All these children are invisible to the driver…

Fuck all those cars!!! Put them away to hell, not to earth. They are too big for all - except for small egos. But for small egos is therapy much better.

  • The Snark Urge@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    59
    ·
    1 year ago

    Americans never asked for this, it’s the classification system for light trucks implemented following the Yom Kippur War that left too much leeway in the definition for “light trucks” that has been driving auto makers in this direction.

    Of course there have been knock-on cultural issues where certain people make it part of their ego and the market effect becomes self reinforcing, but that’s how we got into this mess. History is a series of unintended consequences, again.

    • Hot Saucerman@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      33
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Agreed. The industry is invested in avoiding regulation that could impede their profits at all costs. This means they will invest in advertising pushing the idea that these vehicles are needed.

    • CoderKat@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      1 year ago

      I’d argue that they have asked for trucks to get so big because they seemingly sell better that way. It’s admittedly an imperfect thing to look at since there’s few alternatives and many other factors, but these big trucks didn’t immediately take over the market. At some point they were introduced and consumers liked them.

      • The Snark Urge@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        This is why I said it became an ego thing. Automakers didn’t set out to kill the most kids possible and ask “how do we design towards that”, they exploited a regulatory loophole which then cracked open a wider market niche based on people’s egocentrism, brutality, and myopic attitudes toward transit (e.g. carbrain).

      • meowMix2525@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        I’m not sure if American consumers “liked” them so much as they were pushed heavily by auto makers while they quietly phased out more practically sized vehicles like hatchbacks, station wagons, and a lot of sedans (other than those sedans that fetch a high price for their performance and appeal to an entirely different market; your corvettes, mustangs, etc.) That ‘light truck’ designation brings with it larger profit margins; the vehicle itself is bigger so the manufacturer can charge more for it, and then they have to obey fewer environmental regulations so development/manufacturing is cheaper in comparison to trying to meet the regulations for smaller vehicles.

      • BigNote@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        To be fair, they are hugely popular in both Canada and Mexico as well. I’ll leave it to you to figure out why.

        Hint; if marketing didn’t work, it wouldn’t be a multi-billion dollar industry.