There is no other place on the planet that idolizes the automobile the way we do in the U.S. Yes, most of the world has cars, and yes, some of the best cars in the world are made by foreign nations, but at the end of the day, cars are a fundamental part of American culture. Cars are status symbols, primary and essential modes of transportation, sex symbols, entertainment, subjects for art and trash, they're idols, they're sources of frustration, they're money pits, and they're a part of everything that makes us who we are.
Trouble in the U.S. auto industry sounds to many Americans like the end of the fucking world. And for a good number of hardworking good people, trouble in the industry IS the end of the world.
We've pretty much unequivocally decided as a planet that things like car emissions are ultimately going to doom the world, but for every owner of a hybrid there are about 100,000 people who don't give a shit. To make matters even worse, hybrids aren't even much of anything! A 10mpg or so average increase over a decently tuned full-on gas-burner is like pissing on the Triangle Factory Fire. You tried, but in the end not only did your dick burn off, but you're dead and so are thousands of child laborers. Plus, you look like an asshole in your Prius anyway.
OK, that was a little harsh, but still.
But god damn, do we love the shit out of our cars. There's a whole industry devoted to car porn, and I'll be the first to admit I love to get my greedy mitts on a nice, glossy auto mag. Sometimes, there's even tits to go along with the cars, and that makes things like ultra-American!
Seriously, though, there are few things we like more than a good car. Take a look at Hollywood: any high-grossing film that isn't Titanic oAddr featuring Hugh Grant or something stars an automobile or several. The cars might be a sexy mode of transit, they might be a source of conflict or turmoil, sometimes they're blowing up spectacularly, sometimes Michael Bay is turning them into giant robots and THEN blowing them up spectacularly.... Yeah, more on Michael Bay another time.
Love it or hate it, gasoline flows through our blood. The quickest way to get Americans to adopt electric cars? Make them GIANT AS HELL and/or FAST AS SHIT. But guess what - turns out huge or fast vehicles just aren't efficient, and it takes a really huge amount of easily harnessed fuel to make these things run. It's not gas's fault it's killing everything around us, it's our fault that we're too lazy to figure out how to make other stuff just as ready to give off energy. Because that's hard, and if there's one thing our culture hates, it's dropping something easy to tackle something more challenging - unless it takes money away from us or makes our lives more miserable.
Cars are filthy, dangerous things. The licensing process in any given state is a joke - even though lots of people fail their first test or two, it takes a whole lot to ultimately not get to be allowed to drive. Thing is, cars are massive, two-ton killing machines. You don't even need to be driving one at 70mph highway speeds - or even in the car at all, for that matter - to do some damage. Crack someone at 15mph at a stoplight or forget your e-brake while in neutral and watch the carnage unfold. But we're happy to let people we wouldn't trust alone for 30 seconds in our houses or would be aghast at finding out they own a weapon drive around in all sorts of scary jalopies. You know that guy who drives the truck with the black cloud billowing out from underneath? Or maybe he's blasting downtown in a hot Porsche on his cell phone? Either way, I have a feeling he's probably not giving too much of a shit about what he might run into, MOST especially if it's you.
So add me to the ranks of people complaining about how we're killing the planet and each other with cars, but also add me to the much shorter list of people who are aware of it. I love cars. I love big ones, fast ones, ones blowing up, ones I'm driving, and ones I'm ogling in car porno mags and auto shows. I'll happily drive one of those big and/or fast electric cars that really make a difference in expelled pollutants, but I'm certainly not going to drive something that's a terrible ride and really doesn't do that much good other than to the wallets of happy Japanese automakers (sure, call me out on name-dropping the Japanese, but for fuck's sake Ford's hybrid SUV does NOT count, and try to name me another automaker who's got well-selling hybrids in their stable).
We literally live and die by cars, and as much as I'd love a train to Philly and NYC and wherever else, and as badly as this whole nation needs better public transit, I think I'd die before I'd give up driving. It' s a refuge from the real world for me, somewhere I can be truly alone and contemplative, somewhere I can really listen to music, somewhere I can be goofy or angry or serious or sad. Driving is part of what makes us American - and as much as I love cities and Europe and all these other places with great public transit - the American tradition of gas-fired, manual transmission, REAL fucking CARS packed onto long stretches of highways and spewing pollution into the air while waiting at the drive-thru (without the o, g, or h) is just something that defines us. You'll have to pry that steering wheel from my cold, dead, fingers.