
The post didn't say "when I see a lot of jewish names on buildings I know I'm in a Jewish neighborhood," it said "when I'm in a neighborhood with a lot of names on the buildings I know I'm in a Jewish neighborhood" (both paraphrases to keep the dogwhistly deli->jewish link clear). The implication that Jewish people are uniquely interested in showing off their money and status through naming rights donations seems pretty blatant to me.
Ok, interesting. I would usually be willing to give much more benefit of the doubt, but given how unnecessary the comment seemed to the rest of the post, I guess the obvious conclusion is a dog whistle.
Wow, okay, that's not the response I expected to come back to. I'm trying to understand how you interpreted my comment that way.
To be clear, there were no intentional dog-whistles in my post. I thought I was saying something strongly positive, about a phenomenon which I've observed and have great admiration for.
However, your response and the thread that followed, reveals some things I clearly didn't consider. There is surely a lot of anti-semitism out there, and that my comment was mistaken for it, I think shows how pervasive it must be. And it's important, as has been said, to call it out wherever it appears. And I guess that means looking for even tiny hints of double meanings. Which, logically, includes meanings that someone may not be cognizant of when speaking with one meaning in mind. I honestly thought I was being "cute" with the deli thing.
I'm astonished and saddened to see a well-intentioned comment identified as just the opposite. I didn't mean to play into any negative stereotypes about money -- I didn't say anything about being obsessed with money, and if I got near it at all, I was talking about being recognized for _doing good things_ (with money), and how this cultural pattern does that. I think that's pretty clearly positive! (The whole point of the article, after all, was that more people with money should be committed to doing good things with it. Money's a pretty unavoidable aspect here.) But clearly my comment exists in a world where a lot of terrible things also exist, and I guess I can see how it could be mistaken for a vague hint towards one of those terrible things.
Especially on the internet, where tone and nuance are notoriously tricky.
So I'm honestly looking for input. Is there a better way to say what I was trying to say?
Regardless, I'm sorry that you saw something negative in what I said. I'm even more sorry that anti-semitism is so insidious that you had reason to look for negative interpretations in the first place. That sucks.
Many delis are Jewish. He's saying that whenever he sees buildings named after people, he's in a Jewish neighborhood. In context, it plays into nasty stereotypes about Jews being obsessed with money.
To be fair, cultures have characteristics and people should be permitted by their peers to talk about those characteristics in a thoughtful way.
I'm not familiar with what the other guy is describing, nor do I have any opinion on this particular topic. I'm just saying that "people of X culture tend to do Y thing more than the average person" is not in itself a hateful or disrespectful comment.
I think you're reading into it too much. He specifically said he thinks it is not a bad thing. In your opinion, is it possible to say anything about your culture without being anti-semitic?
The type of people driven to become super rich aren't usually the types to be satisfied with what they have, otherwise they would have stopped well before they got as wealthy as they did.
I think it's a cultural thing. In some countries it would be considered very poor taste for someone to pay to get their name on a building. If it's an academic building, I think it makes more sense to name it after someone who contributed to the field. Or it could simply be the "CS building".
> If it's an academic building, I think it makes more sense to name it after someone who contributed to the field. Or it could simply be the "CS building".
And sometimes the legacy is just that the world is a better place thanks to their efforts, and has not much to do with having your name all over the place.
You might care about your legacy while you're alive, but after you're dead, there is no you, so it's not possible for you to care about your legacy after you're dead.
John Harvard and Elihu Yale seemed to have avoided this fate. And Leland Stanford had the same name as his father, so maybe founding a university is the way to go here?
Because naming rights have a very real, tangible value and you can sell them to further your mission?
I guess Jerry Jones could have named his stadium "Dallas Cowboys Football Stadium" and that would have certainly told you everything you need to know. But instead he called it AT&T stadium and pockets $400 million. Both Jones and AT&T are happy. Same principle applies to colleges and hospitals.
Because they needed to raise a lot of money to build the new campus.[0] SF Children's was at the old location, Benioff Children's is at the new location.
Or, maybe, when we realize our society is set up to increase billionaires' fortunes, not happiness or well-being, his example of Giving While Living will become a standard for the very rich, and everyone will know his name. Why not make the word for a selfless act a Feeney?
Maybe we could be inspired by the soviets. IE a theater where musicals and plays are put on is called: House of Culture of State Ball-Bearing Plant Number 1
politicians do it all the time and sometimes they don't even wait till who they name it after has passed.
I would much rather someone have something named for them who donated their own wealth than a political party go around stamping their members names everywhere.
I would much rather have the naming of government buildings to be never named for any politician.
Feeney seems like an awesome guy but sadly in 100 years nobody will know his name!