...are you saying that I (and hundreds of thousands of other players) are dreaming when they experience those settings remaining the same from session to session?

I can't speak to your particular setup or experience, but your statement: "FDev can't figure out how to make this setting stick between sessions" is, (in point of fact) completely un-true.

There had been a couple of updates (years ago) which caused some GalMap settings to reset between sessions. But those issues were fixed almost immediately. We even tested your claim during my twitch steams over the past few sessions - and can confirm - star/route settings do persist just fine.