SUVs Suck - Quotes

SPORT UTILITY VEHICLES

QUOTES

So you think the mentality of the average SUV driver is highly suspect, and you can't for the life of you imagine any valid reason for owning one? Well, let these faithful SUV drivers put your mind at ease, in their very own words:

A "columnist" named Jack Ryan had the following [1] to say (obviously in between hunts for Red October):

Believe it or not, there are so-called advocacy groups out there calling for SUV's to be down-sized or even discontinued. This is serious. And I, as proud owner of an F-150 pickup, would strap myself to my windshield with dynamite taped to my chest, before I let the National Coalition of Hugo-driving Salad-eaters take my truck away. I enjoy being the biggest, baddest vehicle on the block, and if you can't see around my bumper in rush hour, then eat exhaust, buddy, or--if you feel real lucky--try road-raging my keester off the boulevard.

They let this guy drive? I wouldn't let him mow my lawn. And I think you meant "Yugo" there, Billy Bob.

From an article titled "Why Women Love Sport-Utility Vehicles" [2] (a veritable gold mine of online SUV stupidity):

"I like that sport-utility vehicles make a lotta noise," said Samina Q., a 26-year-old nurse in Detroit, Mich., who recently traded her Jeep Grand Cherokee for a GMC Jimmy. "It's that big, powerful truck sound, that vrooom, that you don't get in a car. I really like that sound. You feel like you've got all this power."

And you guys thought the movie Clueless was fiction. I can picture Samina bringing her truck in to have the tires rotated, and the mechanics prying a Volkswagen out from the wheel well.

Smaller women, like myself, especially appreciate sitting up higher in traffic. The seating position provides better visibility, enables us to see obstacles further down the road so we can make smart driving decisions,and gives us more confidence in assessing traffic conditions.

Of course, it never occurs to her that her "higher seating position" prevents other motorists from having any of those same benefits. Think she stands up to see better in movie theaters?

Twenty-something Sommer B., an administrative assistant in Beverly Hills, Calif., enjoys the looks she gets from guys when she's cruising around in an SUV. "There's nothing better than a hot chick in a sporty SUV with big tires, tinted windows and a snowboard on the roof rack," she said... Besides, women drive cars like Volvos; cool chicks drive SUVs."

Something tells me our friend Sommer is a blonde. Wouldn't you love to have your life resting in her hands?

From "SUVLUV" [3]:

"I want to drive a tank," Barbara T. says without shame. "I want my kids to learn to drive in a tank."... While an all-wheel-drive Subaru Legacy might do the job, Barbara says,"I wouldn't be caught dead driving a station wagon."

Hopefully, she'll be understanding if her neighbor's "tank" wipes out those kids of hers. After all, she wouldn't expect her neighbor to stoop to driving a station wagon now, would she?

"Columnist" Reg Henry had this [4] to say:

The fact is there is a responsible case to be made for driving SUVs. It can be summed up in three words: "This is America."

Americans like things big. Ours is a big country with a big-hearted people full of big dreams. The love of bigness, whether we are talking buildings, bosoms, meals or vehicles, is as American as apple pie.

It may be natural for your English persons or Italians to squeeze themselves into Mini-Minors or toy-sized Fiats, but an American in his own land must have room to expand behind the wheel if he or she is to visit giant shopping malls and stop for lunch at large all-you-can-eat buffets.

I know you're gonna accuse me of falling for satire on the quote above, but read the whole article yourself. This guy really is that stupid.

I think I'm finally beginning to understand why so many foreigners hate Americans. I really am.

The Ford Explorer/Firestone tire problems have been all over the news lately. The same SUV drivers who dismiss our complaints with, "Hey, driving is dangerous - accept it" seem to be whining incessantly [5] now that it appears their lives might be in danger. A typical example:

"If I don't get satisfaction [the tires replaced]" by this Friday, Allison E. says, she will clean out the SUV, drop it off at the dealership and take a taxi home.

"I have a 3 1/2-year-old daughter," Allison says. "I won't take this chance."

But she's apparently willing to "take a chance" with other people's 3 1/2-year-old daughters if they happen to be riding in a normal car. Allison, baby, relax. The number of SUV fatalities resulting from tire failures represents a very small percentage of the total people killed in SUVs each year. Heck, many more die from single-vehicle accidents where tire failure wasn't even involved. Hence, the possibility that the tires on your Explorer may self-destruct while you're cruising on the highway isn't a "major highway safety problem from a societal perspective." So quit whining already.

Brock Yates, chief editor for Car and Driver magazine, wrote in an op-ed piece for The Wall Street Journal [6]:

My wife, Pamela, whom I cherish, spends many hours a week at the wheel of our Grand Cherokee, and frankly it gives me an added feeling of confidence when she leaves the driveway in that rugged package. Neither she nor I fret over the possibility of her rolling some hapless victim in a Geo Metro into a wad of metal.

There you have it. He makes it painfully clear he knows what will happen if his wife's death machine rams a small car. And you heard him yourself - neither he nor she cares. And this guy is the primary voice of a national magazine. Sigh...

Finally, to leave you on an up note, there's this quote [7] from a Los Angeles Times article:

"I've taken a vow, no chastising," says Randy Cohen, who writes an ethics column for The New York Times. "I just point certain things out."
Like?
"If you buy an SUV, you're buying your safety at the expense of another's. Hit someone and you'll kill them."

Which summarizes in two lines what I've been trying to say in this entire article...

SOURCES:

(Because otherwise you'd think I made these quotes up)

[1] "If We're All Gonna Die..."
By Jack Ryan
http://www.brian-wilson.com/weregonnadie.html

[2] "Why Women Love Sport-Utility Vehicles"
By Ingrid Loeffler Palmer
http://www.edmunds.com/edweb/editorial/features/
SUV_women.html

[3] "SUVLUV"
By Patty Wentz, Willamette Weekly, April 19, 2000
http://www.wweek.com/html/leada041900.html

[4] "No apologies for having a big vehicle"
By Reg Henry, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, June 6, 2000
http://www.post-gazette.com/columnists/20000606regcol.asp

[5] "SUV drivers carry fear as passenger"
By Del Jones, USA Today, August 22, 2000
http://www.usatoday.com/money/consumer/autos/
mauto775.htm

[6] "The SUV heads to the junkyard of history"
By Paul Mulshine, The San Francisco Examiner, May 31, 2000
http://www.examiner.com/000531/0531op-mulshine.html

[7] "SUVs: How would Aristotle feel?"
By Mary Rourke, Los Angeles Times, July 26, 2000
http://www.s-t.com/daily/07-00/07-26-00/a03ed105.htm