• Samvega@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    55
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    2 months ago

    Humans have quite literally invented cars that are better at killing people, especially children.

    “I don’t want children to die in accidents,” say people as they drive huge masses of metal that might do just that.

    • The Pantser@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      18
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      2 months ago

      I’ll keep driving my PEV Minivan that has 360 cameras and I can see in front of me easily. I care about children’s lives, unlike bubba in his lifted pickup truck. Why do you need a 4x4 lifted 3 feet and you live in the suburbs?

      • skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        10
        ·
        2 months ago

        …you know what they say about guys with big lift…

        Funny thing is, the people I know with large vehicles around here always bemoan how difficult it is to park, yet don’t want to solve the obvious problem because twice a year they want to haul a fridge to the dump or pick up something from the home improvement store rather than have it delivered or rent a truck for an hour.

        • socphoenix@midwest.social
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          7
          ·
          2 months ago

          Counting the differences in cost (loan, gas, expected maintenance, insurance etc) it came out to where I would have to use the truck to haul something at least a very weekend possibly more to break even with a much newer car vs just renting a truck once or twice a year. Pickups are almost universally owned by people too stupid for middle school math imo.

        • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          7
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          2 months ago

          always bemoan how difficult it is to park

          I’ve made multuple older men incredibly upset by laughing at them when they say this

          They get pissy and respond with “well you’re some skinny long haired hippie who drives an EV so what do you know?” Which, yeah, all of that is true

          But then I pull up the pictures of me 4x4ing in the rain and snow through fire smoke at work, pointing out that I drove a RAM3500 fully kitted out and lifted with a giant set of 4 110g tanks in the bed blocking anything other than my mirror and cam view, yet I only had issues parking when people didn’t know how to stay in their own lines, and that I regularly had to squeeze my truck into areas with an inch or less of clearance in order to do my fucking job on a construction site, and I never hit anything but a rock (downhill, someone left a fucking rug out on some dirt in the rain and when my truck hit it I just slid til I hit the rock, company deemed me blameless)

          They usually get flustered and change the subject p quick at that point

      • Nougat@fedia.io
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        2 months ago

        Why do you need a 4x4 lifted 3 feet and you live in the suburbs?

        Penis issue

        • cogman@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          15
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          2 months ago

          Yes, but mini vans aren’t lifted 20 ft off the ground with absurdly huge hoods for no apparent reason.

          The reason trucks and SUVs are killing kids is because you can see a 4ft tall person that isn’t standing 100 yards in front. These are the only vehicles with this problem.

          • niucllos@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            11
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            2 months ago

            Additionally, the raised and blunt hood height makes a full-body impact with no force dissipation much more likely, particularly for shorter people, where a more traditional hood shape allows a struck pedestrian to roll over the top and avert some of the force of the strike

          • dafo@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            10
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            2 months ago

            But it’s still blocking the view for us in normal sizes cars.

            I don’t know how many times I’ve had to hope for the best and carefully inch forwards/backwards when being next to a minivan/SUV/pickup. I’ve been close to being in an accident a number of times because of, well mostly, SUVs.

          • thefartographer@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            4
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            2 months ago

            20-foot lifted vehicles would probably be considerably safer:

            1. They’d easily have the clearance to safely navigate over most pedestrians in their path.
            2. Any attempts to balance them well would be incredibly expensive and you’d likely have many drivers whose cars would fall over from insufficiently sized tires or whatever.

            Hmmm… 🤔 Now that I think about it, maybe we should subsidize these lift kits to make this a self-solving problem

    • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      2 months ago

      Driving a truck and not wanting children to die in accidents are in-fact not in conflict with each other. Or are you implying that truck drivers do want them to die?

      • Samvega@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        10
        ·
        2 months ago

        Driving a truck and not wanting children to die in accidents are in-fact not in conflict with each other.

        Then design trucks which are not as deadly to pedestrians on impact.

        • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          2 months ago

          Large vehicles are inherently going to be more dangerous to pedestrians than cars. If you make a truck the size of a car then it no longer functions in the role it was intented for. Why is everyone so focused on trucks anyway? The nose height on most vans is compareable and on semi trucks it double the height of a pickup yet nobody seems to be complaining about those.

              • Samvega@lemmy.blahaj.zone
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                ·
                edit-2
                2 months ago

                Thanks for the strawman, I can burn it for fuel when winter comes.

                I see that you reference Sam Harris in a recent post. Thank you for making it clear that you’re not worth listening to, bye.

      • Krzd@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        2 months ago

        No, but it clearly isn’t important enough to them to influence their choice.

        • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          2 months ago

          So you think people should not buy trucks because they might be in the 0.1% of truck drivers who end up killing a pedestrian with it? What about the people who have a legitimate use for the bed?

          • Krzd@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            edit-2
            2 months ago

            No, they shouldn’t because even in vehicle to vehicle collisions SUVs kill 4 times more people than cars. Source
            The people that have a legitimate use for such trucks should be required to apply for a exception and/or have a CDL.
            Because in fact almost no one actually needs those trucks. Source [1]
            Most people can use a trailer or rent a truck for the 1-2 times per year they need it.

            [1] I work at a hardware store, specifically in the construction materials department. In 2 years of working there I had literally 1 person use their truck bed to haul a pallet of concrete bags, everyone else either used vans or a trailer. And just 2 weeks ago I had the first customer that used a pickup truck (Mercedes X-Class) to tow a 2.5t trailer to transport paving slabs.
            So no, even trades people don’t need those trucks, so why the fuck should a normal “civilian” have those and be 4 times as likely to kill someone??