--- Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote: >
> Why of the infinite number of false categories one can extract from
> daily life in the United States should one pick on the SUV drivers and
> invent a mystic explanation holding them together as a sort of Platonic
> form?
[...]
> Please offer
> me a sociological, historical, or psychological interpretation.
>
I think the answer is "because it works", and the restriction of the grounds for treating SUV owners as a cateogry to "sociological, historical or psychological" is inappropriate. Human beings flock together like sheep, presumably for the same reasons as do sheep, and people who have made the same kind of choice in one area are likely to have made the same kind of choice in other areas. I personally harbour a deep suspicion of the following groups as likely to either have repulsive political views, or to be bores, or both, in descending order of their performance as more or less reliable indicators:
People with highly polished shoes People with skinhead haircuts Yound male owners of Sony Playstations Drivers of Porsches Drinkers of alcopops Men with goatee beards
There are other groups of people who I tend to like, but naming them is nowhere near as much fun. Choosing a vehicle has always been something of a statement of personality for the class of people who can afford to choose their vehicles, and I'd be surprised if the SUV thing was any different.
dd
===== ... in countries which do not enjoy Mediterranean sunshine idleness is more difficult, and a great public propaganda will be required to inaugurate it. -- Bertrand Russell
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