ALT-15 Should we still be Buying Suvs – No
I know, I know. Everyone LOVES and NEEDS their SUV for whatever reason; to cart your soccer playing kids around, to hull the needed equipment for work, or to just project the image of success. SUVs are a utility based machine designed to make your life just little bit easier. We NEED these beasts in our lives to improve our quality of life. I mean, how did people cart their busy, complicated lives around before SUVs? Oh wait, that's right, however they goddamn had to.
Before anyone goes spouting' off about gas efficiency, safety issues, or utility, let's consider why we really want (not need) our SUVs. The answer to why any of us want anything that appears on TV is advertising. Look at this beautiful, shiny, new car that is going to make your life as American that much easier! Obviously, you NEED this vehicle because we all have "stuff" to cart around and as soon as you purchase your new SUV for only 40 ba-gillion dollars life will improve. Your daily routine will have less hustle and bustle and imagine all that space! Never again will you have to yell "Where the hell am I supposed to put all this stuff?" Great. We're all sold.
Now you have a giant, space-efficient car to cart around with 9 kids stuffed in it. Oh but maybe you can placate them with the built in TV. The tired parents of American cannot turn that down. Nor the fold down seats for even more space.
Whatever. Don't let them tell you what you need and I know you all know what I mean. We have all been innocent(or sometimes not so innocent) victims of the advertising world for years and years and years. The people who market SUVs know your weak spot and have no hesitation at aiming straight for it. After all, there are the ones who created the image of success we're all trying to adhere to; why wouldn't they create the tools to project your false sense of security? SUVs are the corporations of the road; dominant, inefficient, media machines. Driving a big car does not make you anymore secure or successful. Gas guzzling is just the beginning of the SUV problem. SUVs highlight a sickness of society; the fabricated, empty need for bigger, better, faster, and newer. Simplify. Take it down a notch. Spend your hard earned money on something that is going to actually better everyone's situation. We are all in this together.
Excess is word I cannot help but come across again and again. Yes, SUVs are a product of excess; not in their size but the function they serve in our society. It is the excess we've created in our own lives that makes beastly, alienating machines like the SUV a necessity. No, we should not be buying them or the people who market them. What we should be buying more of is our own sense individuality and simplicity. Occupation does not equal importance. Our lives do not have to be this big and busy. We do not NEED SUVs.
I know I have big, overarching ideas, but at least I don't have a big, overarching car ; )
