So I would be interested to know what counts as a ‘ricer’ - it appears to mean a relatively low/middle range car - but lots of countries make such vehicles, so would it apply to something like a Volkswagen Golf, how about a Renault Clio, or perhaps an older BMW 3 series - these are all cars that have a loyal fanbase that carries out modifications - would these be classed as ‘ricers’?
IIRC it might have come from a couple of things. 1) a derogatory term for Japanese sport bikes from the “Harley crowd” who dismissed them as “rice rockets,” or 2) a derogatory term from American muscle car enthusiasts towards the growing popularity of Japanese sport compacts (e.g. Honda Civic and Acura Integra.) “Rice” was especially targeted towards said sport compacts which had a lot of questionable farkle tacked on such as huge rear wings/spoilers, body kits, cheap/unsafe lowering jobs, etc.
Jacked-up pickup trucks are pretty simple to understand.
It’ just a manifestation of the attitude “I’m bigger than you are and I can push you around any time I want.” Plus the general macho “Bigger = Better” thinking. With a healthy dollop of “In an accident I’m invincible up here; meanwhile my bumper is going to go right through your face. Neener neener!”
For darn sure it IS convenient to drive something taller than most other traffic around; your sight lines are much improved. I’ve never had a jacked-up vehicle, but I did drive full sized Bronco / Blazer / Jimmy type vehicles for years while almost everyone else was driving sedans or compacts. The improved visibility of taller vehicles drove a lot of the popularity of SUVs, Hummers, etc., when they first came out.
Then once 70% of vehicles on the road were ordinary pickups, SUVs, etc., the innate human desire to launch an arms race took over. At least in the over-testosteroned demographic.
Once upon a time “ricer” was used in reference to any vehicle motor vehicle manufactured by a Japanese company. ('Cuz, they run on rice, you see!!! Yuk, yuk, yuk!)
Now, my understanding is that the word is used to describe any vehicle manufactured by an Asian company that has aftermarket upgrades or mods.
Supposedly, “rice” stands for Race Inspired Cosmetic Enhancements. I’m guessing that might be after the fact.
that’s definitely a backronym.
That’s the word I was trying to remember!
Thanks.
On the subject of pickup trucks, modifications that involve lifting only the front – or lifting the front and dropping the back – are just plain ridiculous.
My main issue with them is their owners insisting on driving them around the block like 20 times at 200AM every night.
If they want to waste their money putting a giant wing on the back of their piece of shit FWD 4-banger, that’s their business.
There was a website around the time I was a freshman in college (so around 1998-99) that satirized the “rice boys” and their cars. The author of this website seemed to define “ricer” as a car with purely cosmetic modifications that make no actual performance improvements – huge wing, bad lowering lob, loud exhaust, with a stock engine. Cars that were all show and no go, in other words. That was where I first encountered the term, but I suspect jz78817 is closer to the way it’s most commonly used.
As for lifted trucks, I imagine if you actually go off road a higher suspension can be an advantage. Not that most of these guys actually ever take their shiny trucks off road. But I assume that was the reason behind if – they want to look like they could go off road, if they wanted to.
I was looking to see if similar levels of cars from other countries would be included or have some similar derogatory monicker - seems to me that it is only applied to a particular region of the world which coincidentally thought of as being a large producer and consumer of rice - given that it is a derogatory comment based upon a regional stereotype, that to me is lazy racism. Resolved ‘ricer’ is a derogatory racist term applied to the car products of a region , race or creed. I would have thought Dopers were better than this, maybe they could have come up with a better term - I mean, really what you are actually saying is not that these cars fail to meet some American standard - you are saying way more than that.
tbf the OP is not American.