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SUV Love

LVX23

22:43 / 20.08.03

Don't be ashamed...

www.suvlove.com

(pretty funny in spite of itself... Maybe not Switchboard material but I thought it would arouse the most response here.)

Slim

02:00 / 21.08.03

Say what you will about wasting gas and obstructing other's view but as a person who has driven both I must admit that an SUV is a helluva lot cooler than a Ford Focus.

Mazarine

02:12 / 21.08.03

As the owner of a compact car, I deeply resent the use of two tiny parking spaces clearly labeled 'compact cars only' by SUVs. I do not expect anyone to care.

But the commercial where a kid builds a little wooden hummer to win a go-cart race to the tune of 'Happy Jack' does render me a bit fond.

Baz Auckland

05:47 / 21.08.03

I hate them, if only for nearly sqashing me on my bicycle due to the lanes (or streets in some cases) being too narrow for them and I at once.... bastards.

illmatic

08:49 / 21.08.03

I've just read half of the opening essay linked above , and I was convinced he was taking the piss. "What a brilliant satirist", thought I. The clincher surely has to be the line "poor people scare me". Halfway down the page, now I'm not so sure...I'm beginning to feel very scared. Can someone clear this up for me? He is taking the piss, isn't he? Please god....

Less searchable M0rd4nt

09:00 / 21.08.03

Yes, Illmatic, I'm certain this is satire (tho' the writer seems to have run out of steam a little towards the end of the piece).

illmatic

09:54 / 21.08.03

I don't know, Mordant, there's the list of articles and products at the side, plus the nine pages of testimony from idiots. I think it's serious. Frightening, but serious.

Saveloy

10:39 / 21.08.03

Maybe I've stumbled across too many libertarian pieces on the web, but it looks totally genuine to me. If it is satire then it's extremely subtle, I'm sure I've seen the same attitudes expressed for real on message boards, in email groups and in articles. With a satirical piece you'd expect a bit more exaggeration or absurdity, either in the style or the content. I can't imagine anyone going to this much trouble to replicate something so faithfully.

that

10:48 / 21.08.03

Yup, Saveloy said exactly what I was thinking. I reckon it's almost certainly serious.

illmatic

11:02 / 21.08.03

I love all that “it’s the free country” shit on the message board. Like if you challenge someone’s right to be a complete fucking asshole with no respect for the people around them or the environment, you’re challenging a basic human right. By extension, if someone stops me for acting out every idiotic impulse I get, say, shitting on their front lawn, it’s a fundamental challenge to my human rights. But fuck them, their opinion doesn’t matter because I'VE GOT A FUCKING BIG CAR.

illmatic

11:12 / 21.08.03

Why don't you go drive your weiner cars to Russia and make out like a bunch of gay communists. Then America will have citizens that deserve to live here - men who are proud to use all the petroleum they can afford to buy, fly the stars and stripes, and support the war for MORE AMERICAN OIL! Go USA! Don't take my hard earned bucks to buy your drugs with welfare checks!

From the message board. I no longer know what is true of false but that made me laugh.

SMS

22:50 / 21.08.03

Anyone up for a road trip to Russia? I'm driving by Australia along the way.

I did think we had the right to be "complete fucking asshole[s]" though in the fundamental right of free speech or something.

Baz Auckland

23:37 / 21.08.03

I saw some punk in a beat-up little car with a bumper sticker that said "Fund Terrorism. Drive an SUV". Can you say 'idiot?' The way I see it, terrorists are going to get their money, so it's in our best interests to make sure they get ours. That way, we can cut off their supply of money anytime we want. If they got all of their money from other countries like France, then we'd have no excuse to invade them to protect our national security.

...I bow before the logic of the argument. SUVs rock.

Linus Dunce

23:52 / 21.08.03

But it is a class thing, right? Like somebody said on the site, no one bitches about pick up trucks. I think it's a little like the anti-hunting argument in the UK -- right for the wrong reasons.

w1rebaby

00:05 / 22.08.03

I bitch about pickups. In fact, they're worse. The number that have anything in the back apart from an armoured box for the Powerbook is miniscule. Don't tell me anyone buys something called a Dodge Ram because it's a really useful vehicle.

Linus Dunce

00:35 / 22.08.03

I think I might buy a pickup if I lived in the US, outside a city. But it would be an old one that I wouldn't mind about the paintwork or how fast it went, and I would be more concerned with the reliability of its de-tuned engine than whether or not it had air conditioning. And it would have to pre-date such nonsense as "Ram." I am, you see, a closet redneck.

SMS

02:24 / 22.08.03

Trucks are very useful vehicles, usually to the whole family. This means that if you buy the truck, you will loan the truck out often. At least, that's true around here... then again, around here is suburbia, and I think there was a thread on Barbelith a year or so ago about how evil were the suburbs, so there probably is consistency there.

w1rebaby

02:36 / 22.08.03

Trucks are very useful if you want to move stuff. I've been thankful for them more than once.

On the other hand, how often do you want to move stuff?

Baz Auckland

01:51 / 23.08.03

..and now there's 40 less of them...

Fires destroyed dozens of SUVs and a warehouse at an auto dealership Friday, and vehicles there and at three other dealerships were spray-painted with slogans such as "Fat, Lazy Americans."

The blazes at the Clippinger Chevrolet dealership broke out about 5 a.m. Friday. Flames destroyed about 20 vehicles, mostly Hummer H2s, which are luxury SUVs patterned after the military's workhorse Humvee. Another 20 vehicles were badly damaged. A separate blaze caved in a warehouse roof.

There were no reports of injuries, but damage was estimated at $1 million. SUVs at dealerships in nearby cities of Arcadia, Duarte and Monrovia were also vandalized, though there were no other fires.

...Hummers are the worst of the lot too...

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