Listen you sanctimonious she-beast:
I only said that RoadRash should be prepared for people like you who were going to be appalling idiots who jumped off the handle.
Thanks for proving me right. Rod Roddy, can you tell her what her parting gifts are going to be?
I’m going to kill myself for stepping into this, but it’s getting ridiculous.
First:
Later:
Finally:
The term for this is ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’. Start with a snide prediction, wait for someone to take the bait, then jump their shit and say ‘I told you this would happen’.
Lay off, Hastur, and quit hijacking the OP. [sub]Which I really have nothing to say on, myself. cough[/sub]
I’m going to kill myself for stepping into this, but it’s getting ridiculous.
First:
Later:
Finally:
The term for this is ‘self-fulfilling prophecy’. Start with a snide prediction, wait for someone to take the bait, then jump their shit and say ‘I told you this would happen’.
Lay off, Hastur, and quit hijacking the OP. [sub]Which I really have nothing to say on, myself. cough[/sub]
Oh, sweetie, you really pushed a button here.
The fact is, public transit makes the streets livable for people to dryve their Ford LeBehemoths about. The daily ridership of Montreal transit, if converted to cars, would create a bumper-to-bumper traffic jam on three lanes of the 401 from Montreal to Toronto.
Worse yet, we’re on an island - if the people who took transit every day from the South Shore to Montreal were to take cars instead, the traffic delays (already unconscionable) would expand to utterly unmanageable proportions. You would have to get up at god knows what hour to get two kilometers over the Jacques-Cartier Bridge.
Furthermore, reducing traffic by means of public transit benefits car drivers in the category of health (that’s your air too, pal) and safety (every 1,200 cars replaced by a professional metro driver is 1,200 fewer accidents waiting to happen). So the short answer is yes - transit directly and indirectly benefits car users, who should expect to pay for it because they use a car.
Sod off.
In the previous threads that have been in the pit on this subject, there have been a contingent of SUV owners who have behaved much like our showgirl, Lola.
It can be seen as self-fulfilling prophecy, or it can be seen as warning someone newer to the board than I about what may come of a reasonable question.
There’s another way to see if a vehicle’s a commercial vehicle even if its empty: check the license plate*.
*Doesn’t work everywhere, but it does here.
Here we go again.
There are many reasons I own an SUV. One of which is the 4x4 capability. I live way up in the Colorado Rockies, 11,200 feet to be exact. I use 4x4 EVERY DAY for about 5 months out of the year.
My wife has one two. And we have a 4x4 plow truck. And a 4x4 tractor/loader. Sort of a recurring theme.
Yesterday, I brought home 5-6"x6"x8’ landscape timbers in my Pathfinder. Like to see someone do that with a Honda Civic.
If you don’t need an SUV, fine, don’t buy one. Just don’t pretend to know what I need better than I do.
good for you, I drive a fast mustang with crappy mileage. also and old work truck with crappier mileage.
Here we go again…
Funny how it’s always the evil SUV, isn’t it? Never the pickup truck, or minivan, or hydrocarbon-spewing rustbucket Oldsmobile. Why is that?
erislover says
[quote]
" I don’t have to justify driving a monter fucking vehicle that I sometimes consider taking off the road but still never manage to do anything other than drive on trails!"
Well, I own an SUV that I drive off-road quite often and you’re right, I only drive on pre-existing trails. That’s because I’m a member of Tread Lightly and it’s one of the self-imposed rules we have.
Have you ever attended an off-road event? Do you have a fucking clue what happens at one? It is not a bunch of loudmouth drunk rednecks barreling through rivers. Usually on Saturday we will slowly drive and walk through the area doing a trail clean-up, picking up the detritus left by hikers and mountain bikers and yes, off-roaders. On Sunday we drive on those same pre-existing trails, following the rule of off-roading “As slow as possible, only as fast as necessary.”
In 2 weeks myself and 4 other Land Rover owners are going to “circumnavigate” Lake Michigan by land and raise money for breast cancer while doing it. Do I still fit in your heartless SUV owner profile?
I love my SUV. I got rear-ended by an Oldsmobile 2 weeks ago and the front of the olds was absolutely destroyed. My Land Rover suffered some scratched paint on the bumper and a slight crack in the bumper light.
I’ve gone on long enough. If you want to see how ridiculous SUV bashing is, go look up some of fatherjohn’s old threads.
August & enip:
Did y’all bother to notice that the OP wasn’t ranting about all SUV drivers but ONLY those who drive the things like they’re made out of tissue paper?
Or did you just quit reading when you saw the letters SUV?
Did you do the math yourself, junior, or did mommy help you?
I don’t have anything to add other than: I love my truck. While it’s nowhere near as cool as Doc Nickel’s, I love it. 2000 F150 XLT. Silver. Very pretty. I don’t take it offroad because I live in the city and I just don’t go offroad a lot. I sometimes carry stuff in the bed, and never worry about trips to Home Depot.
But mostly, I feel safer in it. I don’t worry about rolling underneath someone else if they pull out in front of me like we nearly did in our Neon, or almost dying like my mom nearly did in her small hatchback (I can’t remember the model) when she was hit on the passenger side (she was driving). Sure, it’s not like I’m driving a tank down the street. I’m not invincible in it, and I try to always keep that in mind. (I almost hit a car once when I intended to change lanes to the right and I didn’t see him (he had a very, very tiny car and I’m short). It would’ve been my mistake, so I try to remember that and pay close attention to the ‘little people’ around me.)
Yep, it guzzles gas. I spend about $30 a week on gas, for a 25-gallon tank. That’s three times as much as we spent on the Neon and its 10-gallon tank.
I hope the truck last another 10 years and when it conks out, I’ll get another one.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Monty *
**August & enip:
Did y’all bother to notice that the OP wasn’t ranting about all SUV drivers but ONLY those who drive the things like they’re made out of tissue paper?
Or did you just quit reading when you saw the letters SUV? **[/Q]
Did you bother to notice that I wasn’t responding to the OP but to the anti-SUV zealots that hijacked the thread?
Yea, and your comment did a lot to make sure that didn’t happen didn’t it. Your post (the second one in this thread, BTW) essentially turned what started as a ‘SUV-owners-who-drive-like-grannies’ flame into the standard SUV vs. Everyone Else flame. I hardly think you did that as some sort of public service to the OP so lay off the martyr routine.
Actually, your momma helped me. And your daddy was watching
And the point I was trying to make is that if you hadn’t started off the replies with your lovely little inflammatory post, LolaBaby wouldn’t have responded the way she did. I can’t speak for her, but hell, she might have even agreed with the OP, being that she uses her SUV for more than vanity purposes. But since you instantly turned the OP from a specific rant to a rant against all SUVs like Wabbit said, she felt inclined to speak up to you, not the OP.
To reiterate: LolaBaby got defensive because of what you said, not what the OP said. Therefore you have no grounds on which to say ‘This is the kind of person I was trying to warn the OP about,’ because you invited those sorts of responses. Are you really that frickin’ dense that you can’t see that?
to ** matt_mcl/**
di have responded to your post in GD , http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=117203, in order to avoid a hijack. Hope to hear from you dear.
I have an SUV
If that’s compensating for something, I can’t imagine what it is. Other, possibly, than me not being ugly enough.
I have to agree with the OP. As someone who has two SUV’s that see more off-road than on-road use, the large majority of people who do own them drive them as if they are made of glass. And the other annoying thing is, people who come to a complete damned stop before making a right hand turn- the sucker won’t turn over at 25 mph, folks, I’m sure- My Explorer (regularly used off road) will take a sharp right at 35, and the Land Rover, (used almost exclusively off-road) with it’s tall skinny tires and big aluminum body, will do it easily at 30. Of course you have to have arm muscles like a longshoreman to steer it at those speeds…
Trucks were made for work. A lot of people use them for transport of themselves and family because they feel safer, and I’m all for feeling and being safe. Of course I prefer good driving skills for safety to large crumple zones, but apparently we can’t legislate intelligence and driving skill.
BTW, my Exploder comfortably gets four people to work at 15 mpg. Compared to a geo with one person in it getting 50 mpg, the Explorer is getting slightly better overall economy. To go 60 miles, the explorer uses exactly four gallons of fuel, one gallon per person. To take four people in four Geos 60 miles takes 4.8 gallons of fuel, or 1.2 gallons per person. Plus, with normal maintenance my Exploder will go 200 or even 300 thousand miles, wheras the average mileage of a Geo Metro appears to be around 100,00 miles when it goes to the yard (I see a lot of metros in yards). Of course, ymmv. So my Explorer will have to be recycled (with the associated energy costs) about 1/2 to 1/3rd as often.
I have no problem with being environmentally aware and responsable, so don’t flame me assuming I’m saying Geos and Yugos are bad, it’s just not a reasonable comparison.
b.
Billy:
Not a complaint, not a rant, just an honest curiosity. I’m sure the trucks won’t turn over at 25mph usually. But what about when the alterations are made to it? I’m referring to the jacking the vehicle up until it’s about twice its normal height (and the danged lights aren’t adjusted so they don’t blind half the city). Doesn’t that change the center of gravity?
Agreed, Monty. I’m talking stock here, not the jacked-lifted-ridiculous machines that look as though they belong in a circus.
Upside is that those kinds of vehicles often cost several thousand dollars to put tires on when they’ve been worn out from driving on pavement. Hell, I kind of wish they’d turn over, as long as nobody else is around to get hurt. Used to be there were light and bumper height restrictions, but they don’t seem to exist anymore or get enforced.
b.