Stop Doing This in 2024: The Outdated Car Trends We Need to Ditch NOW!
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- Опубліковано 27 сер 2024
- I needed to get some stuff off my chest about car culture in 2024. I've been around the community since I was a kid and seeing its current state worries me. The antics the few are perpetrating have put our entire community under a microscope. We can all have fun without being idiots.
#carculture #cars #idiots #rant
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I'm with you. I have been very active in the Fiat community, which has been somewhat insulated from the typical young import tuner crowd, and definitely insulated from the muscle bros, but that element is there. I stopped going to "local car meets" and "cars and coffee" type events for a variety of reasons that made them either not fun, or downright unsafe. I've had people insist that I have to street race them, who don't seem to understand the purpose of a street/track build where the street is daily and the track has curves. That I'm not a wuss because I meet them on the freeway won't drag race their K swapped whatever or their v8 whosit in my 500 Abarth or 124 Spider because I enjoy my cars differently than that. Went to my share of meets that ended up shut down by the police, and realized that living "on the edge of the law" isn't what I enjoy doing.
In 2015 I started an organized event that went to a rural area for spirited driving with the Fiat community, which was handled by a popular vendor afterwards. That got shut down about 3 years ago because as it got bigger we started having issues with people pushing the limits of safety way too far. After it became obvious things were getting out of hand we made a decision to stop the event because we didn't want to be responsible for someone's driving off a mountain with their underage children. I still regularly have people ask why we don't resume that annual event. I wish we could, I made a lot of friends. But a few bad apples spoil the events.
I've recently been criticized from other members of the community because I daily drive my 124 Spider, and I take it to the track regularly, and I use it like a car. Apparently I was supposed to protect it in a garage from the elements and baby it. I was like, what are we here for, to criticize others for not sharing our vision of cars as collectibles to not be enjoyed?
I tried going to the big Houston car meets, but apparently having a car that's not "purebred" enough or expensive enough means you get relegated to the spectator lot. I was the stupid guy who showed up in an Italian car on Italian day, and got turned away at the gate because my brand of Italian car wasn't exclusive enough. And that was before the muscle bros got themselves banned.
Mostly I just go out by myself now, or go help a few of my friends wrench on their cars.
I am glad you didn't give in to the nonsense. People like that will always try to recruit more lunatics to join the courtyard. Whatever you drive, love it, learn it, and appreciate it. It doesn't matter if you are a one-make, one-model, multi-make, or collector-type of enthusiast, there is something out there for everyone.
Guys that talk about car culture but dont have track day videos but discuss meetups is wild. Drive the car, break it, upgrade, repeat.
I walk that walk and have the track day videos, but people each enjoy their cars differently. Some people just like having a nice car and sharing that experience with their buddies. It's when we start gatekeeping each other that it becomes toxic. Like "You can't be a car guy if you don't race it" or like happened to me recently "You shouldn't let that car get rained on" wtf ... I drive my car the way I want. Which, does happen to include amateur track day videos sometimes though usually I can't be bothered to save the footage.
Yeah its wild out there. Its crazy that I feel like I cant even take my 392 Challenger out to a movie, or the mall, or park overnight not in the garage because its so likely to get stolen and end up fucked up from these side show clowns. Obviously, I have a muscle car now, but had a Civic Si, RX7, IS300, mini trucks, etc etc. I have been in the car game since 2004 but was into imports since the late 90s, ran a couple car clubs, ran a local car forum, and now I have no desire to be a part of the modern car culture. These dudes these days don't know how to be a tuner. How to modify their platform to be tasteful. Its all about how loud, or how much money you spend, or how much disregard you have for the car you have or other people on the road. Us old heads try to guide these kids but they are more concerned with TikTok and Insta than having a clean well modded car.
I do think the culture is a reflection of society and the attention seeking disease thats so pervasive. The fact that you have to damn near hire security guards to watch your car is crazy. I had a friend that bought a new gen 392 Charger a while back. Only had it 1 week (still had a paper tag on it) when they stole the wheels, while it was parking at his apartment in a gate parking deck.
People have become so addicted to these social media "builds" where the perception is dumping tons of money in to cars is the only way so the people watching feed into it and try to emulate. Some of these car bros will buy any and everything that is sold to them in the hopes of "building something, lol" that will bring them the same attention as the builds they see online.
I think what you said in your video is fair. I’ve been around the the auto enthusiast culture since I was born thanks to my family being called enthusiasm cells.
My opinion in 2024 car culture is there is no responsibility for public safety, and there is no respect for vehicles in general.
I do like how regardless of how old or how young you are people still remain to be enthusiast about the car culture, but it certainly doesn’t compare to the community that driven by passion for outcome.
What's crazy is that when I was young a car was seen as the "grail". When you got it, you loved it more than life, lol! You wanted to make sure you took care of it like your life depended on it, especially when your father tells you that if you break, you better fix it because he isn't, lol! My dad was a +30 yr ASE mechanic and taught me the value of maintenance and care. These kids today are driving trash cans with wheels. Everything is for show and clout. Then when the car breaks or they crash it, their parents buy them another to do the same.
I believe what you are seeing is we have a major societal issue, where people are overly selfish and lack respect for others. Unfortunately my Challenger Scat Pack did get stolen. The car got the attention because I kept it clean. Really enjoyed it as a road trip car. I didn't do nothing major to it except the rear seat delete. A catch can and the lower air intake box from a Hellcat. Put a set of American Racing Hellion wheels on it. But I don't do anything where I can put others at risk and the popping exhaust is annoying to me. I do prefer to be around the chilled car guys versus the goofs here go out here and do the dumb shit that gives the community a negative image. Hope to have another Scat Pack in a couple years, by then I hope they lose their coolness factor to the masses.
Man that sucks! Some people don't want to work for anything and rather take someone else's hard work. I have no respect for people like that and hope they are caught an jailed. I do hope you get another Scat Pack and enjoy the hell out of it! The community can be awesome because you get to share your passion with other like minded people, no matter what vehicle or mods they have, the passion is the same.
Sick S2K my man.. 😎
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I could see it coming when everything went from forums to facebook. 10-15 years ago, you had to join the forum and actually be a member before you got invited to meets and other stuff. Now its on facebook with idiots who gotta put their lack of brain cells on stream.
My local car community has gone to hell. Most local car shows are nothing but 40 different charger/challengers or theres 10 basically brand new cars in the show. Then maybe 2-3 cool old cars. I wanna go to the car show and see the type of vehicles that carfax doesn't know about. Not your moms old Altima that you and your buddies ruined in 20 mins and covered in stickers like a drunk 2 year old.
The discussions about the muscle bros being banned from the Houston events really do show the divides in the car community and what's gone wrong. No respect for other people, the law, or the efforts of event organizers to put on an event that doesn't have to happen.
I do think every sub-group of the community has its toxic side. I know plenty of muscle car bros that hate what their sub-group has become and many of them stay out of the "community". Unfortunately, when you have relatively in-expensive, high horsepower vehicles available at every domestic dealer in the country, ignorant people will take advantage and ruin it for everyone else. I grew up building muscle cars and can say without a doubt the culture around it was absolutely different in the 2000', 1990's and prior.