RARA-AVIS: Re: Cars, politics and status

From: Charlie Williams ( cs_will@hotmail.com)
Date: 30 Nov 2006


--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Moore" <moorich@...> wrote:
> I don't think the choice of automobile is necessarily an indicator
of
> politics or status in the real world. There are too many variables
> that can go into that decision. When I was a kid in rural Georgia
I
> was amazed at the number of people who beggared themselves to drive
> an expensive car while they lived in a shack in danger of falling
> down. Now you may stretch the term "political" to cover their
choice
> but no one seeing them on the road would have an accurate indicator
> of financial status.

Years ago there was a bloke in my home town who lived in a shitty hovel in the worst council estate. But that hovel came with a lock-up garage. And in that garage he kept a Lamborgini Countach. People loved that guy.

Personally, for years I drove cheap little "women's cars" (as I was told they were by BMW-driving "real men" in the car park) simply because they were offered to me at staggeringly bargain prices at the right time. Does that make me a feminist? Really, I'd be a bad feminist.

> The one place where your observation is most often true is in
> fiction. Writers do often use the choice of automobile to
underscore
> status of the character.

Definitely. I doubt if any writer takes that decision lightly.

Cheers,

Charlie Williams.

---------- charliewilliams.net



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