Compared to Asphalt Nation (Holtz, 1997), Carjacked focused more on critiquing car culture and less on presenting policy alternatives. Authors Catherine Lutz and Anne Lutz Fernandez also paid more attention to encouraging individual readers to change their transit behavior, e.g., by selling a second or third car, buying used rather than new cars, and investigating options for telecommuting.
Truth About Cars editor Edward Niedermeyer (2010) offered grudging respect for the practical advice that the authors offered but concluded that the book had too much anti-car rhetoric to be taken seriously by those who “love, appreciate and regularly use automobiles.”
That’s an interesting point. If this book had been written primarily with the mythical car enthusiast in mind, would it have gotten much traction with the automotive media? I doubt it. The relationship between the media and the industry is too “incestuous,” as journalist Dan Neil (2005) has pointed out.
Are car buffs too sensitive to deal with basic issues?
However, for the sake of discussion let’s assume that a Carjacked-type book targeting auto enthusiasts did receive substantial press attention. What words would have needed to be removed in order for Niedermeyer to feel comfortable that Carjacked was not grounded in the “politically-driven, auto-hatred of the far left?”
He described as “distracting wedge issues” talk about anthropogenic global warming and the impact of talk show hosts such as Rush Limbaugh on public discourse. Yes, these are politically charged topics, but does that mean they should be ignored?
Let’s consider climate change. Research by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (2010) found that “motor vehicles emerged as the greatest contributor to atmospheric warming now and in the near term. Cars, buses, and trucks release pollutants and greenhouse gases that promote warming, while emitting few aerosols that counteract it.” Should automotive journalists sidestep this issue just because some folks aren’t willing to acknowledge the overwhelming scientific evidence that humans are disrupting the climate?
By the same token, Lutz and Fernandez’s section on drive-time radio doesn’t just focus on right-wing hosts. Instead, the authors offered a more subtle analysis of how the isolation of driving combined with talk radio that is inflammatory — either from the right or the left — can cultivate fear, anger and political polarization. This can impact our public discourse on policy issues as well as increase the incidence of road rage. Again, should journalists ignore such social phenomena just because they have partisan political overtones? I think not.
Subtle analysis dismissed with ‘defensive gut response’
Niedermeyer does deserve credit for reprinting a key paragraph of Carjacked:
“. . . asking individual Americans to take a close look at the problems caused by the automobiles can elicit a defensive gut response. Just as suggesting that a loved one sit down with a marriage counselor or a nutrition advisor can evoke fears of divorce or draconian diet restrictions, asking a driver to examine the full impact of the car on his life can prompt deep anxiety that he will be forced to give up his car. But for most of us, the choice is not between the car and no car. It is about whether it is possible to drive less and pay less for it; it is about recognizing the powerful lure of car advertising and educating ourselves about the schemes of the dealership; it is about making careful choices about where to live when we move. . . .” (p. xiv).
One need only look at the comments section of Niedermeyer’s book review to see how some car buffs can react in a “defensive gut response.” For example, DweezilSFV (2010) stated, “These two can piss off. If they had their way we’d only be able to operate our electric carriages with someone walking along 100 yards in front of us waving a red flag to warn the horses.”
That’s a red herring. The core of Carjacked’s message is to become more conscious about why and how we use the automobile — and that each of us may come to different conclusions depending upon the circumstances of our lives. Niedermeyer keyed into the personal responsibility side of that discussion and dismissed the book’s policy implications as reflecting “a certain amount of utopian anti-car-ism.”
Eh. Carjacked strikes me as the work of pragmatic reformists rather than eco-radicals. Alas, it’s a lot easier to reject an argument by declaring it extreme than to address its substance.
Carjacked: The Culture of the Automobile and its Effect on Our Lives
- Catherine Lutz and Anne Lutz Fernandez; 2010
- Palgrave Macmillan, New York, NY
“We don’t just have more cars, of course, we have more car. Our vehicles are much bigger and more powerful than ever before. American manufacturers have put their vehicles on a course of steroids over the last decade or two, almost doubling their fleets’ horsepower.” (p. 3)
“Many people continue to see the car as a man’s tool and take pleasure in being, or being attached to, a man who loves cars. Like a man who watches football rather than tennis, and drinks scotch rather than chardonnay, he is considered a man’s man if he understands and takes control of a car, especially a powerful one.” (p. 22)
“The idea that a certain number of car deaths is inevitable is swiftly debunked by a quick look overseas. Pedestrians in the United States, per trip, are three times more likely to be killed by cars than pedestrians in Germany and over six times more likely to be killed than those in the Netherlands.” (p. 203)
OTHER REVIEWS:
Autosavant | Times Higher Education | The Truth About Cars | Amazon | Goodreads
RE:SOURCES
- DweezilSFV; 2010. Commentator in “Book Review: Carjacked: The Culture of Automobiles And Its Effects On Our Lives.” The Truth About Cars. Posted February 26; accessed April 30, 2013.
- Kay, Jane Holtz; 1997. Asphalt Nation: How the Automobile Took Over American and How We Can Take it Back. Crown Publishers, New York, NY.
- NASA; 2010. “Road Transportation Emerges as Key Driver of Warming.” National Aeronautics and Space Administration Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Posted February 28; accessed April 30, 2013.
- Neil, Dan; 2005. “Interview with Brooke Gladstone & Dan Neil: A Perfect Vehicle for Criticism.” Onthemedia.org, April 15. No link; quote from Wikipedia entry “Dan Neil.” Accessed January 8.
- Niedermeyer, Edward; 2010. “Book Review: Carjacked: The Culture of Automobiles And Its Effects On Our Lives.” The Truth About Cars. Posted February 26; accessed April 30, 2013.
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