FWIW I would ban all motor sports, seriously what do we need them for?
Talk about a waste of things.
One annoying thing I always hear from the anti-SUV crowd is that “oh you’re excused cause you might need it but ALL OF THEM DON’T!”.
It’s simply ridiculous because you have no idea what their lifestyle is like, and you’re making blanket assertions, maybe they went to the store in their SUV one day, and towed a trailer the other day, I wonder which day you saw them, and unfairly characterized them?
Do you really need that computer you’re posting on? You do know that the factories that made it were probly powered by a mixture of polluting coal factories and other power sources. By leaving it on you’re getting power from the companies that produce it, encouraging pollutants to be burned and destroy the atmosphere.
The arguement that we ultimately don’t “need” anything is really friggin stupid and hypocritical.
I posted a response to this before. Taking need up to life and death choices, we ‘need’ very few things. Shelter, water, food. This type of argument detracts from the few real anti-SUV positions that exist. And frankly, is grasping at straws.
In 1991, I was laid off. I looked for work for 6 months before I found my current job. I had a dog at the time (she passed in August).
I was offered a perfect job. I choose to take it. I could have abandoned my dog, or buy this house. Would you like to challenge my choice? Better do it in the Pit.
Heh. Which is not nearly as bad as the anti-SUV’s folks mantra - “but do you really need it, will you die without it”. It’s a completely ridiculous argument.
Most anti-SUV folks at least admit that if you have a use for your SUV (the people I know do), they have no problem with it. What world would you like to live in - One where lifestyle choices are made for you, or one where you can make them yourself.
IMHO, the “It’s not need, it’s your lifestyle choice argument”, when taken to this extreme, smacks of envy, and says quite a bit about the anti-SUV crowd.
My responsibility is first, to myself(1). Then to my Wife(2). Then to the rest or our family(3). Everyone else is fourth.
I cannot perform (2) if I don’t fulfill (1). I can’t do (3), If I don’t do (1) and (2). I cannot do the fourth unless I take care of one, two and three.
You can call it need, responsibility or want. I make choices. Some are easier than others. Buying a vehicle that does what I need it to is one of the easiest choices I make.
I’m not a fan. But, motor sports push the envelope. They provide much of the technology that is used in every day cars.
Aside from entertainment, this is the place that big and small automakers can and do work the designs to the ultimate extreme.
Many races, or most, limit the amount of fuel you can use, and the size of the engine.
I imagine someone will be along to fill in the blanks, but motor sports have a tremendous amount of trickle down into everyday cars.
If everyone was perfectly happy with a 1980 Honda Civic, that’s what we would all be driving.
You are very right. I don’t have enough information about your life. That’s true. But what I do know is that ALL americans live a wasteful life. In general and I say this as an American. You can say that “hypothetically” I couldn’t know that, but I bet you don’t recycle, and you don’t preserve electricity. Its okay. i don’t care if you don’t. But just don’t give me this bullshit about need. Thats what gets me. Just say that you don’t give a fuck about conservation of resources. Its your right to not care I could live on the top of Kilamanjaro. Then I would need an SUV to live, most likely. If you don’t care just say so, but don’t act like you have no choice to live wastefully. Again I say its your choice as an American to live a wasteful life, but just don’t feed me bullshit.
Honestly do you really need to live? I mean, it’s not like you’re doing anything special, you should just stop eating, you don’t really need to eat anything, stop being so damn wasteful.
Oh and don’t be such a blanket thrower, my family recycles everything and we preserve electricity. Yep, we have a Ford Excursion because we’re all tall, and transport a lot of things, I’m sure we could get by with a bunch of extra cars, instead of using one that can do many things, but it just isn’t that convenient. Can you show me another car that can go up high mountains carrying 8 large passangers for a long period of time (6+ hours) and tow a trailer? Does it get 15-20 MPG?
About the whole need thing, yes, we choose to need things, it’s just a way of speaking. I choose to live, therefore I “need” to eat, I “need” to drink water.
Wow, I never knew those homeless guys in cardboard boxes were living wasteful lives. But I guess it’s time for EVERYONE to give up SOMETHING!!!
Who gets to pick? Me? Or you?
No. I don’t need a computer. Nor have I ever come to the SDMB defending it as a need. But if we were compare it to an SUV, which is scarcely relevant comparison anyway, I’d go with the SUV being the larger resource hog.
So what’s your point?
This is a pattern that we’ve seen before, and change is already on the way.
1)People buy large cars for their families and perceived safety and hauling ability.
- Large public backlash against size and lack of actual safety attach a stigma to large vehicles.
3)Automakers respond by producing smaller, safer, more fuel efficient vehicles that also haul less stuff.
4)People get by, but reminisce about when you could haul 6 bodies, 3 boats, and a small house in their car
5)Automakers respond, selling large, gas guzzling vehicles to people again.
And now, we are on that opposite swing again, the SUV crowd, with SUV’s being essentially to Americans what our big station wagons were, except now they are trucks so as to allow them to skirt gov’t regulations that apply to cars. Fact is it is less in the automakers favor to build large, less fuel efficient cars, simply due to things like CAFE standards, which would then lower their averages. Factor in the higher profits of SUV’s, and you end up with your current craze.
Before trying to regulate SUV’s out of the picture, one must understand that SUV’s were regulated into existence as family haulers. Harsher fuel economy regulations on cars meant that it became less economically feasible for the automakers to build large cars, so they just aimed for a loophole and said “Hey, buy a truck instead, it does everything that your old car back in the 60’s and 70’s did, and looks cooler than a minivan!”
The balance has already tipped though, Crossover SUV’s (which are either lifted station wagons, or minivans wearing more rugged styling with their sliding doors removed) are starting to populate the streets, and larger cars that are more fuel efficient than SUV’s, but still haul all of your stuff while looking cool. See cars like the V-8 powered, RWD Dodge Magnum station wagon (designed to make people feel like they are driving in the safety of a Panzer), or the upcoming Ford 500, which boasts the ability to fit 8 golf bags in it’s massive trunk, has more legroom in the rear than a Crown Vic, all while being a foot shorter and coming with optional AWD.
Since public opinion of SUV’s, and the technical ability of the automakers to build a large sedan/wagon that can hit 30 MPG while having more than 150hp have come together, expect the cars to get bigger.
Detroit sold us on a society that needs bigger cars. With the US a large, spread out country with lots of highways in between, to a degree we do need larger cars. Europe’s density allows people to get by with commuter cars, which tend to be less capable than a larger car when it comes to highway comfort.
Do I drive an SUV? No. I can understand why people would, but I don’t like driving while being so far away from the road. I’m also one of those people who prefers to be in a car when driving in the snow and ice too.
Why?
It’s a lot harder to regain control of a 5,000 lb vehicle skidding out of control than it is a 3,000 lb vehicle doing the same.
Modro – Good post. Yep, crossovers are coming. I just hope that SUV’s with ground clearance and low-range will still be available. Well I guess they will always be available, I just hope I am allowed some choice of models.
Jesus Merkwurdigliebe, get off your high horse. I do happen to recycle, and I live in a Solar House.
The only bullshit going on around here is the anti-SUV argument about need. Sort of like Clinton and what “is” “is”. Chrimoney, if you can’t come up with a better argument other than “move, then you won’t need an SUV”. Or, “Sell your boat” there really isn’t much point in responding.
I know what I need. You do not. I know this because I am able to make non-biased observations and come to justifiable conclusions.
I’m just going to point out that the more energy there is, the more uses people find for it. That’s the fallacy of the 200mpg carburator story. Speaking as someone who does work in automotive design, I can tell you that the major car companies are intensely interested in alternative fuels. There’s just one problem.
Gasoline is amazingly efficient. There’s more darn power per gallon in gasoline than just about anything else, it’s reasonably nontoxic to the skin, it’s easily transported, and easily to fill up with. And… fairly nonpolluting, these days. Some cars burn quite amazingly clean.
Whatever gasoline’s successor is, it has to meet or beat all of the existing things gasoline is good at. That’s darn hard to do. Right now, the best odds are on fuel cell technology, but it’s still not quite good enough.
For the record, 2004 Toyota Matrix XRS. 28 MPG observed, four door, hauls like a SUV, drives like a sportscar. It’s a happy little station wagon.
Futile, since you readily admit you don’t need a computer, then why don’t you get rid of it right now. It’s using up electricity, which for the most part requires burning fossil fuels, as well as the energy that went into the manufacturing and transportation process to get it to your home. Not to mention all the toxic, unsafe for the environment metals and chemicals that are used in the chips and whatnot. Seems kinda wasteful to me…
The point is, you really don’t NEED anything. The doctor could have just taken you and thrown you into the gutter after you were born and left you to die. That way, you would not be using up all these precious resources and energy by being alive today. If we all barely scraped by using the smallest amount of resources and energy possible, we would all be living pretty miserable lives. If I have the resources at my disposal, both monetary and energy-wise, then I’m going to use them to make my life easier, more enjoyable, and generally more fulfulling. Which is something I don’t want you, the government, or anyone else interfering with.
Meh. I’m car-free so I don’t sweat it much. But like it or not or society runs on gas.
Don’t bet on hemp, it already loses out in energy per hectare to corn. And corn based fuels are heavily subsidized. Furthermore, I did a calculation a couple of months back and noted that a very, very large portion of our crops (danm near all our corn and then some) would be needed to make all the fuel we consume. That calculation ignored the logistics problems too.
My money would be on Shale Oil. There are HUMUNGOUS reserves of this stuff, they dwarf the crude oil reserves. Trouble is that you have to mine the stuff, and cracking it is harder. So it will be more expensive, but paying $3.50 a gallon is better than letting the economy grind to a halt. Not like Europeans aren’t paying that amount already (and then some).
Another benefit of Shale Oil is that we have very decent reserves here in the US. But another problem is that cracking it leaves an unusable solid waste product that needs to be disposed of.
Okay so it can be gotten without the risk of another Exxon, then it does not seem anymore objectionable to me then oil anywhere else. The over sea transportation required for mining under water had me worried.
No, any oil coming from Alaska, whether it be from offshore deposits like those of the Cook Inlet or from onshore like Prudhoe Bay and ANWR, are stll going to risk another Exxon Valdez accident since all of it is shipped via pipeline to the Valdez terminal for tanker loading and sealane transportation to the lower 48 and the far east. As mentioned, that’s a delivery problem completely independant of prospect/recovery location.
Offshore deposits don’t require overseas transportation elsewhere either, although that occasionally may be the method used. A system of pipelines and gathering stations permeate many offshore fields (much of the Gulf of Mexico) and deliver the petrocarbons to the refineries.
Onshore/offshore deposits and supertanker/pipeline transportation have no set associations, other than boating out onshore deposits isn’t economically or mentally feasable.
Because I want it. I don’t deny I want it and I don’t pretend there is any other excuse for having it.
And there lies the difference.
I want my SUV to. I want it because it is the most practical vehicle I can own.
It allows me to do the things I need to do. That’s why I bought it. When I look for a vehicle, I ask myself - what do I need? So, I consider that I need my SUV.
That’s not that hard to understand. Yet some of the anti-SUV folks (in this thread) would suggest moving and getting a different job. Do any of you folks see how irrational that makes your argument?
The meaning and intent of the words ‘choice’ and ‘need’ are being twisted to such an extent that they no longer have meaning in this thread.
Twisting the meaning of these words is a lame, desperate attempt to try to discredit SUV owners. It demonstrates that some of the anti-SUV folks argument is emotional, not logical. The anti-SUV folks have no more ammunition, so it comes down to semantics of simple words. We may as well debate about the best color, or sandwich. Since those are choices as well.
As lieu noted, there is some environmental risk inherent in the transportation of produced hydrocarbons. The oil and gas business was very different in its approach to environmental concerns when it began, and it was different in that regard before the Valdez crack-up.
Much effort is made, that wasn’t previously, to miinimize the risks. And we’re very good at producing and transporting the stuff these days. Some risk, of course, remains. IMHE, the benefits of developing Alaskan reserves far, far outweigh the risks.