I suppose it shouldn’t come as a surprise that a group of people who are pretty deeply involved in the automotive enthusiast community also have some opinions about it. And, indeed, the comment section reveals that a lot of you have some feelings about the clichés that have become a big part of automotive enthusiasm.
In response to our Question of the Day post about what enthusiast stereotypes annoy you the most, we got a lot of responses. And it seems that a lot of you think that car lovers need to keep up with the times.
Old is good, new is bad
One of the most commonly referenced pet peeves was a general respect for all things old and, perhaps more to the point, a skepticism about all things new. The broad strokes of this annoyance were summed up well by user McFly.
“I’m a bit tired of regressive ‘car enthusiasts’, desperately clinging to old tech and demanding that development must be stopped. Cars are a symbol, maybe the symbol, of modernity. If you don’t want to move ahead, don’t drive,” McFly wrote. “It goes without saying that not all new solutions are good, just as all old solutions weren’t good either. But trying new solutions, and make the best ones stick, is what development is about. I totally see the point in owning old cars for nostalgia, but my choice in nostalgia has nothing to do with my choice of a new car.”
Read: What Enthusiast Cliché Are You Sick Of Hearing Repeated?
EVs are the devil’s work
Along the same lines, commenters noted a resistance to electric vehicles among enthusiasts. To user Nobody Exist’s point, there was some controversy about this in the comments section, but they said they’re sick of hearing car lovers claim that EVs are the tool of the devil.
“It infuriates me when people say that EVs are being forced upon them by the ‘woke democrats’ or anything like that,” they wrote. “No one is telling you what car you can buy. You can still go to a showroom and blow $100k on an 11 MPG RAM TRX.”
Bashing economy cars
Others, like user Holden Ute, were annoyed about the lack of love that small, simple, economy cars get. In concert with others complaining that some critics aren’t good at reviewing the cars in their proper context (i.e. it can feel like they are sometimes inappropriately compared to premium vehicles), it’s true that a good economy car is a delight that often goes unappreciated.
“Shitting on economy cars like the Kia Rio or Versa,” wrote Holden Ute. “There is a beauty in cars that’ll get you from A-B and aren’t trying to be anything they’re not.”
Vent haters
User Maher landed on a particular peeve of mine relating to fake vents. While I agree that an overabundance of needless design complications can look cluttered or cheap, I staunchly believe that there is nothing inherently wrong with a fake vent. Aesthetics are a perfectly good reason for that fake vent to be there, and if poking a hole through the body would make the car less efficient, then I’m happy the automaker didn’t.
Overvaluing a single feature
Other complaints can be summed up as giving any one aspect of a car (or the car itself) too much value. While user Jo R is tired of hearing people cast judgment on others based entirely on the car they drive, user BoxerFanatic is sick of seeing any one performance metric act as a stand in for its overall competence.
Low miles obsession
Finally, user Kip is sick of seeing low miles being praised and held up as a sign of the quality of a vehicle. They complain that driving a car a reasonable amount and properly maintaining it is better than letting it sit.
“The fact that a 20-something year-old Ferrari 348 has only 300-something miles on the odometer is a reason to boo and hiss the owner and lament the destruction of a great car, not reward them with a purchase price that’s 3x the original MSRP,” writes Kip.
Are there any other clichés you’re sick of hearing about? Do you agree or disagree with these? Let us know in the comments below.
