Sport Utility Vehicles - Your Opinion

[PanzerJaeger]

We havent kicked this around in a while. What do you guys think of SUVs and the people who own them?

I got into an altercation at the gas station just yesterday with some woman over my own SUV.

I guessed early on that she was not of my political persuasion do to her appearance, or lack of any attempt to correct it. (Like a spawn of jeane garofalo.) The "Bush Lied, People Died" sticker on the back of her 198? POS only confirmed it.

What I didnt expect was for her to walk right over to me at the pump and tell me that I was destroying the planet. The only other place Ive been confronted in such an overt political manner was the college campus.

From there it devolved into a rather pathetic scene, her telling me what a bad person I was and me telling her what an ugly person she was.. I was a little disapointed in my performance, but by the way she laid out her talking points it was obvious she was a seasoned veteran of the unwilling gas station confrontation.

Finally, she pulled out a flyer and told me something to the effect that "if I could handle the truth, I should read it". Well that was it! She was an activist! She had apparently been doing this all day to SUV owners. My tank had long since been full so I told her to take a shower and left.

In any event, this lead me to believe that there is still a lot of hostility over SUVs. I thought it had sort of died down a little, but apparently SUVs are still a major target of the left wing activists.

[Steppe Merc]

Only ok if used by people in say Colorado, where you need 4 wheel drives. I hate all those damn SUVs in my town. Damn huge things and few of them need it. And no one ever needs a Humvee, unless your in a battle zone.
But I'd never walk up to someone and say they were destroying the planet, becuase there is far worse thing than SUVs polluting the world.

[Del Arroyo]

SUVs are pretty stupid vehicles. If you want off-road, get a pickup. All that extra space is not improving your quality of life, any more than all the extra space in one of those new monster houses they keep building everywhere nowadays.

He who owns a roomy sedan and a ranch home on a sizeable, well-manicured lot is enjoying his affluence. Super-sizers just don't get it.

DA

[Strike For The South]

TRUCK THE REAL MANS SUV

[The_Doctor]

I typed suv in google and found an odd image.



If you have a large family then they are ok.

[Azi Tohak]

SUVs suck. They're pointless and wasteful. Want a 4x4? Get a deisel pickup. Want to carry the family around? Just get a four-door car.

No reason to have an SUV.

Sure there is, compensating for a little unit, and to kill other people on the road. What other reason do you need? Fuel efficiency? Cost effectivness? HA! You're American! You NEED to have the best otherwise you will die alone, unloved, poor and dead.

Can you tell I don't like those stupid things?

Azi

[Ser Clegane]

Hmm ... curious.

While I agree that SUVs are non-necessary fun vehicles that need too much gas and I do not consider them to be particularly appealing, I don not quite understand why a lot of people get so upset about SUVs.

Many people seem to have less of a problem with expensive sports cars like e.g., a Porsche or a Ferrari - both equally unnecessary in a county with a tempolimit, and both also not the most efficient cars when it comes to gas consumption.

Why the borderline (or even beyond borderline) aggressive opinions about SUVs?

[Adrian II]

Why the borderline (or even beyond borderline) aggressive opinions about SUVs?

[PanzerJaeger]

SUVs are pretty stupid vehicles. If you want off-road, get a pickup.

Thats actually not the case.

Offroading is one of my favorite hobbies and I have never see pick-ups on any trails over class 1 - and many of them must be pulled out of the mud. The wheel base is too long, they are not agile, and they do not have differential that is needed for off-roading.

Of course, in that same vein, you never see Ford Explorers or Chevy Trailblazers out there either - unless they are heavily modified. Pretty much only Jeeps, Land Rovers, and Land Cruisers can handle the tough trails.

[PanzerJaeger]

I would love to see a pickup try this! (As long as im not responsible for towing it off the trail!)

[Geoffrey S]

Bah, chose the wrong option. I meant to vote "if 4x4 is necessary". I've got nothing against SUVs in principal, it's simply that when I see one driving through the busy streets of Utrecht or Amsterdam I can't help but wonder what the point is of using one in that kind of a situation, other than purely as some kind of status symbol.

[Del Arroyo]

I would love to see a pickup try this! (As long as im not responsible for towing it off the trail!)

Well, I would submit that if it's not practicable to walk on, then it's not technically a trail. In rural Mexico in mountainous areas (in other words HARD CORE, there are no roads), everyone uses pickups and they work just fine. As long as you're not going over boulders, you're good with a pickup.

I suppose a more jeep-like vehicle might handle a bit better. And if you enjoy roaring over boulders for fun, then yes, a genuine Sport Utility Vehicle might be the answer.

But please, enough of the Ford Explorer crap.

DA

[sharrukin]

I think a lot of people get SUV's who have no real need for them just as people get BMW's or a Porsche for the same reason. I am a practical guy and these seem silly to me but if the owner is willing to pay the freight on them and the gas bill, then its their business IMO.

[Taffy_is_a_Taff]

who honestly NEEDS a Porsche?

[Kaiser of Arabia]

We havent kicked this around in a while. What do you guys think of SUVs and the people who own them?

I got into an altercation at the gas station just yesterday with some woman over my own SUV.

I guessed early on that she was not of my political persuasion do to her appearance, or lack of any attempt to correct it. (Like a spawn of jeane garofalo.) The "Bush Lied, People Died" sticker on the back of her 198? POS only confirmed it.

What I didnt expect was for her to walk right over to me at the pump and tell me that I was destroying the planet. The only other place Ive been confronted in such an overt political manner was the college campus.

From there it devolved into a rather pathetic scene, her telling me what a bad person I was and me telling her what an ugly person she was.. I was a little disapointed in my performance, but by the way she laid out her talking points it was obvious she was a seasoned veteran of the unwilling gas station confrontation.

Finally, she pulled out a flyer and told me something to the effect that "if I could handle the truth, I should read it". Well that was it! She was an activist! She had apparently been doing this all day to SUV owners. My tank had long since been full so I told her to take a shower and left.

In any event, this lead me to believe that there is still a lot of hostility over SUVs. I thought it had sort of died down a little, but apparently SUVs are still a major target of the left wing activists.

I'd ask her why 2000 casualties in a war to protect america was unjustified but 400,000 sorting out Europes problems was.

[Franconicus]

The answer is easy. It is a free country and if you like them use them. (I do not but that does not matter). If they do any harm to anybody or damage to all (like green house effect) the government can ban them or raise the tax for fuel. It is as simple as that.

[Franconicus]

From there it devolved into a rather pathetic scene, her telling me what a bad person I was

At last

[yesdachi]

I love SUV’s.

I don’t have one, nor do I need one but when I ride in one with friends/family I love the “luxury” I love how roomy they are, how high up you sit, the ability to hit a pot hole and not loose your exhaust, the additional safety to me, I just feel safer in one. I have been in accidents before as a passenger and driver and in the instance of me being a passenger my mom was driving my bro and me to school in a small eco safe car and were hit by a station wagon. He walked away and it took the Jaws of Life to get my mom out. Had we been in an SUV my mom wouldn’t still have trouble with her legs and the a-hole who hit us could have been the one hurt. Anyone that cries that SUV’s are killers is a hypocrite unless they drive a pillow that runs on angel farts.

I call them “luxury” because that’s what they are and if you can afford them and don’t break the law go for it. We are creatures of excess (I considered inserting a list of materialistic crap we spoil ourselves and our environment with but I don’t think I need to, to make my point) and “luxury” and SUV’s are just another excess we indulge in. Some people just don’t like them and that’s fine but don’t try and justify it by saying they “kill” unless you are 100% “kill” free yourself. (Now if you don’t like the person driving then that is a different story.)

Your sin is worse than mine doesn’t cut it IMO.


Side note: I applaud the stinky girl for being passionate and helping her cause but what frustrates me is that she obviously looked like crap and was hostile and confrontational rather than being presentable and friendly. She could have easily given PJ the flyer and told him the benefits of a world w/o the SUV. If you are out in public trying to sell people on your cause remember that you are a representative of that cause and try and not make your cause appear trivial by looking/acting like a freak.

[drone]

Side note: I applaud the stinky girl for being passionate and helping her cause but what frustrates me is that she obviously looked like crap and was hostile and confrontational rather than being presentable and friendly. She could have easily given PJ the flyer and told him the benefits of a world w/o the SUV. If you are out in public trying to sell people on your cause remember that you are a representative of that cause and try and not make your cause appear trivial by looking/acting like a freak.

And for her approach, PJ would have been well within his rights to point out that her "198? POS" should have been upgraded to a modern ULEV or SULEV vehicle. Those old cars have terrible emissions!

I might debate your safety evaluation of this class, though as I have noted already they do have some shortcomings. Interior safety barriers on SUVs in the USA are usually just as well set up as the minivans and cars now. The higher center of gravity, of course, continues as a greater concern. Your are quite correct that the use of their "light truck" designation to evade the tougher CAFE standards for sedans was a "dodge" used by the auto makers, but the uneconomical charge isn't as well grounded. While you are correct from the perspective of engineering efficiency, the US market did not find the economics relevant given available cash flow v cost of operation, and the marketing economics worked (still work?) just fine. By the way, much better sense of your views in this post. Not sure I agree, but much more compelling.

The government regs have been instrumental in creating the situation we have today. The current regs give no incentive to build smaller, effecient SUVs, as this takes time and money to develop. The bigger and heavier the vehicle the better since the reg exemptions kick in. The engineering ineffeciency is what is going to hurt US automakers in the near future. The profit margins for SUVs are high because the design is low tech (not counting the cool gadgets) compared with cars. Automakers have been forced to engineer cars to be lighter, stronger, cleaner, and more effecient, while SUV/light truck engineering has been lacking. GM/Ford/Chrysler rode huge profits in the past decade on SUVs, if the demand drops they have nothing to fall back on. The financial health of these companies currently relies on SUVs, so I'm not holding my breath for the government to clamp down on SUV safety and emissions standards (unless California get in on the action). Rising gas prices are likely to hurt SUV sales, so the US automakers will need to catch up. I guess market forces will win here, and the heads of GM and Ford have a lot of work to do.