I'm riffing off of Amy here. This started as a comment on her post about streamlining the number of acronyms, but I think it can be its own post. Here's how I started:
Ha, I'll believe it when I see it. The problem is that the military can suggest that we eliminate redundant terms, but that's not gonna get people to stop using them! The Army has a collective memory like an elephant.
We moved to Bragg seven years after the grand opening of the new Womack hospital. They turned the old hospital into the inprocessing building. I can't even tell you the official name of this place because everyone calls it "old Womack." It hasn't been the hospital for over a decade, but newcomers show up to the post and people act like they should know which building used to be the hospital!
And it was worse on our post in Germany: people would refer to one building as "the old Shoppette." I finally asked a civilian who had worked on post since the dawn of time, and apparently it hadn't been the Shoppette in like 17 years or something.
Military types are set in their ways. If an acronym once existed, half the people are still going to use it anyway, which will continue to confuse new recruits. And if a building ever at one point used to be something else, it will still be referred to by its old designation. Despite the fact that the population turns over at these places every three or four years, the names stay the same. Twenty years from now, people will still be calling that dilapidated building "old Womack." Heck, maybe someday they'll build a new hospital and Bragg will then have buildings called "old Womack" and "old old Womack."
And the problem is that, as stupid as I think it is, I too call the place "old Womack." I perpetuate the problem.
Encountered this on other installations?
