Ugly, and Everywhere
by Lewis(Disclaimer: this post, like all of our posts, is the work and opinion of the author, not the church.
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Since this blog is about Worldview, I’m compelled to say that in my view, the world has become far less attractive in the past few years.
Not on God’s part, of course, because he is the ultimate artist, but mankind has uglied the place up, and one of the chief contributors to this blight on the beauty surrounding us is Toyota, whose Prius spoils the landscape seemingly everywhere.
My wife, whose aesthetic senses are very well developed through decades of international travel to evaluate temporary living environments (also known as hotels), can barely stand to look at the things. But because she lives in an area where people have the weird idea that driving a Prius is a good thing, she is forced to look at them over and over.
Last Friday we were driving home from dinner at our favorite Chinese restaurant when she noted three of the offenders in a short space. “Yes,” I said, “there are a lot of them around.” We were less than two blocks from our house at the time, and she said, “I’ll bet we’ll see 10 of them before we get home.”
“Impossible!” I said. And we immediately started counting.
“There’s one. There’s another. There’s one more.”
“Here comes one.”
“There’s one – that makes five.”
“Six. Seven.”
“There’s one over there. Eight.”
Just as we reached our street corner we met number nine, and as we turned into our driveway we saw the Prius belonging to our neighbor across the street parked in his driveway. Ten.
Clearly this ugliness has become desireable, since the new Honda Insight looks alarmingly like the new Toyota Prius III. People apparently don’t care that they are making the place look terrible, as long as they can save a few dollars a year in fuel costs and get the social recognition that comes with driving a car that looks like every fifth car on the road.
In an interview with Luke Wilson, he noted that a lot of folks in Hollywood, who apparently are more conscious of status than anything else, drive a Prius and fly private.
I’m in favor of being a good steward of the place God has given us to live (Earth), but in my view that means helping keep it beautiful as well as helping keep it clean. If you insist on driving some kind of gasoline powered car, do the earth and my wife a favor, and at least get one that adds to the beauty of this marvelous planet.
And if you really want to be good to the beauty of the earth and the environment, buy a Tesla.
Tags: beauty, environment, Honda Insight, Luke Wilson, Tesla, Toyota Prius
July 7th, 2009 at 11:44 am
I love the performance of the Prius, and don’t care much for their looks, but think they didn’t take the aerodynamics quite far enough. Why stop at a 50 mpg, why not go for 100mpg?
If only GM had produced this car:
http://www.scaled.com/projects/gmcar.html
For really cool looking car, see the aptera: http://www.aptera.com/
The beautiful people of Hollywood could fly in their private vehicle at ground level, and have even more people look at them.
Yeah, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but cars that look like this are going to be popular in the future, because, well, there is beauty, and then there is Physics.
July 7th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
Great links!
The GM car looks great, but I keep having visions of the “gull-wing” doors flipping open and smashing the cars right by it when the owner tries to get out after parallel parking. That would be a disaster…
I don’t think the Priuses are ugly, but they are anonymous. The Honda hybrids don’t help either. I mixed it up with other cars until I gave up trying to tell one from another.
I find most cars imitate one another. Car models’ designs absolutely bleed into each other, from brand to brand. Color is a problem, too. I hate the metallic paints, because they’re everywhere. If a car is a vivid color, blue, green, yellow or purple, it’s memorable…but most cars are not.
And Lewis, if you want an example of an ugly car, you can take pretty much any one of our cars. Say, our Aerostar that blew up. It is memorable, though; I see models of that car everywhere (although they’re not as numerous as Priuses). So why are you pointing fingers? (Don’t answer that.)
I love the way the new electric vehicles are both functional and uniquely beautiful.
July 7th, 2009 at 11:23 pm
OK, I’m about ready to order an Aptera. An excellent concept, and while the car is a tiny bit quirky in appearance, it is certainly beautifies the landscape and makes it more interesting, all at the same time.
Speaking of quirky, Judy (my wife) and I once bought a car that was thought to fit that description — a 1975 Saab 99. Here is a link to an ad for one of those.
But the best thing about that car was its completely ugly color. We called it “bile green,” though neither of us knew the actual color of bile, simply to describe how bad it was. In fact, the dealer gave us an extra $100 off the price (big money in 1975) because the color was so bad!
Now, of course, I have the added advantage of being able to tell people, “Yes, I’ve always been on the leading edge. Why, clear back in 1975 my wife and I drove a truly “green” car, and we loved it.”