As long as it's not a photo showing them or the loved ones, or a piece of art they created themselves. 'Meme culture' mostly seems to reject licences because it's a bother, not out of idealism.
That's a perfectly valid reason. Requiring a license for everything is pathological. Unlimited license for anything is also problematic, as you point out, but there should be some principle of balance between moral obligation and administrative overhead.
We already have corporate entities that claim ownership of particular words or colors, not because they invented them but because they laid claim to them and want to extract rents therefrom. Branding serves a rational commercial function, but when taken to extremes it begins a resemble a form of psychic territorial aggression.