SUV Nation

Today when my sister and I were heading to the mall in her little Saturn, I noticed an enormous Lincoln Navigator out the driver's side window. When I looked to the other side, there was a more modest Range Rover. In our lane alone, (within eyeshot, anyway) there were six SUV's. As we passed some of them by while getting onto the off-ramp, I also took notice of the fact that most of them didn't have any passengers, just the driver. So I made a comment. It's the same comment that I make every time I see luxury SUV's.


I can hear the trees screaming as they fall. And also...

Why??

Clearly, you're not driving it to any campground, not with the manolos and chanel suits that match. The fact is that SUV's are one of the single largest contributors of harmful emissions. Sure they have lots of power and many people consider them to be status symbols, but don't forget that a super-sized engine means super-sized emissions. I officially quit smoking a few weeks ago, but I'm reminded of one day this past winter when I was huddled outside with some co-workers having a cigarette. A woman who worked in the adjoining building pulled into the parking lot in her massive SUV, and then proceeded to bitch and complain the whole way into the restaurant about how it's unfair for non-smokers to have to walk past a "cloud of smoke" on their way into a bar, and also about how we're polluting the environment every time we light up.

Now, I'm not saying that isn't true. It's obviously true. My point is that non-smokers are officially winning the battle. Within five years, there will be a Toronto by-law in place stating that in addition to not being allowed to smoke in the usual places (malls, government buildings, airports, bars, pool halls, bingo halls, etc) you cannot smoke on the street, in your car (if you are on city property, this discludes private driveways etc), or on restaurant patios.

But what about the battle of the enviromentalists?

Smoking will eventually be banned outright. Will there ever be a ban on SUV's? Not likely. I'm sure that a fair amount of the municipal and provincial government officials who would be responsible for initiating such a bill already have an SUV or two parked in their driveways at home. And now the province of Ontario is discontinuing the Drive Clean program. Drive Clean was basically the only government initiative that even came close to trying to put a lid on the pollution situation in the province. Sure it was mostly bullshit, but at least it got a lot of big time polluters off the road. It was set up under the ambitious plan that this province would one day be able to say that they tried their darndest to attain Kyoto numbers.

So here we are.

Tabi said I should draw a cartoon of an SUV driving up a road into some beautiful wooded area, with the path of destruction behind it. A lot of people buy an SUV so they can pack it full of shit on their camping trips. But consider this... all that nature that you're driving your SUV out to isn't going to be around for long if you keep it up.

The irony is just fucking sad.