SUVs

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

At 05:13 PM 5/22/01 -0700, Joanna wrote:
>There was this New Yorker cartoon that caught one aspect of the SUV 
>phenomenon: It showed a disgruntled middle aged male sitting next to his 
>buddy in an SUV that towers above the rest of the traffic (but stalled in 
>the middle of this traffic) and saying, "You think I would have gotten one 
>of these if I knew they were going to come out with a $9 boner pill?"
>
>Now Viagra has been around for a while and folks are still buying SUVs... I 
>guess the application of Viagra still requires some intimacy...whereas
SUVs....
>
>I don't know. Again, if you take Robinson Crusoe as one of the founding 
>capitalist myths, the SUV and everything it offers, subverts that myth: 
>it's headed back to the island. It also always struck me that it is the 
>post-holocaust vehicle of choice. There's this fantasy wrapped up in it 
>that after the bombs go off, or the darkies riot, or whatever, you can pack 
>your family in your SUV and head for the hills.

I think you are reading too much into this SUC (sport unitility car) thing.

 People buy them not to make up for some personal inadequacy or to manifest
their deep id, but simply because they have been told so by advertisers and
cued so by others.  Contrary to popular belief, the guiding principle of
human behaviour is following the flock - rather than solipsistic rational
choices.

wojtek