Or, you could choose not to go to London, y’know? No one NEEDS to vacation abroad. Right? I think we should start sneering at anyone who flies a long distance for a vacation, because they are wrecking the planet with their greedy desires. And it’s not necessary. Stay home and volunteer at a recycling center, for God’s sake. You would if you cared about the planet.
Even if I need it to haul around my massive penis?
You do realize that SUV drivers are just as likely to be women as they are men. Just exactly what kind of macho image do you think the women are trying to project?
That said, your argument was that SUVs block sight lines, take up more parking spaces and are more deadly in an accident.
Correct me if I am wrong, but what I really hear you saying is that you just don’t like SUVs and their stereotyped drivers, therefore, they should all be eliminated in favor of whatever it is that YOU deem acceptable.
Which was why I picked motorcycles as my example. It’s no more fair to say that everyone who is riding a motorcycle is doing so to project a macho image than it is to say that everyone who is driving an SUV is doing so to project a macho image.
How are all those CCTVs doing for you?
I bought a nice looking cruiser. I am also wearing a huge jacket and helmet, carrying a messenger bag, in Arizona summer. There’s like 20 other people in Phoenix actually using helmets. I know I don’t look cool.
Needed a new vehicle, motorcycles are light on gas usage, and they’re fun to ride. Screw macho.
This is what you need, baby!
One of these days … I’m moving up there with y’all.
I flown through London about 10 times in the last 16 years. Each of those times it was for business, not a vacation. I didn’t have much choice in the matter, my job required it. So like I said show me a road map where I could have driven to Sweden from LA, and I will be happy to do so.
It may *cost *you more but it certainly doesn’t hurt you more. Europeans seem to be able to pay 3 or 4 times what Americans pay for gas (while of course bitching and moaning to some degree) and yet have some understanding of *why *the price is so high; of why huge fuel taxes can be and are beneficial; of why it is in their country’s/planet’s best interest to use less gasoline.
Americans, OTOH, are deeply shocked at their high gas prices. Many Americans feel that oil should be provided to the USA at a discounted rate or even free-of-charge because we are the Shining Beacon of Democracy, or God’s Favorite Nation, or because USA #1!!!, (or whatever).
Some wonder, “why the Hell do we pay all those taxes for a first-rate military if we won’t even invade and occupy all the Gulf States so we can have cheap gas?”
So while your gasoline costs $9/gallon and ours is only $4/gallon, it doesn’t actually hurt you nearly as much as it does us. Because you guys enjoy widespread acceptance–even admiration–of intelligence and critical thinking (we do too, but only when it can be proven to have direct and immediate economic or military benefit for us, and even then it is derided and mistrusted) and that helps you understand the “dark mysteries” of global economics; that helps you folks understand that the same rules that apply to everyone else in the world apply to you as well.
With knowledge comes power. In this case, the palliative power of rationality.
Yes. I hate them because my car is small (though the mileage still sucks) and I can’t see around them on the highway. When they get behind me if have headlights filling my back window. That’s why I hate them.
So, you drive facing backwards, or do you just wrap it around your torso so you can feed it into the gloryhole you’ve cut between the cab and cargo box? 'Cause, really, that bending it probably isn’t good for you 
As I said, a truly retarded argument unless you’re arguing that the SUV driver gives up all his other gas-consuming luxuries in favor of the SUV. Me, I’d be guessing the kind of person who can afford a 10 or 15 mpg SUV and be damned-to-expenses is gonna be taking a whole lot of more foreign trips than I am.
But let’s examine your retarded argument:
a. Going to London. But one which is taken using the most efficient form of transport available. A form of transport which, because it’s carrying cargo and business passengers, is going to be going there anyway. (The more passengers, the lower the fuel cost/passenger.)
b. Driving an SUV. A luxury. But one which, for many people, there are many, many reasonably alternatives, many of which are cheaper, better for the environment, and more considerate of those sharing the road with the driver.
So, I dunno. I’m leaning towards (b) being a rationalizing, inconsiderate, selfish dickhead. But that’s just me.
I Love Me, Vol. I
Perhaps instead of just bitching about other peoples lifestyles. And commenting on what they need or not, you could do a little research and post a thread about a possible solution. Ehhh? Or do you just want to bitch.
I drive an SUV and I’ve started three threads about alternative engine tech in the last three months. I haven’t seen you in any of them.
I’ll take looking smart over looking cool any day. Good for you. Now just don’t rev your engine in front of my house and we’ll get along just fine. 
“I"m a closeted dyke with major penis envy”?
Well, as you know this is a Pit thread. It’s purpose to call out some owners of SUVs. Specifically the ones who are completely clueless and don’t understand how their chosen lifestyle could have any effect on anyone else. That’s who I’m bitching about. If you are one of those people then I understand why you would be pissed–it hurts to be called a selfish tool especially if you are one.
If you are not one of those people then this Pitting wasn’t directed at you.
As for those threads you’ve started, I’m actually quite interested in alternative engine tech. It’s fascinating to imagine what resources besides oil the selfish knuckle-draggers will heedlessly waste next!!
Why do people persist in this notion that driving an SUV is an example of projecting machismo or an aura of wealth? Until just very recently, SUV’s were very popular because they were affordable (let’s leave the Escalade and Hummer out, as they ARE the aforementioned outliers of wealth projection/mere shiny toys) and so was gasoline. People have families, some live in inclement weather areas where SUV’s can negotiate the snow and rain better than your average car.
I have a minivan…am I next now? It is the size and weight of a large-ish SUV. It doesn’t have a V8, but the 227hp V6 in a 4200lb vehicle only nets me about 22mpg at best on the interstates. There’s five of us, we need a utility vehicle for camping, long trips, dropping the kids off wherever…there isn’t all that much difference between my Caravan and a typical SUV.
I don’t get the outrage, seriously. Hummers I can see, Escalades, too. But even my neighbor, whom has five kids, has a Suburban. Those things are HUGE and guzzle gas…but it’s for seven people!
Jeebus.
No fucking way! I love my cellular-based wireless broadband access, and I’m on it right now. I’d sooner give up my land DSL line.
See this bothers me, and I don’t even own an SUV.
I even agree with the general feeling of SUV’s being the poster child for overconsumption.
However, this “parking space” argument is nonsense, I drive a minivan and I take up just as much space as an SUV parking, and parking spaces everywhere I’ve been across this country accomodate MG’s and SUV’s equally well. Perhaps drivers of these things are to blame for not knowing how to park.
The sight line thing bothers me too, because there are far, FAR more 18 wheelers out there than there will ever be SUV’s, and people have to deal with them because they are necessary to our economy. Some people really do need their SUV’s, because they were purchased a couple years ago, gas was relatively cheap, they have kids and a lot of stuff and it wasn’t an issue. Not to mention that many are tied into loans on their SUV’s and they “need” them because they are still “paying for them”.
As for the “I drive a Civic and I have a problem with SUV’s because if one hits me I am going to die” argument, well…I also drive a Scion Xa, one of the tiniest cars out there and I worry about this too, while I fill up my 10 gallon tank for $40 and go almost 400 miles on it. In fact, I worry all the way to the bank.
It doesn’t really matter what you drive, accidents happen and you may die. Be a better, more aware driver.
I have no problems with large families having large vehicles. I have a friend with four small kids. Try finding a car in which you can put six people, three of whom legally require car seats, with any degree of comfort. But they also have a smaller, older car for him to drive to work.
The worst example of the OP sort of thing, beyond my mother, who I posted about on page 1 of this thread, was a former friend’s wife who drove 42 miles each way to work. When she needed a new vehicle, they didn’t go out and buy a car that got good milage, they bought this big honking older SUV in which she said she got 12 mpg. Because it made her feel safer. Seven gallons a day driving to and from work, ALONE. I hope she’s enjoying the costs these days!