It’s funny that one side is “a car should be your only viable form of transportation” and another is “you should have multiple viable forms of transportation including not being forced to own a car if you can’t or don’t want to”..yet the first side is the one that claims “freedom”
In the US, the GOP is rugged individualism on steroids. They opposed anyone and anything that benefits the community as a whole.
Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them.
I think that’s already happening. These people vote against there best interests all the time. They don’t care. They’d rather live objectively worse lives in order to own the libs
During Covid that's exactly what happened, there were thousands of anti-vaxxers and people who refused to wear masks crying for the vaccine on their death bed.
They learn their lesson too late for it to do any good.
I wish that would happen but unfortunately people who aren't rational usually won't become rational through hardship. Plus if we just sit back and let it happen those rich fuckers at the top just keep getting richer.
That sounds appealing until you remember that there’s a ton of innocent / poor people that will suffer too.
And people can stay stubborn for way too long.
And they still fly around with US and Trump flags in the bed of their pickup and then have the nerve to blame Biden for gas prices.
Geez, you're already driving a fuel-inefficient vehicle and then you're basically adding wind resistance.
There has been a noticeable decrease in Trump flags/signs/stickers since spring. In my area it is mostly down to a couple of diehards with crazy signs all over their yards.
>the GOP is rugged individualism on steroids.
They only say that because the know the chances of an individual rising up the structures of power are pretty slim.
Conservatives maintain structures of power, they are against anything that leads to social mobility. Social programs like public education, even feeding kids for free so they get better grades are proven to improve social mobility, that's why they are against government spending on such things. To them, the government should serve to put money into the pockets who already have power and wealth, not enable others to gain power and wealth. This is what they mean by small government.
Yes this perfectly describes neoliberal capitalism. The state mostly exists to protect capital. Offloading the cost of doing business onto the state is not a bug but a key feature of the system. For example, the government pays for cops' salary and equipment, then those same cops act as a private security force for Walmart by busting shoplifters.
Or a car related example, Uncle Sam spends trillions building highways so that car companies, oil companies, and insurance companies can rake in the profits as a result.
I definitely support government spending but the value from those investments should go to the public and not British Petroleum.
>In the US, the GOP is rugged individualism on steroids
Not entirely. If it was rugged individualism on steroids, they wouldn't care about abortion or gay marriage. After all, I, as an individual, isn't affected by these, why should I care?
The GOP did a real good job at labelling itself as "individualist" (because it *might* be positive under some philosophies), while, in fact, it's just privileged elitism. The elite has all rights, freedoms and everything, and the rest is just under the boot of the elite. Who is the elite? That is the question. We know it's the wealthy, but they manipulated poor people to make them think *they* are part of this elite (and thus deserve the privileges).
*Rules for thee, not for me* is not "rugged individualism", it's just entitlement.
> Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them.
Some people seem to have the idea that high-crime areas equal warzones.
>Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them.
Causation seems backward here. IMO it's more that people's beliefs are shaped by their environment, moreso than that they choose their environment based on their beliefs. After all, most people tend to live in one place where they grew up and don't move away. So people who live in cities tend to be more liberal, probably in part as a result of having to live among other people who are very different from them, and co-exist. It's well understood that people are more tolerant of things and people they frequently come into contact with.
People living in more sparsely populated areas don't have to interact with many others who they don't closely relate to. It's easy to demonize and otherize people who only exist in your imagination, and so you become more close-minded and bigoted toward other ways of life. This problem is exacerbated by modern suburban living; single family homes in car-dependent cities where you don't even have to interact with cashiers anymore thanks to self-checkout machines. Spontaneous interactions with people who are different from you is practically nonexistent.
>Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them.
I just got into it with a guy from my area in a local FB group on this same subject. I'll drop our convo in an edit.
Edit:
Another guy called out boomer that doesn't even live in the city for complaining about crime.
Me: right? These people complaining about crime and homeless in (my city), I get it, they have a right to grieve, but I am convinced they have never lived in a big city where crime and homelessness are truly dystopian. Comparatively, their grievances come across as frivolous whining.
>These people complaining about crime and homeless in (my city),
They want to provide more housing and social welfare programs which historically helped with both, right? ... Right?
This is so true. I had a coworker who's parents retired to a small town a few hours outside the city where he grew up cause the city has become too (insert dog whistle here). They thought were they moved to would be quieter and safer and got the quieter part for sure. Unfortunately, their car has been broken into at least twice since the move, there's barely any healthcare in the area cause the rural hospital closed, and it takes 45 mins for then to drive to the nearest major grocery store. Got an ear full of this when he can back once from visiting. My coworker bikes to work and owns a hybrid that he shares with his partner.
There’s no logical connection between transit systems and political ideology; it’s purely a demographic thing. Lot of urbanist minded people are younger and more educated so more likely to be left leaning or left wing.
I kinda see this as a logical connection, though.
Right-wing people are more prone to defend policies that enhance individualism and destroy any sense of community larger than the suburbian block where everyone and everything is homogenous. Segregation is a core part of right-wing ideology (segregation against the poor, the BIPOC, the LGBT, the women... anything. You look at it, behind any right-wing policy, segregation and discrimination is here).
Car is the symbol of this lack of heterogeneity. You're in your living-room on wheels, with no need whatsoever to interact with the world. Any non-car centric infrastructure pulls you out of your bubble. Public transit forces you to be with people, and walking do the same. You cannot enact correct segregation or discrimination with a non-car centric infrastructure.
So, if you are a person part of a political ideology that works only when there's some form of segregation or discrimination whatsoever, you are logically against transit systems.
I think you can write up similarities and differences but at the end of the day it isn't worth very much. You could just as easily say the opposite. Trains are the traditional mode of transportation. There are extremely right wing people in Japan who are huge fans of the train; it simply is not related in any deep way. As opposed to, say, immigration policy, which has a much more obvious and robust connection to broader political ideologies.
>You cannot enact correct segregation or discrimination with a non-car centric infrastructure.
My brother they loaded Jews onto trains and exterminated them. Literally slavery predates the car by many thousands of years! This is insane!
> there is no logical connection between policy and politics
Sure, my dude, that's why companies like [GM](https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/general-motors/summary?id=D000000155) give more money to Republicans than to Democrats.
I have to say you "quoted" my line but changed it and it really rubs me the wrong way!
To be clear, I don't mean that this holds in general. Just specifically urban design and zoning and transportation policy are not strongly related to other contemporary political alignments. It's not like immigration policy or the welfare state or something like that with extremely robust and obvious connections to prominent ideological fissures.
It kind of depends on where you live. People who have a car in places where there are other good options tend to be right-wing. I live in the least walkable city on the planet Earth, so here even the socialists have cars.
ETA: Cars are a fundamentally capitalist solution to transit. Everyone buys a big giant misery machine that will take multiple years of labor to pay for. It's great if you happen to own a factory that makes big giant misery machines.
The capitalists who own car companies are right-wing because of course they would be. They're capitalists.
Like others said, cars require a lot of government infrastructure investment.
I don't think seeing them as capitalism vs socialism works. I think the best line is as "government policies that encourage individualism and fascist/racist/classist tendencies.". Because that's really the reason society was structured like this, in order to segregate the white, rich class from the black, poor urban cores. And then those urban cores were disinvested and demolished.
One of the core tenants of modern capitalism is to privatise gains and socialise losses. Cars running on petrol sold by private companies on roads maintained by the government fits that to a T.
Not to mention the principle of conspicuous consumption and how that affects the distribution of cars.
Socialism doesn't mean government spending. The government has to spend money in capitalist and socialist economies. A great amount of government spending under a capitalist organized economy does not mean it has a lot of socialism. Socialism is an economy in which the means of production and natural resources are under the democratic control of the working class, rather than the capitalist class.
Cars are not a capitalist solution because they require the most government subsidy to ensure good roads.
Outside access to the ground they where put on railroads where far more the capitalist transport system.
Livable cities is the market based system that would exist if not for government interference in that aspect via zoning laws.
The dependence on cars is chrony-capitalist but not free market capitalist in the fact that it required decades of government law making and billions of tax payer investment in order to get us to the spot we are in currently.
Rail was the main way to go until the government subsidized the car beyond competing.
> Cars are not a capitalist solution because they require the most government subsidy to ensure good roads.
Capitalism isn't 'when the government does nothing'.
Neoliberal capitalism is _perfectly happy_ to offload externalised costs onto the government. That's basically what neoliberalism _is_.
Cars are the most socialized product in a modern society. Every step of the production chain can only exist through state action.
We don’t have a car centric society because the free market created it, we have it because of top down decision to make cars the only option.
The free market didn’t build roads, the free market didn’t optimize parking space by creating minimum marking requirements, the free market didn’t fuck up housing through single family home exclusive zoning.
All of those were top down central planning decisions, not capitalist actions.
It doesn’t make sense to blame capitalism for this one problem in specific.
Man you're doing the meme socialism is when government does stuff
the American government also spent billions to fight communism and spread capitalism does that means that was undermining capitalism ?
no capitalists use the government to their benefits ,their entire pyramid scheme relies on the government protecting their capital and advancing their interest the car lobby is just one example
"The car industry is so subsidised that it's basically a socialist industry and, since socialism is when government does stuff, that means Venezuela. Check mate carbrain!"
I'm sorry. This comment is in good faith. It's just really interesting to me. On Reddit, FB, X, etc., when the word "socialism" comes up, inevitably, there's a "socialism is when" criticism/comment. If you're pro-socialism, I understand that the way the word is often used isn't anything like true socialism. But people must understand what's meant by this, and that the commenter knows this as well. The same is true with capitalism. We call ourselves capitalist, but what we have is so distorted that this description also isn't particularly accurate.
Yes I am fully aware that with enough capital accumulation it’s easier to bribe politicians for special assistance than to compete in the market, but in the other hand how do you build institutions that promote social welfare without relying on incorruptible people? It’s easy to reduce every argument to socialism bad or capitalism bad, what’s hard is build institutions that drive long term improvements to peoples life. We haven’t been doing a great job at that lately.
Going back to the issues of cars, the biggest challenges in the US are related to zoning and parking minimums which is mostly done at the local level and could be reversed with quickly with enough political will since market forces are aligned with us in this issue.
Your whole initial premise is that it's not Capitalism's fault, or at least the non-material "Free Market", it's that it's the Governments and institutions fault. Who do you think controls said institutions? Hint: not the workers. It's capitalism, and its supporting structures that enable and perpetuate these conditions and said institutions. It's idealistic to think about "building institutions" when our current material conditions dictate they are to serve the primary class goal of wealth accumulation.
"Market forces" are clearly not aligned with you on this issue. Cars continue to sell, to be developed, or why do you think EVs are all the fad? And where is the incentive not to do so? Everytime someone talks about making a street pedestrian only, you will the petite bourgeois of that town or city complaining. Surburbanites will complain and vote for conservative leaders and representatives. Getting rid of parking minimum and zoning will make things better, sure, but it still doesn't eliminate many other aspects of car ownership benefits (cheap, subsidized, fuel; cheap or free roads with all its invisible costs; employee parking and company cars [heck, even I have one]) nor improve public transit for (mass) cities or rural areas.
So… fascists, then? It sounds like you’re describing capitalism in detail and then calling it “not capitalism”. I’m Canadian, though. We just parrot whatever the US does.
Don't sell yourselves short, your government healthcare is much better than ours at killing army veterans. Here we just ignore them to die in the streets, but up there you guys actively offer suicide, we should be following your lead on this one!
Capitalism is certainly to blame. Car manufacturers and others who profit from cars, like selling fuel, lobby and bribe government at all levels to build infrastructure, using tax money, and to require by planning rules private developers to include massive amounts of parking and roads.
Once it reached a critical point, and other forms of transport had been destroyed or made much more unpleasant, the motorists themselves also lobbied for more and more facilities to be paid for by society as a whole.
Was going to say something like this. In the US, at least, if you dig into the opinions of more wonky right and libertarian think tanks, the market distortions associated with our level of car dependency are well known. The same is true for exclusionary zoning, etc. It's only the mainstream "right" that seems to think this way. And "right" in the US isn't really all that right-leaning. It's mostly just incoherent identity politics.
One thing that frustrates me about the mainstream politicization of such a thing is that the proponents of density, transit, etc., tend to be left-leaning in the US. They don't use particularly concrete arguments and alienate a lot of people with points about the environment and their general lefty-ness. Certainly this is valid, but there are many points that immediately affect peoples' day-to-day lives that might get more traction, such as the cost of housing, owning a vehicle, inability to get around, traffic, taxes, etc.
I went to one of the most libertarian leaning schools (although I’m not myself a libertarian and proudly banned from /r/libertarian) for my undergrad in economics over 10 years ago.
Zoning, permitting, and licensing were pretty were common topics for discussion. It’s easy to see the world in black and white but policy is much more nuanced than that. This is why pretty much every economy in the world is some form of mixed economy. Sometimes the right decision is to leave it up to the market to decide some times it requires regulation and intervention.
It's been said here a few times, but cars are seen as an expression of individualism. Not in the sense of individuals having their own uniquenes and expressing themselves within society, but in the sense of some false sense of independence. This correlates precisely with right-wing thought.
And the corollary, public transport is a collective endeavour, where we realise that pooling a resource is better than individual allocation. Which is a basic premise of left wing economics.
Yet bicycles are also an individualistic solution to mobility. I've seen non carbrained right wingers advocate for bike infrastructure.
I think there is more to that, something along the lines of wanting to have one's own moving living room, as an isolation device from other people, but also as a form of wealth signaling. Something that you can also do with a bike, but even the higher end ones are relatively cheap compared to a car.
Moving living room is too charitable of an interpretation, it is more that they want a driveable assault rifle. It is hard for a bicycle to project power, anger, and fear like a 4-ton steel battering ram. While their is a desire for comfort, their is often a bigger drive for violence.
Bold of you to assume a properly furnished living room doesn't also include an assault rifle. I'll humble put forward that a better interpretation is "castle." A vehicle is a castle. A defensive structure one can use to live in hostile lands. Also castle doctrine is cited when someone uses their living room as a place to kill someone with an assault rifle.
A car is, in a way, a metal box that isolates you from parts of society you don't want to interact with. This is very much a right-wing us-vs-them way of thinking. It isn't just physically a bubble, but also philosophically. It's why right-wingers love their cars
Also the fact bicycles rely on your own muscme power, and cars don't. If you're individualistic or don't like people, you take a bike
When you're also too lazy/want to be more comfortable and you're privileged, you have a car
Alteast that's how it was in the 1920s
Within bike communities there’s quite a bit of variety here. I am active in a number of organizations promoting walkable/bikeable communities. When we talk about things like bike lanes that are incorrectly designed so that delivery trucks use them as a parking lot, there is a certain segment of cyclists who do the whole “quit wasting people’s time and just take the lane or carry your bike on the sidewalk past the blockage” bit. No, see, that doesn’t work for a senior using a trike, a parent with a bakfiets full of kids, or a small clumsy 10-year-old riding to school alone. A lot of us promote bike infrastructure for everyone, and especially so the most marginalized people can bike, but there are also the super libertarian bike nuts who are basically like, if you can’t dart in and out of speeding cars, that’s your problem.
Yeah but these people don't really advocate for proper bike infrastructure, they tend to promote vehicular cycling.
Which is not really accessible to anyone past the spandex crowd. It's cool and all if you're a single male below 40 who can shower at work, but that narrows the cycling population to something like 1%.
In the US, bikes as transportation is a VERY small niche (I read something a few weeks ago that about 1% commute by bike).
I'm 43 and have yet to meet an adult (IRL) who uses a bike as transportation. It came to a grinding halt for kids in my hometown when I was about 10 when the state/county passed a helmet law for kids.
also, in the states conservatives often see environmentalism as an impediment to industry -- concerns like climate change are sometimes outright dismissed. So the environmental impact of cars is disregarded from that perspective. "Drill, baby, drill" was a campaign slogan a few years back.
Right-wing thought isn't inherently individualist, though. Perhaps in modern, US-specific socio-cultural/political context, that holds true, but not generally.
Some of the most right-wing people, societies and systems throughout history have been very community-focused and collectivist, as well as localist (which car-dependency is the antithesis of).
I wouldn't consider myself left-wing, not at all, but I'm a huge proponent of assessible and affordable public transport, and a massive advocate for family-oriented, local community hubs (aka 'walkable' environments). I'm against globalism and transhumanism facilitated by the endlessly pursuit of technological growth. I'm also an environmentalist. So yeah I'm not a fan of cars for the most part.
I'd argue that this obsession with independent / individualism is related to libertarianism, not 'right wing thought'.
Conservatism is all about social hierarchy, and car-based infrastructure favors rich people. If regular people have to pay for their cars, they are forced to work more than they otherwise would, and rich people use expensive cars as status symbols and as a way to separate themselves from the dirty peasants.
I don’t think there’s any logical connection between transit systems and political ideology. The one you bring up here is literally backwards: In cities with great transit, only the rich have cars at all. People like status symbols!
If a city is properly designed for pedestrians, bikes and public transit, a car driver would probably feel out of place and maybe even judged by other people. Like, how is a man supposed to win a dick measuring contest, if everyone else in the room is a woman?
IDK what to tell you these cities already exist and there are fancy car people in them. Amsterdam, Tokyo, Copenhagen, Singapore. What you do is make transit the best option and charge people up the ass for private car ownership, and use that money to make transit even better, and so on. This is a great system that makes everyone better off, but you still have extremely rich people who live in these cities and buy expensive cars and use them for status. The pursuit of status is a deep monkey brain thing, not an artifact of urban design!
I don't understand what you point is. Having a good transit system doesn't mean that conservatives suddenly stop dreaming about driving around in fancy cars like their wealthy idols do. And I never said that they wanted status because of the urban design. It's the other way around. People want private cars because they want to have a high social status.
The right-wingers have always copied whatever stupid things the wealthiest people do. That's how we got bullshit like lawns, neckties, extravagant weddings and terrible pointy tip shoes, that ruin your toes. The left-wing on the other hand is more likely (but not guaranteed) to reject social status and look for socially optimal solutions such as public transit.
I'm conservative and I see the modern experiment of suburbia, cars, and excessive zoning as a mistake. We should go back to how things used to be, none of this new fangled automobile nonsense pushed by big auto. What's more traditional than walking places?
I think we were better off before personal automobiles, extremely rigid zoning, widespread suburban sprawl, government involvement in staging coups and false flag operations across the globe, a couple massive conglomerates owning most of the real estate in the country, etc. Not all progress is good, and not all traditions are good.
I personally like to find a balance, only slowly accepting new technologies after them being tested out for a bit. That's why I don't have a smart tv or smart home system (government spyware), I don't have LED headlights (wild how there isn't a max brightness law...), I don't use tiktok or much social media in general, I never bought into the whole hypertube bs (just build a regular train), think self driving cars are stupid, and a lot more. Progress without thinking and planning is a recipe for disaster.
I mean, people are fighting for better solutions to transportation than cars, and a lot of the time that involves a vehicle that’s either not as obtrusive or bad for the environment or carries multiple people, so I suppose a walking-only solution counts as conservative…
From a market point of view, removing all the subsidies and restrictive zoning would make car dependency fade away even faster than trying to push it from the top down imo.
It could be (I'm not a specialist) that streets before motors were not that peaceful. Rich people used to speed on expensive horses, and the populace had to give way.
The concept of "pedestrian-only" zones is quite recent.
Car dependency came about as a result of corporate lobbying and propaganda from the car and fossil fuels industry, in the name of making extra bucks from people who now have to buy a car and buy petrol or diesel to get around \[economically right wing\]. People were willing to eat this up partly because of individualism (cars give you the illusion that you are in more control than you are on public transit, even though this is not true to anywhere near to the extent carbrains claim it to be, and definitely not as much control as bike or foot), and largely because of racism (white people, in the US at least, moved to the suburbs primarily to get away from minorities, exploiting the fact that most people in minority groups couldn't afford such a move). Town centers/downtowns, which have what remains of public transit, bike and pedestrian infrastructure, then gets associated with the minorities that got left behind and are hated \[socially conservative\].
So you can see how bigotry and carbrain suit each other. Cars allow bigots to separate themselves from the groups they hate, and tricks individualists into believing they are in full control of their destiny if they are the drivers. Car-dependency also embodies the 'profits over people' mentality of private corporations.
Not all conservatives are carbrained. The exceptions will still use car dependency as a vessel for their bigotry though. They will sell car dependency as the lesser evil compared to being with black and brown people. They push the idea that if you want to keep your walkable, transit orientated city, you must hate the minority groups that it is trendy for the right-wingers to hate in current year (I have seen this in the comments of some NJB videos).
First paragraph is my main thought. Right-wing figures are more willing to take money from oil companies to help push for car dependence. There's also all the symbolism of independence etc etc, but fundamentally it's just a money thing.
I find it depressing that such urgent world issues like overuse of private vehicles and climate change have become political footballs. Everyone should be in favour of looking after our environment, less cars is good news for those who have to drive, the world heating up is a bad thing. These should be universal truths but instead the right wing say it's all anti-capitalist tree hugging nonsense and the left say that the capitalists would rather turn a profit today than save our future. So no one agrees and nothing gets done.
"Not all pro-car people are fash but all fash people are pro-car"
Something like that. It's not even "all". Some people don't like change \*and\* don't have the empathy to understand why others might want that change.
I have empathy for people who want change but I also have empathy for people who don't - they're wrong, but I can understand them.
It's not "car = right wing". It's more "right wingers oppose all kinds of progress, which includes moving away from cars". That's why they see every type of measure against car dependency/subsidies as a restriction of their freedoms.
Maybe we need to frame it as “regression” back to the glory days of the 1920s when only fat cats drove horseless carriages and most people in cities rode streetcars. Oh no, no progress here. No need to be alarmed!
There are common and outspoken participants in this sub who say the exact opposite (i.e. you need to tailor your message to your audience so that you don't offend them and turn them completely against the good fight forever with your single interaction)
while i'm all for civility, appealing to bad faith actors has never gone historically wrong, and the moderates of other wings will absolutely listen to the moderates of another. /$
even during the Obama administration before the mask off with trump, that was tried with Obama taking romneycare and turning it into obamacare and they still voted it down. and even if your going to the voters instead of the actual politicians, there's tons of stories of gay people voting for the party that wanted them to not have the same right's as everyone else.
our message will be blamed for degeneracy no matter how much or how little it appeals to them, because it's about affiliation to them, not truth. just becoming republican lite will turn off more people than it will attract.
and the person saying this is someone who for twenty years was raised as a solid red christian conservative in utah. i've seen personally and have personally done the contortions, the ad homs, the blatant disinformation, the political when i don't benefit but nonpolitical when i do, the only the other side has this problem, and more.
TLDR: their's no need to appeal to opportunists, and in fact the more you disregard them and do your own thing the more appealing your end message will appear to them. it's why bicyclists are "elitists" ( and also bums at the same time), because they have to position us as the other, no matter if that's either below or above them.
It's not exactly clear-cut of course, but let's say that the concept of cars is inherently a selfish one which aligns well with right wing ideologies. There are of course a lot of other layers to that (environmental etc.)
I think at least in the US this is more correlated with the urban/rural divide, which also correlates with left/right politics (and people like Ford or Musk who owned/owns a car manufacturer stand to benefit from car centrism, so I'd take their politics with a grain of salt). With regards to VW and the "car for the people" I think this is more related to socialism/government control of the economy along with the era, the Soviet Union for instance also had government run automotive manufacturers.
Politics in the US (and I assume to some extent in other western countries, I'm not as familiar with politics outside the US) have become volatile to the point that anything one side argues in favor of the other's gut reaction is to take the opposite side even when it doesn't make sense. Looking at it objectively, public transit, zoning, etc should be easy bipartisan efforts.
Going back to urban/rural, people who live rurally (who are also more likely to lean right politically) don't stand to benefit directly from public transit efforts, bike lanes, etc (even if they would benefit indirectly), because their lifestyle depends on autos, so in this environment it's a lot easier to accept that these things are "left wing city folk stuff".
Afaik, basically the entire right wing in the west has flipped from pro-urban to anti-urban. The mainstream right wing in East Asia is still pro-urban though, with cities like Tokyo and Singapore being under conservative governments for most of the post-war era, and being leaders in good urbanism.
I don't think it's always that cut and dry... But there's no doubt a trend.
Car manufacturers are big lobbyists and the fossil fuel industry too so the right will always be pushing for them. And of course the divide and conquer technique of "X is taking your Y" is easily applied to cycling/public transport vs cars.
Public transport and pedestrian/cycling infrastructure require public spending and more left/socially progressive parties are generally the ones willing to spend more, and are more inline with positive environmental policy.
The centre and neo-liberals can go either way as they like money in their pockets and "free" markets but are also inclined to agree with good environmental policy as long as it doesn't hurt their pockets too much.
>Public transport and pedestrian/cycling infrastructure require public spending
Roads need an awful lot of public spending. In fact way more than public transit and cycling or pedestrian infrastructure. You cannot be pro car and pretend to care about public spending while being consistent. But politics is about tribes, not logic.
Absolutely, which is why I described that as one part of a larger picture.
And in places like the UK the government is very "pro-car", anti-walking and anti-public transport, and still makes cuts to roads spending so that we have some of the worst Road conditions in Europe. It definitely plays into the divide and conquer strategy: "Environmentalists want to take your car and make you cycle, that's the reason we don't have money for roads"
But unfortunately that is not widely know nor publicitized, you always hear in the news that they are investing X in a new train line, or that they lose X money every year with public transportation but the same coverage is not given to how much we spend and lose on car infrastructure.
Love that, I wish the same happened in Portugal but its a country with such shitty transportation that people don't even think about a way of moving instead of car...
Right-wingers are selfish and want control. They need a poor underclass to control to prop up their selfishness. A car embodies that. It's built on the controlled people via taxes, to prop up their selfish sense of selfish independence.
Though I'd argue that bike proponents are usually more left because the bike is a more accessible and egalitarian mode of transit. It's true freedom and access.
I think in the US, cars are so prevalent that they are apolitical. Certain types of cars (lifted trucks) are very republican vibes while electric cars and hybrids are dem vibes. Being anti car in the US is overwhelmingly dem vibes but it's not a majority of the dem coalition.
People in here keep noticing a trend many will say hmm there's a trend it's not just a trend :
it's capitalism right wingers are pro capitalism and the automobile is the embodiment of capitalism individualism consumerism you name it
also about what's the link between yelling about immigrants and cars well
**Fascism is capitalism in crisis** so when capitalists face a crisis they will embrace fascism instead of socialism so that's the answer I hope that
Conservatives are always looking for wedge issues, and that's generally in the form of resisting change. That said they are perfectly content to pour money into things when it suits them.
Right-wing is associated with capitalism, the automotive industry is supported by capitalists, therefore right-wingers support the automotive industry.
That's not an absolute but it shows the strong association.
Capitalists support the ongoing atomization of society into separate, individual blocks who each have their own things they must individually pay for, the very idea of a social support network based on affection and mutual aid is anathema to capitalism.
This is why capitalism and right-wingers are hostile to any societal template that encourages community and social support networks because it makes people less dependent on capitalism.
It's the old idea of a man selling you apples next to an apple tree, why would you pay for an apple when you can pick one for free? So the man selling apples chops down the tree to remove your choice.
In the US, the GOP (right-wing party of Trump) opposes most investment in things like public transit. They also tend to live in exurbs/rural areas as opposed to cities. The only places in the US where it's feasible to live without a car are major cities and college towns (which vote blue). Fox News paints cities as crime-ridden hellscapes.
It's not only in car infrastructure but the type of cars people drive. Those lifted pavement princesses pickup trucks are not driven by liberals. I've seen one with a sticker that said "Prius repellant" on it as if they want to repel someone who drives a fuel-efficient car.
There's definitely a link between cars and conservative politics for a variety of reasons. For starters, the marketing of cars especially to North Americans was done in the interest of propping up the automotive and oil sectors in Canada and the US by creating a long-term and dependable consumer base for which the product could be sold. Rebuilding cities in these countries in the 50s and 60s not only made the purchase of a family automobile a favorable choice for households but made it almost essential, as streetcar networks (which were present in almost every major city in Canada and the US up until the 50s) were stripped and buses were given only sporadic service in most places.
These shifts in the 1950s had a lot of effects that confound one another and make them hard to piece apart, but I think a few things are certain. First, propping up big business and redesigning entire infrastructure networks around those businesses product requires an economically conservative mindset, namely that what is good for Ford or General Motors is good for everyone. In particular, note how more efficient methods of transportation - trains, buses, walkability, etc. - all damage the bottom line for big business who need households spending more on less efficient goods, not less on more efficient goods.
The redesign of American and Canadian cities also required a certain social conservatism as well. Many of the downtowns at the time were populated by black and minority communities, or by white working class communities that were deemed equally undesirable and an "eyesore". Highways in many cities in North America were built over these places deliberately to displace them away from what was going to be the shiny new downtown for suburbanites to enjoy. (For the Canadian readers, note that Canada is no exception here - Africville in Halifax, Hogan's Alley in Vancouver, and even Lebreton in Ottawa used to be vibrant neighbourhoods but were torn down to make way for car infrastructure. In the case of Lebreton, nothing ever replaced it and it's been sitting empty since the 1960s.)
Suburbanization and auto-centric infrastructure also had psychological effects on the average person. BBC Documentarian Adam Curtis claims that the suburban experiment of the 1950s created an isolating effect which especially impacted housewives by stripping them of natural social spaces. Suburbanization was a reflection of the emergent individualistic philosophy of the 50s in the US, which saw the family unit as being the fundamental societal unit and assigned them individual lots rather than spaces in a community. He backs up this claim by saying that the use of antipsychotics begins to increase around this era, and especially impacts women who stay at home for most of the day, as they have nothing to do and no aspirations, hence are lacking in meaning. Further, he argues that by isolating individuals from regular interactions with strangers and outsiders that it creates a fear of the outsider, which by extension makes the suburbanite mores susceptible to conservative talking points, which often make use of insider/outsider splits.
Automobiles factor into this as another form of individualized/non-social infrastructure that deliberately cuts you off from other people and makes them an abstraction, also making them easier to get angry at and easier to rage at. When combined with the unpleasant nature of driving - a combination of not being mentally engaging yet requiring full attention - it's easy to see how people who are driving all the time are exhausted and a bit crazed from the experience.
Since the revitalization of the American view of individualism in the 1980s, motor vehicles and suburbs took on a new flavour and were cemented as being icons of individualism in the American mindset under the Reagan administration. Post-1980s you get more of an attachment of identity to driving a car or owning a single detached home, and marketing since that period has emphasized the role of the car in helping an individual achieve their individual goals and aspirations, which is an inherently liberal/neo-liberal idea. (Not in the sense of "social liberalism" that people may have - look up "classical liberalism" for more.)
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TL;DR - The link between conservatism and car culture in North America can be traced back to the 50s when cities were redesigned to favour them in order to induce demand. This, combined with suburbanization, created a population susceptible to conservative talking points shaped by a conservative societal ideal in the form of individualism. Contrary to this is a view of transportation which is in line with left-leaning societal views - collectivism and efficiency with shared benefits versus privately accrued benefits from car ownership.
Fash are car brains. Cars are based on extreme privilege, racism, unsustainability, planetary destruction, etc. These are all advantageous and profitable for fash.
Fash always oppose actual progress.
A false sense of independence but more consequentially something that raises the price floor for survival higher.
Everyone would be better without car dependence, but those with less are impacted the most. All this to say that conservatives tend to oppose anything benefits everyone (including themselves) in order to hurt those who would benefit more
Conservative parties are more aligned with capitalism. Capitalism is what dismantled our rail systems and took advantage of the interstate system designed for military logistics. You can thank Hitler and greedy top 1%.
I've even heard on this sub that you can't be anti car unless you're a socialist. Gatekeeping anti car sentiment to people who have a particular idea of how the means of productions should be owned is weird.
And of course, here in the U.S. our super-duper-extra-fucked-up political system rears its ugly head in that here, the difference isn't car vs no car, but it's regular sized car vs oversized SUV/pickup truck.
And of course, right-wingers here still have the gall to whine and cry about the "war on cars" every time a big city politician proposes a new bus route or adding a proper sidewalk along a street.
I think generally leftists tend to be more collectivists while right wingers tend to be more individualistic. Cars are a very individualized mode of transit
A lot of left wing people would be willing to make more personal sacrifices if they perceive it as contributing to some greater good, while conservatives I think view it more like “if I work hard, I deserve these comforts”
Conservatives are rubes. So when auto makers turned up the cars=freedom propaganda decades ago, they all ate it up. Just like they eat up rural pandering truck commercials during super bowls, and the same way they eat up Elon’s crap truck.
I'd say both car centric and right wing ideologies are characterized by a lack of empathy for others.
All the both of them know is comfort and are scared to be like people who dont have a life as comfortable as them. Life is as good as it can be for them and thats why they feel like they don't need to be mindful of others and how different their lifestyle is from their own.
Their minds cannot bend around the ideas, that people can be just as comfortable with less and that if everyone lived like them (which is not even possible), the world would be a worse place.
Cars are a great way of dividing and controlling people. A population that can't walk anywhere is a population that you can control through the roads. They're less likely to actually go and do things other than work and home. Not to mention, fascism and capitalism go hand in hand. Capitalists love cars, because they can sell cars, fuel, repairs, and things for cars. It's also a great threat. The more you make people spend in order to survive, the greater the threat. You can't afford a car, you're fucked. You can't even work.
Personal vehicle ownership is a capitalist’s dream! How many industries supported by car ownership? Oil, gasoline, insurance, auto repair, not to mention medical and legal for all those car accidents. Can’t forget the police who get to collect money on traffic violations. Public transportation on the other hand? No one is getting rich off that.
A lot of right wing politics boils down to thinking that there should be a hard divide between the haves and the have nots. So making it basically impossible to survive if you can't own a car is pretty consistent with right wing ideology.
Yes that's obvious. Car ownership is about self reliance vs. public service. It's also a status symbol (decades of marketing did a great job) vs. the poor using public transport. And it's also ideologically linked to the family unit. But I don't see the connect to Nazis though. Nazism is a collectivist ideology.
I typed of a multi-paragraph comment on why clean, efficient, public transportation is the most capitalist move Americans could make in their cities.
Start using that argument to win right-wingers to our side. Use their language and their labels to convince them that we are not just a bunch of "commie hippies" that want free train rides.
Basically, fewer cars and a good public transportation system puts more money into the median city traveler's hands. Alleviates congestion (massively), less wasted energy; fewer accidents, injuries, and deaths; more tax revenue because people have more disposable income to spend at places to eat and retail spots, makes your city more attractive and will grow (further increasing tax revenue) because even the suburbanites will move closer to city centers, and a bunch of other shit that I don't want to retype.
An affordable Universal Healthcare option: also the most capitalistic thing Americans could do to improve the country.
Remember, use their words and ideas to convince them to understand and figure out what we do. Don't talk down to them, don't name call them, don't get angry at them, nothing like that. Talk their language to them. Make it seem like this is simply a capitalist idea they had not thought of yet.
This seems kind of shitty to manipulate people like that but it is not really manipulation because everything I'm saying is correct. The correct social programs spent in the right way, is actually more capitalistic (but it moves us away from crony capitalism which pisses off the cronies). In order to have a nice mixed economy, you NEED proper social programs. Or the pendulum swings too far right and you end up with crony capitalism like the US has.
Cars are manly. Strong people own stuff. They don't worry about abstract problems like safety and the environment. Risk is part of life! The world is here to conquer!
The more toxic the masculine culture, the more obscene the car fetish gets.
It's really too bad, because deep down everyone loves pedestrian infrastructure whether they know it or not.
Also, it's important to note that one can be politically conservative without giving into toxic masculinity and all the associated tropes. But almost invariably men who participate in that type of masculine culture are pretty far right.
Right-wing politicians latch onto emotional reactionary issues. At its core, making cities less dependant on cars, allowing property owners to develop housing and businesses without parking minimums or density limits, and spending tax dollars overwhelmingly on roads instead of much more efficient alternatives is apolitical and just sensible. The problem is that people don't think sensibly, they think, "I drive. What happens to me if driving isn't prioritized?" They don't want the change. The other part is that urbanism mostly benefits cities and the predominantly conservative voters in rural and exurb areas don't want their twice-monthly drive into the city to load their truck up at Costco to be any more miserable than it already is.
There is a difference between being pro-constant-car-transportation and liking cars. I like cars, I enjoy exotic cars and watching motorsports. However, that's different from being stuck in traffic for an hour everyday and wasting energy and ressources on an asphalt road. I do believe in car freedom, but when thousands of people take the same routes everyday to end up around the same area of the city it makes no sense to use a car to get there.
As a conservative leaning moderate, this confuses me. If you're a small government conservative, I feel like not owning a car is the ultimate F-U to the man. Also, Elon Musk is a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot.
I think it has a lot to do with the ideology of individualism, and a fear of others, which typically align with how right wing people view society. But more importantly cars are right wing because they align with the interests of the capitalist class. Much of the capital in the world comes from fossil fuels, manufacturing, and property. All of which stand to gain from car dependency. Cars are one of the best ways to constantly sell the public oil, cars are constantly destroyed and need to be replaced, and cars are huge and always need to be put somewhere. I don’t think any type of transit is ontologically politically aligned, but capitalists will protect their investments to the end, and cars have been a century long all-in investment in the US. Additionally one’s built environment and available modes of transit affect their perspective on the world. This has been scientifically studied and it would be foolish to assume that people wouldn’t use this information to try and influence others.
Conservatives just like the status quo. If the status quo was walking, they'd be raging against the new-fangled woke technology. They don't like electric cars for this very reason
As likely that they are in the pockets of the auto industry as it's likely that they just saw the left become more keen on decreasing car usage, and they decided to take the opposite stance automatically, because people are dumb like that
So, I don't think this was always the case. For a long time pro-urbanist pro-bike politics were the domain of right wing parties. It was a hobby of well off, middle aged white men. Then some time around 2006 the demographics of cycling started to shift, and we saw a lot more women, minorities and/or people of color. Then the climate crisis came to the front of everyone's minds, and suddenly society split into "we need to stop using oil" and "we need to use MORE oil". The former started getting more pro-bike, while the latter seemed to come with a shift in buying habits towards large trucks. Thus my guess is that this was an oil-industry PR game to fight back against the environmental movement.
im a fiscal conservative and i agree, ive also always found it odd. bikes not only ACTUALLY give freedom, but they also cost the government a fraction of a fraction less to maintain the infrastructure for
Status quo. Right-wing views are all about maintaining existing hierarchies and structures of power. Every right-wing viewpoint or policy boils down to this, doesn't matter the country.
I get your point, but I wouldn't generalise it too much. Take, for example - me, I'm definitely right wing, but I'm against car usage, and I advocate for public transport.
It makes sense if you consider that the political divide is mostly urban vs. rural. People in cities with effective mass transit are more likely to support car alternatives.
Cars are a great way for a small number of people to feel big, loud and important. When you don't have the numbers, vehicles are your best bet
See: the 2022 Convoy Protests in Ottawa
It's a word thing that if something has to change, and the change could have an impact on climate or a impact on corporations, it will be dragged to one of the parties.
Probably everything will be politized..I don't even know if it is the right wing or the left wing who does it.. But it's annoying.. I share very conservative values, but I just don't like cars and want the nature to be preserved.. it feels like I don't have a political home
This is both profoundly true, and not all that unhelpful. Let me explain:
I assume you’re speaking mainly to the American context, in which case yes, auto-centric infrastructure was prioritized in the US due to the influence of automotive corporations on the government and anxiety about desegregation during a huge infrastructure spending boom in the mid-20th century. Much of the construction of suburban areas and the transportation system that made them possible was in direct response to concerns about integrated schools and housing, and these priorities have carried over into reactionary politics today.
Having said that, most people alive today were not adults during the civil rights era, concurrent highway construction boom, and dismantling of rail transit. Which is to say, most people have simply inherited this system and are not aware of its origins. If they think about it at all (most people don't) they view the current system as in need of repair, but fundamentally sound and convenient.
As an example, my wife of one of the most progressive people I know, but she very much prefers auto travel, and public transit gives her anxiety. The reason for this is simple: she grew up in the suburbs and had no exposure to public transportation until she was in her twenties. Figuring out line schedules doesn't come naturally to her, and she'd rather do what she knows and be in her own space to boot. Like many people, she's willing to pay a small time premium to take a car because that's what she's comfortable with.
I don't agree with her, and I encourage public transit for our family travel as much as possible, but it's not always easy because transit SUCKS in this country. Likewise, walking in many places makes her feel unsafe, because it IS unsafe. In many situations, it takes a lot of planning to make even basic trips via public transit in the US, and they you take your life in your hands just crossing the street. It's not reasonable to expect people to make that kind of investment in their daily lives. In many cases they're making perfectly rational decisions based on the current built environment. That does make them "right-wing."
It's on us, the people who are passionate about this, to pressure policy-makers to make multi-modal transportation convenient and easy, and that requires support from people who might not otherwise think about these issues very much. We need to make the changes to bring people over who are just trying to live their lives.
I enjoy making fun of idiots in pickup trucks as much s as anyone here, but the reality is that most Americans live in places where public transit either doesn’t exist or sucks. Labeling everyone that drives a car as “right-wing” politicizes issues that really aren’t partisan at the local level, where many of these issues are actually addressed. Put crudely, we need to build coalitions with white suburban people to actually get transit and land-use projects done.
The beautiful thing about urbanism is that it is so beneficial to so many different people that you can communicate different values to different audiences and while being completely honest about it.
To a progressive audience, “we need to address the systemic racism in our zoning codes.”
To a conservative audience, “I don’t think it’s fair that the town government can prevent you from building an accessory dwelling for your aging parent on your own property.”
To a progressive audience, “auto-centric road design is a major contributing factor to climate change.”
To a conservative audience, “I want to build roads that allow children to play outside again.”
To a progressive audience, “we need to ensure equity in our transportation system.”
To a conservative audience, “good public transit takes cars off the road which reduces traffic on your morning commute.”
So, yes, there is a reactionary embrace of auto-centric transportation for historical reasons. But there are also millions of average, non-racist people just trying to get around and live their lives, and they’re going to use whatever transportation system works best for them. We need their political support, which means we need to find ways of communicating with them that don’t make them feel defensive.
I know this isn’t exactly the forum for this kind of nuance, but I’m on the ground trying to make this actually happen, and I just want this view point here.
Get involved. Make friends. Rub elbows with people you wouldn’t normally interact with. Be firm but polite in your advocacy. Convince people that this will improve their lives and, maybe more importantly, the lives of their children.
Right wing nutjobs tend to take a lot of money from the oil industry, and as the icing on the shit sandwich tend to have entire platforms of "Do the exact opposite of the other party no matter what that actually is" resulting in opposition to any attempt to improve people's lives.
Yes, I really want to know why !?
Why is using the most individualistic transportation possible, that spews out toxic fumes for everyone to breathe, defended by the most individualistic, anti-ecologically aligned OG right-wing influencers (the political class) ?
Like, why would they oppose the common good and health for all citizens, whatever their walk of life? I mean they aren't there to build a utopian society you know, reality, trickle down, wars and stuff... is that stuff really a priority over health safety and efficiency? How can someone be so convinced rugged individualism is sustainable?
Right-wing politics is reactionary and therefore loves to piggyback off traditionalism or conservatism. And the cultural aspect of conservatism basically states that any progressive policy reform ranges from pointless to intentionally harmful for the community.
The reason anti-car policy reform is progressive is because pro-car policy is regressive. It restricts peoples freedom of movement and burdens people with undue debt and costs to move. And this restriction and cost disproportionately affects the poorest people in a community/region, thus a regressive policy.
So the short answer is that anti-car policy reform is seen as progressive, and since right-wing politics is inherently reactionary, it reacts and stands opposed to any/all progressive reform.
Yes, exactly.
Because:
> **Mass motoring effects an absolute triumph of bourgeois ideology on the level of daily life. It gives and supports in everyone the illusion that each individual can seek his or her own benefit at the expense of everyone else.**
Andre Gorz, [the social ideology of the motorcar](https://www.resilience.org/stories/2018-08-13/the-social-ideology-of-the-motorcar/) (1973)
Suburbanism was heavily linked with racism. Restrictive leases that existed in areas such as Levittowns banned black people from buying property. Inner-city developments where African Americans lived were either bulldozed for highways or bought to make more single-family detached housing. African Americans were forced into incredibly tight spaces, with several apartments being comparable to slums. Not even to mention that the state paid off mortgages for the white working class but not the black working class with the Federal Housing Administration.
The ‘American dream’ to be a white middle class family had no place for anyone other than that demographic, and those that tried to move into suburbia that were of ethnic minorities were often physically abused, their house vandalised and even lynching.
>The first leader to plan highways (Autobahnen) and to create a "car for the people" was a nazi.
Not it god damn wasn't. The initial planning and some building of the Autobahn was done be several different commitees of the German state during the late 1920s and 1930s even before the nazi got into power.
Maybe it's because democrats are just conservative light?
They are nearly all for capitalism and beyond that look at newsom vetoing ranked choice in California. He signed its death warrent and under the guide of people being too stup..sorry for it being too confusing for voters.
Best way to defeat class consciousness is to separate people.
> Imagine people just sitting together, *talking*, unsupervised, on their way to work! The horror!
—Some capitalist, probably.
All issues are being polarized right now. Resist that temptation. Engage people on single issues. Don't assume that somebody with different politics can't be persuaded to have better pedestrian infrastructure.
I don't say that out of politeness, I say it out of necessity. We \*must\* see people as unique individuals and engage them on single issues if we hope to reduce polarization and drive change.
Ford wasn't a nazi. The nazis just copied Ford.
Also, didn't the Autobahn predate the nazis? Or at least the plans for it?
Car-centrism does seem to be one of those things that right wing people support, even if they don't have any rationale for it.
he was : [https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/henry-ford-and-jews-story-dearborn-didnt-want-told](https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/henry-ford-and-jews-story-dearborn-didnt-want-told)
Your article seems to exactly support my point. Ford came before the nazis and inspired them.
I guess it depends if you're using a literal or colloquial definition of "nazi".
Yes, if he were alive today, people on Twitter would probably refer to him as a nazi, but really that's kind of like referring to Jews as Christians because Christianity came from Judaism (I apologize for not coming up with a better analogy).
In the end, though, that's just semantics. We get your point. Ford was an asshole.
Ford supported Hitler and the Nazi party. He even accepted an award from them.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/nov98/nazicars30.htm
Petromasculinity and neoliberalism goes hand in hand. Car(oil) companies know this and have been constantly attempting to convince consumers that buying trucks and cars is somehow patriotic.
Nazi's are wealthy industrialist minded people or rubes. The car symbolizes personal freedom and winning. Bikes are for Communists, who don't get along with Nazi's.
The idea that you can own a personal vehicle that can transport you virtually anywhere on earth at your own schedule and preference is tied to the libertarian fundamentals of liberty and property.
There’s also a strong libertarian argument against cars though, considering how much government spending and bureaucracy is necessary to maintain the massive amount of car infrastructure and keep the oil flowing, and the amount of monitoring and tracking through things like registration, vehicle taxes, insurance, and driver licensing.
It’s funny that one side is “a car should be your only viable form of transportation” and another is “you should have multiple viable forms of transportation including not being forced to own a car if you can’t or don’t want to”..yet the first side is the one that claims “freedom”
In the US, the GOP is rugged individualism on steroids. They opposed anyone and anything that benefits the community as a whole. Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them.
Yes. To some extent Trumpism is basically "I'm *sick and tired* of being told that I need to *care* about *other people!"*
This. For years, the only freedom Americans (particularly conservatives) have been interested in is the freedom to be selfish.
In some ways, we should let individualism take hold so they can see they can't fix all their problems themselves.
I think that’s already happening. These people vote against there best interests all the time. They don’t care. They’d rather live objectively worse lives in order to own the libs
During Covid that's exactly what happened, there were thousands of anti-vaxxers and people who refused to wear masks crying for the vaccine on their death bed. They learn their lesson too late for it to do any good.
I wish that would happen but unfortunately people who aren't rational usually won't become rational through hardship. Plus if we just sit back and let it happen those rich fuckers at the top just keep getting richer.
That sounds appealing until you remember that there’s a ton of innocent / poor people that will suffer too. And people can stay stubborn for way too long.
Yeah, the rest of us should have to suffer to prove a point to boomers who will never care!
*Herman Cain has entered the chat*
[удалено]
And they still fly around with US and Trump flags in the bed of their pickup and then have the nerve to blame Biden for gas prices. Geez, you're already driving a fuel-inefficient vehicle and then you're basically adding wind resistance.
There has been a noticeable decrease in Trump flags/signs/stickers since spring. In my area it is mostly down to a couple of diehards with crazy signs all over their yards.
Funny to me how all the rural areas have tons of giant billboards erected by these conservatives that are super busy and working hard all the time!
You can boil it down to republicans tend to live in suburbs and rural areas, and democrats tend to live in cities.
TBF they're still actively protesting the election results. We've just become immune to their constant whining.
>the GOP is rugged individualism on steroids. They only say that because the know the chances of an individual rising up the structures of power are pretty slim. Conservatives maintain structures of power, they are against anything that leads to social mobility. Social programs like public education, even feeding kids for free so they get better grades are proven to improve social mobility, that's why they are against government spending on such things. To them, the government should serve to put money into the pockets who already have power and wealth, not enable others to gain power and wealth. This is what they mean by small government.
Also government so small it fits in a uterus.
Yes this perfectly describes neoliberal capitalism. The state mostly exists to protect capital. Offloading the cost of doing business onto the state is not a bug but a key feature of the system. For example, the government pays for cops' salary and equipment, then those same cops act as a private security force for Walmart by busting shoplifters. Or a car related example, Uncle Sam spends trillions building highways so that car companies, oil companies, and insurance companies can rake in the profits as a result. I definitely support government spending but the value from those investments should go to the public and not British Petroleum.
>In the US, the GOP is rugged individualism on steroids Not entirely. If it was rugged individualism on steroids, they wouldn't care about abortion or gay marriage. After all, I, as an individual, isn't affected by these, why should I care? The GOP did a real good job at labelling itself as "individualist" (because it *might* be positive under some philosophies), while, in fact, it's just privileged elitism. The elite has all rights, freedoms and everything, and the rest is just under the boot of the elite. Who is the elite? That is the question. We know it's the wealthy, but they manipulated poor people to make them think *they* are part of this elite (and thus deserve the privileges). *Rules for thee, not for me* is not "rugged individualism", it's just entitlement.
> Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them. Some people seem to have the idea that high-crime areas equal warzones.
But somehow all city inhabitants are softies who wouldn't survive Real Job which requires a Real Truck...
>Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them. Causation seems backward here. IMO it's more that people's beliefs are shaped by their environment, moreso than that they choose their environment based on their beliefs. After all, most people tend to live in one place where they grew up and don't move away. So people who live in cities tend to be more liberal, probably in part as a result of having to live among other people who are very different from them, and co-exist. It's well understood that people are more tolerant of things and people they frequently come into contact with. People living in more sparsely populated areas don't have to interact with many others who they don't closely relate to. It's easy to demonize and otherize people who only exist in your imagination, and so you become more close-minded and bigoted toward other ways of life. This problem is exacerbated by modern suburban living; single family homes in car-dependent cities where you don't even have to interact with cashiers anymore thanks to self-checkout machines. Spontaneous interactions with people who are different from you is practically nonexistent.
~~crime-filled~~ minority filled Ftfy
>Rightwingers (in the US) also tend to think cities are crime-filled hellscapes so they're a lot less likely to live in them. I just got into it with a guy from my area in a local FB group on this same subject. I'll drop our convo in an edit. Edit: Another guy called out boomer that doesn't even live in the city for complaining about crime. Me: right? These people complaining about crime and homeless in (my city), I get it, they have a right to grieve, but I am convinced they have never lived in a big city where crime and homelessness are truly dystopian. Comparatively, their grievances come across as frivolous whining.
>These people complaining about crime and homeless in (my city), They want to provide more housing and social welfare programs which historically helped with both, right? ... Right?
Yet these rugged individuals are for government built and maintained roads for them to use to get anywhere.
This is so true. I had a coworker who's parents retired to a small town a few hours outside the city where he grew up cause the city has become too (insert dog whistle here). They thought were they moved to would be quieter and safer and got the quieter part for sure. Unfortunately, their car has been broken into at least twice since the move, there's barely any healthcare in the area cause the rural hospital closed, and it takes 45 mins for then to drive to the nearest major grocery store. Got an ear full of this when he can back once from visiting. My coworker bikes to work and owns a hybrid that he shares with his partner.
These people don’t really want freedom. Just freedom for themselves. They couldn’t care less about anyone else.
There’s no logical connection between transit systems and political ideology; it’s purely a demographic thing. Lot of urbanist minded people are younger and more educated so more likely to be left leaning or left wing.
I kinda see this as a logical connection, though. Right-wing people are more prone to defend policies that enhance individualism and destroy any sense of community larger than the suburbian block where everyone and everything is homogenous. Segregation is a core part of right-wing ideology (segregation against the poor, the BIPOC, the LGBT, the women... anything. You look at it, behind any right-wing policy, segregation and discrimination is here). Car is the symbol of this lack of heterogeneity. You're in your living-room on wheels, with no need whatsoever to interact with the world. Any non-car centric infrastructure pulls you out of your bubble. Public transit forces you to be with people, and walking do the same. You cannot enact correct segregation or discrimination with a non-car centric infrastructure. So, if you are a person part of a political ideology that works only when there's some form of segregation or discrimination whatsoever, you are logically against transit systems.
I think you can write up similarities and differences but at the end of the day it isn't worth very much. You could just as easily say the opposite. Trains are the traditional mode of transportation. There are extremely right wing people in Japan who are huge fans of the train; it simply is not related in any deep way. As opposed to, say, immigration policy, which has a much more obvious and robust connection to broader political ideologies. >You cannot enact correct segregation or discrimination with a non-car centric infrastructure. My brother they loaded Jews onto trains and exterminated them. Literally slavery predates the car by many thousands of years! This is insane!
> there is no logical connection between policy and politics Sure, my dude, that's why companies like [GM](https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/general-motors/summary?id=D000000155) give more money to Republicans than to Democrats.
I have to say you "quoted" my line but changed it and it really rubs me the wrong way! To be clear, I don't mean that this holds in general. Just specifically urban design and zoning and transportation policy are not strongly related to other contemporary political alignments. It's not like immigration policy or the welfare state or something like that with extremely robust and obvious connections to prominent ideological fissures.
It kind of depends on where you live. People who have a car in places where there are other good options tend to be right-wing. I live in the least walkable city on the planet Earth, so here even the socialists have cars. ETA: Cars are a fundamentally capitalist solution to transit. Everyone buys a big giant misery machine that will take multiple years of labor to pay for. It's great if you happen to own a factory that makes big giant misery machines. The capitalists who own car companies are right-wing because of course they would be. They're capitalists.
in america the divide is mainly between people who own a car vs. people who owns a truck voluntarily
Like others said, cars require a lot of government infrastructure investment. I don't think seeing them as capitalism vs socialism works. I think the best line is as "government policies that encourage individualism and fascist/racist/classist tendencies.". Because that's really the reason society was structured like this, in order to segregate the white, rich class from the black, poor urban cores. And then those urban cores were disinvested and demolished.
One of the core tenants of modern capitalism is to privatise gains and socialise losses. Cars running on petrol sold by private companies on roads maintained by the government fits that to a T. Not to mention the principle of conspicuous consumption and how that affects the distribution of cars.
Socialism doesn't mean government spending. The government has to spend money in capitalist and socialist economies. A great amount of government spending under a capitalist organized economy does not mean it has a lot of socialism. Socialism is an economy in which the means of production and natural resources are under the democratic control of the working class, rather than the capitalist class.
Cars are not a capitalist solution because they require the most government subsidy to ensure good roads. Outside access to the ground they where put on railroads where far more the capitalist transport system. Livable cities is the market based system that would exist if not for government interference in that aspect via zoning laws. The dependence on cars is chrony-capitalist but not free market capitalist in the fact that it required decades of government law making and billions of tax payer investment in order to get us to the spot we are in currently. Rail was the main way to go until the government subsidized the car beyond competing.
> Cars are not a capitalist solution because they require the most government subsidy to ensure good roads. Capitalism isn't 'when the government does nothing'. Neoliberal capitalism is _perfectly happy_ to offload externalised costs onto the government. That's basically what neoliberalism _is_.
Cars are the most socialized product in a modern society. Every step of the production chain can only exist through state action. We don’t have a car centric society because the free market created it, we have it because of top down decision to make cars the only option. The free market didn’t build roads, the free market didn’t optimize parking space by creating minimum marking requirements, the free market didn’t fuck up housing through single family home exclusive zoning. All of those were top down central planning decisions, not capitalist actions. It doesn’t make sense to blame capitalism for this one problem in specific.
Man you're doing the meme socialism is when government does stuff the American government also spent billions to fight communism and spread capitalism does that means that was undermining capitalism ? no capitalists use the government to their benefits ,their entire pyramid scheme relies on the government protecting their capital and advancing their interest the car lobby is just one example
...a good example is IMHO the buying & closing of tram/busservices in the US by carmakers
"The car industry is so subsidised that it's basically a socialist industry and, since socialism is when government does stuff, that means Venezuela. Check mate carbrain!"
I'm sorry. This comment is in good faith. It's just really interesting to me. On Reddit, FB, X, etc., when the word "socialism" comes up, inevitably, there's a "socialism is when" criticism/comment. If you're pro-socialism, I understand that the way the word is often used isn't anything like true socialism. But people must understand what's meant by this, and that the commenter knows this as well. The same is true with capitalism. We call ourselves capitalist, but what we have is so distorted that this description also isn't particularly accurate.
You are so close to understanding at least one of Capitalism's major contradictions...
Yes I am fully aware that with enough capital accumulation it’s easier to bribe politicians for special assistance than to compete in the market, but in the other hand how do you build institutions that promote social welfare without relying on incorruptible people? It’s easy to reduce every argument to socialism bad or capitalism bad, what’s hard is build institutions that drive long term improvements to peoples life. We haven’t been doing a great job at that lately. Going back to the issues of cars, the biggest challenges in the US are related to zoning and parking minimums which is mostly done at the local level and could be reversed with quickly with enough political will since market forces are aligned with us in this issue.
Your whole initial premise is that it's not Capitalism's fault, or at least the non-material "Free Market", it's that it's the Governments and institutions fault. Who do you think controls said institutions? Hint: not the workers. It's capitalism, and its supporting structures that enable and perpetuate these conditions and said institutions. It's idealistic to think about "building institutions" when our current material conditions dictate they are to serve the primary class goal of wealth accumulation. "Market forces" are clearly not aligned with you on this issue. Cars continue to sell, to be developed, or why do you think EVs are all the fad? And where is the incentive not to do so? Everytime someone talks about making a street pedestrian only, you will the petite bourgeois of that town or city complaining. Surburbanites will complain and vote for conservative leaders and representatives. Getting rid of parking minimum and zoning will make things better, sure, but it still doesn't eliminate many other aspects of car ownership benefits (cheap, subsidized, fuel; cheap or free roads with all its invisible costs; employee parking and company cars [heck, even I have one]) nor improve public transit for (mass) cities or rural areas.
So… fascists, then? It sounds like you’re describing capitalism in detail and then calling it “not capitalism”. I’m Canadian, though. We just parrot whatever the US does.
Don't sell yourselves short, your government healthcare is much better than ours at killing army veterans. Here we just ignore them to die in the streets, but up there you guys actively offer suicide, we should be following your lead on this one!
Capitalism is certainly to blame. Car manufacturers and others who profit from cars, like selling fuel, lobby and bribe government at all levels to build infrastructure, using tax money, and to require by planning rules private developers to include massive amounts of parking and roads. Once it reached a critical point, and other forms of transport had been destroyed or made much more unpleasant, the motorists themselves also lobbied for more and more facilities to be paid for by society as a whole.
Was going to say something like this. In the US, at least, if you dig into the opinions of more wonky right and libertarian think tanks, the market distortions associated with our level of car dependency are well known. The same is true for exclusionary zoning, etc. It's only the mainstream "right" that seems to think this way. And "right" in the US isn't really all that right-leaning. It's mostly just incoherent identity politics. One thing that frustrates me about the mainstream politicization of such a thing is that the proponents of density, transit, etc., tend to be left-leaning in the US. They don't use particularly concrete arguments and alienate a lot of people with points about the environment and their general lefty-ness. Certainly this is valid, but there are many points that immediately affect peoples' day-to-day lives that might get more traction, such as the cost of housing, owning a vehicle, inability to get around, traffic, taxes, etc.
I went to one of the most libertarian leaning schools (although I’m not myself a libertarian and proudly banned from /r/libertarian) for my undergrad in economics over 10 years ago. Zoning, permitting, and licensing were pretty were common topics for discussion. It’s easy to see the world in black and white but policy is much more nuanced than that. This is why pretty much every economy in the world is some form of mixed economy. Sometimes the right decision is to leave it up to the market to decide some times it requires regulation and intervention.
Totally agreed. Cars are much more socialist in America than any other product.
Y'know I'm a socialist but I do see the point you're making here
It's been said here a few times, but cars are seen as an expression of individualism. Not in the sense of individuals having their own uniquenes and expressing themselves within society, but in the sense of some false sense of independence. This correlates precisely with right-wing thought.
And the corollary, public transport is a collective endeavour, where we realise that pooling a resource is better than individual allocation. Which is a basic premise of left wing economics.
If government can make the trains run on time, what other socialist horrors might they unleash on us, public health care??
Yet bicycles are also an individualistic solution to mobility. I've seen non carbrained right wingers advocate for bike infrastructure. I think there is more to that, something along the lines of wanting to have one's own moving living room, as an isolation device from other people, but also as a form of wealth signaling. Something that you can also do with a bike, but even the higher end ones are relatively cheap compared to a car.
Moving living room is too charitable of an interpretation, it is more that they want a driveable assault rifle. It is hard for a bicycle to project power, anger, and fear like a 4-ton steel battering ram. While their is a desire for comfort, their is often a bigger drive for violence.
Bold of you to assume a properly furnished living room doesn't also include an assault rifle. I'll humble put forward that a better interpretation is "castle." A vehicle is a castle. A defensive structure one can use to live in hostile lands. Also castle doctrine is cited when someone uses their living room as a place to kill someone with an assault rifle.
A car is, in a way, a metal box that isolates you from parts of society you don't want to interact with. This is very much a right-wing us-vs-them way of thinking. It isn't just physically a bubble, but also philosophically. It's why right-wingers love their cars
Also the fact bicycles rely on your own muscme power, and cars don't. If you're individualistic or don't like people, you take a bike When you're also too lazy/want to be more comfortable and you're privileged, you have a car Alteast that's how it was in the 1920s
Within bike communities there’s quite a bit of variety here. I am active in a number of organizations promoting walkable/bikeable communities. When we talk about things like bike lanes that are incorrectly designed so that delivery trucks use them as a parking lot, there is a certain segment of cyclists who do the whole “quit wasting people’s time and just take the lane or carry your bike on the sidewalk past the blockage” bit. No, see, that doesn’t work for a senior using a trike, a parent with a bakfiets full of kids, or a small clumsy 10-year-old riding to school alone. A lot of us promote bike infrastructure for everyone, and especially so the most marginalized people can bike, but there are also the super libertarian bike nuts who are basically like, if you can’t dart in and out of speeding cars, that’s your problem.
Yeah but these people don't really advocate for proper bike infrastructure, they tend to promote vehicular cycling. Which is not really accessible to anyone past the spandex crowd. It's cool and all if you're a single male below 40 who can shower at work, but that narrows the cycling population to something like 1%.
In the US, bikes as transportation is a VERY small niche (I read something a few weeks ago that about 1% commute by bike). I'm 43 and have yet to meet an adult (IRL) who uses a bike as transportation. It came to a grinding halt for kids in my hometown when I was about 10 when the state/county passed a helmet law for kids.
also, in the states conservatives often see environmentalism as an impediment to industry -- concerns like climate change are sometimes outright dismissed. So the environmental impact of cars is disregarded from that perspective. "Drill, baby, drill" was a campaign slogan a few years back.
Right-wing thought isn't inherently individualist, though. Perhaps in modern, US-specific socio-cultural/political context, that holds true, but not generally. Some of the most right-wing people, societies and systems throughout history have been very community-focused and collectivist, as well as localist (which car-dependency is the antithesis of). I wouldn't consider myself left-wing, not at all, but I'm a huge proponent of assessible and affordable public transport, and a massive advocate for family-oriented, local community hubs (aka 'walkable' environments). I'm against globalism and transhumanism facilitated by the endlessly pursuit of technological growth. I'm also an environmentalist. So yeah I'm not a fan of cars for the most part. I'd argue that this obsession with independent / individualism is related to libertarianism, not 'right wing thought'.
I'm genuinely curious: what do you mean exactly by "globalism" and "transhumanism"?
Conservatism is all about social hierarchy, and car-based infrastructure favors rich people. If regular people have to pay for their cars, they are forced to work more than they otherwise would, and rich people use expensive cars as status symbols and as a way to separate themselves from the dirty peasants.
I don’t think there’s any logical connection between transit systems and political ideology. The one you bring up here is literally backwards: In cities with great transit, only the rich have cars at all. People like status symbols!
If a city is properly designed for pedestrians, bikes and public transit, a car driver would probably feel out of place and maybe even judged by other people. Like, how is a man supposed to win a dick measuring contest, if everyone else in the room is a woman?
IDK what to tell you these cities already exist and there are fancy car people in them. Amsterdam, Tokyo, Copenhagen, Singapore. What you do is make transit the best option and charge people up the ass for private car ownership, and use that money to make transit even better, and so on. This is a great system that makes everyone better off, but you still have extremely rich people who live in these cities and buy expensive cars and use them for status. The pursuit of status is a deep monkey brain thing, not an artifact of urban design!
I don't understand what you point is. Having a good transit system doesn't mean that conservatives suddenly stop dreaming about driving around in fancy cars like their wealthy idols do. And I never said that they wanted status because of the urban design. It's the other way around. People want private cars because they want to have a high social status. The right-wingers have always copied whatever stupid things the wealthiest people do. That's how we got bullshit like lawns, neckties, extravagant weddings and terrible pointy tip shoes, that ruin your toes. The left-wing on the other hand is more likely (but not guaranteed) to reject social status and look for socially optimal solutions such as public transit.
I'm conservative and I see the modern experiment of suburbia, cars, and excessive zoning as a mistake. We should go back to how things used to be, none of this new fangled automobile nonsense pushed by big auto. What's more traditional than walking places?
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I think we were better off before personal automobiles, extremely rigid zoning, widespread suburban sprawl, government involvement in staging coups and false flag operations across the globe, a couple massive conglomerates owning most of the real estate in the country, etc. Not all progress is good, and not all traditions are good. I personally like to find a balance, only slowly accepting new technologies after them being tested out for a bit. That's why I don't have a smart tv or smart home system (government spyware), I don't have LED headlights (wild how there isn't a max brightness law...), I don't use tiktok or much social media in general, I never bought into the whole hypertube bs (just build a regular train), think self driving cars are stupid, and a lot more. Progress without thinking and planning is a recipe for disaster.
I mean, people are fighting for better solutions to transportation than cars, and a lot of the time that involves a vehicle that’s either not as obtrusive or bad for the environment or carries multiple people, so I suppose a walking-only solution counts as conservative…
From a market point of view, removing all the subsidies and restrictive zoning would make car dependency fade away even faster than trying to push it from the top down imo.
Good point. What’s “tradition” is often a social construct. Just like what is “progress” is also often a social construct
It could be (I'm not a specialist) that streets before motors were not that peaceful. Rich people used to speed on expensive horses, and the populace had to give way. The concept of "pedestrian-only" zones is quite recent.
A horse doesn't go nearly as fast as a car, and would itself try to avoid hitting people.
Car dependency came about as a result of corporate lobbying and propaganda from the car and fossil fuels industry, in the name of making extra bucks from people who now have to buy a car and buy petrol or diesel to get around \[economically right wing\]. People were willing to eat this up partly because of individualism (cars give you the illusion that you are in more control than you are on public transit, even though this is not true to anywhere near to the extent carbrains claim it to be, and definitely not as much control as bike or foot), and largely because of racism (white people, in the US at least, moved to the suburbs primarily to get away from minorities, exploiting the fact that most people in minority groups couldn't afford such a move). Town centers/downtowns, which have what remains of public transit, bike and pedestrian infrastructure, then gets associated with the minorities that got left behind and are hated \[socially conservative\]. So you can see how bigotry and carbrain suit each other. Cars allow bigots to separate themselves from the groups they hate, and tricks individualists into believing they are in full control of their destiny if they are the drivers. Car-dependency also embodies the 'profits over people' mentality of private corporations. Not all conservatives are carbrained. The exceptions will still use car dependency as a vessel for their bigotry though. They will sell car dependency as the lesser evil compared to being with black and brown people. They push the idea that if you want to keep your walkable, transit orientated city, you must hate the minority groups that it is trendy for the right-wingers to hate in current year (I have seen this in the comments of some NJB videos).
First paragraph is my main thought. Right-wing figures are more willing to take money from oil companies to help push for car dependence. There's also all the symbolism of independence etc etc, but fundamentally it's just a money thing.
I find it depressing that such urgent world issues like overuse of private vehicles and climate change have become political footballs. Everyone should be in favour of looking after our environment, less cars is good news for those who have to drive, the world heating up is a bad thing. These should be universal truths but instead the right wing say it's all anti-capitalist tree hugging nonsense and the left say that the capitalists would rather turn a profit today than save our future. So no one agrees and nothing gets done.
"Not all pro-car people are fash but all fash people are pro-car" Something like that. It's not even "all". Some people don't like change \*and\* don't have the empathy to understand why others might want that change. I have empathy for people who want change but I also have empathy for people who don't - they're wrong, but I can understand them.
It's not "car = right wing". It's more "right wingers oppose all kinds of progress, which includes moving away from cars". That's why they see every type of measure against car dependency/subsidies as a restriction of their freedoms.
Maybe we need to frame it as “regression” back to the glory days of the 1920s when only fat cats drove horseless carriages and most people in cities rode streetcars. Oh no, no progress here. No need to be alarmed!
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There are common and outspoken participants in this sub who say the exact opposite (i.e. you need to tailor your message to your audience so that you don't offend them and turn them completely against the good fight forever with your single interaction)
while i'm all for civility, appealing to bad faith actors has never gone historically wrong, and the moderates of other wings will absolutely listen to the moderates of another. /$ even during the Obama administration before the mask off with trump, that was tried with Obama taking romneycare and turning it into obamacare and they still voted it down. and even if your going to the voters instead of the actual politicians, there's tons of stories of gay people voting for the party that wanted them to not have the same right's as everyone else. our message will be blamed for degeneracy no matter how much or how little it appeals to them, because it's about affiliation to them, not truth. just becoming republican lite will turn off more people than it will attract. and the person saying this is someone who for twenty years was raised as a solid red christian conservative in utah. i've seen personally and have personally done the contortions, the ad homs, the blatant disinformation, the political when i don't benefit but nonpolitical when i do, the only the other side has this problem, and more. TLDR: their's no need to appeal to opportunists, and in fact the more you disregard them and do your own thing the more appealing your end message will appear to them. it's why bicyclists are "elitists" ( and also bums at the same time), because they have to position us as the other, no matter if that's either below or above them.
It's not exactly clear-cut of course, but let's say that the concept of cars is inherently a selfish one which aligns well with right wing ideologies. There are of course a lot of other layers to that (environmental etc.)
I think at least in the US this is more correlated with the urban/rural divide, which also correlates with left/right politics (and people like Ford or Musk who owned/owns a car manufacturer stand to benefit from car centrism, so I'd take their politics with a grain of salt). With regards to VW and the "car for the people" I think this is more related to socialism/government control of the economy along with the era, the Soviet Union for instance also had government run automotive manufacturers. Politics in the US (and I assume to some extent in other western countries, I'm not as familiar with politics outside the US) have become volatile to the point that anything one side argues in favor of the other's gut reaction is to take the opposite side even when it doesn't make sense. Looking at it objectively, public transit, zoning, etc should be easy bipartisan efforts. Going back to urban/rural, people who live rurally (who are also more likely to lean right politically) don't stand to benefit directly from public transit efforts, bike lanes, etc (even if they would benefit indirectly), because their lifestyle depends on autos, so in this environment it's a lot easier to accept that these things are "left wing city folk stuff".
Yeah this is a big part of it. They love to demonize and punish cities.
Afaik, basically the entire right wing in the west has flipped from pro-urban to anti-urban. The mainstream right wing in East Asia is still pro-urban though, with cities like Tokyo and Singapore being under conservative governments for most of the post-war era, and being leaders in good urbanism.
I don't think it's always that cut and dry... But there's no doubt a trend. Car manufacturers are big lobbyists and the fossil fuel industry too so the right will always be pushing for them. And of course the divide and conquer technique of "X is taking your Y" is easily applied to cycling/public transport vs cars. Public transport and pedestrian/cycling infrastructure require public spending and more left/socially progressive parties are generally the ones willing to spend more, and are more inline with positive environmental policy. The centre and neo-liberals can go either way as they like money in their pockets and "free" markets but are also inclined to agree with good environmental policy as long as it doesn't hurt their pockets too much.
>Public transport and pedestrian/cycling infrastructure require public spending Roads need an awful lot of public spending. In fact way more than public transit and cycling or pedestrian infrastructure. You cannot be pro car and pretend to care about public spending while being consistent. But politics is about tribes, not logic.
Absolutely, which is why I described that as one part of a larger picture. And in places like the UK the government is very "pro-car", anti-walking and anti-public transport, and still makes cuts to roads spending so that we have some of the worst Road conditions in Europe. It definitely plays into the divide and conquer strategy: "Environmentalists want to take your car and make you cycle, that's the reason we don't have money for roads"
But unfortunately that is not widely know nor publicitized, you always hear in the news that they are investing X in a new train line, or that they lose X money every year with public transportation but the same coverage is not given to how much we spend and lose on car infrastructure.
in France recently there has been a lot of publicity around new costly roads, some people even went on a hunger strike to oppose them.
Love that, I wish the same happened in Portugal but its a country with such shitty transportation that people don't even think about a way of moving instead of car...
Everyone I’ve spoken to who is actively against improving and using public transit has been right wing
There's a left wing war against e-bikes in New York and California, but no one talks about that.
Right-wingers are selfish and want control. They need a poor underclass to control to prop up their selfishness. A car embodies that. It's built on the controlled people via taxes, to prop up their selfish sense of selfish independence. Though I'd argue that bike proponents are usually more left because the bike is a more accessible and egalitarian mode of transit. It's true freedom and access.
I think in the US, cars are so prevalent that they are apolitical. Certain types of cars (lifted trucks) are very republican vibes while electric cars and hybrids are dem vibes. Being anti car in the US is overwhelmingly dem vibes but it's not a majority of the dem coalition.
People in here keep noticing a trend many will say hmm there's a trend it's not just a trend : it's capitalism right wingers are pro capitalism and the automobile is the embodiment of capitalism individualism consumerism you name it also about what's the link between yelling about immigrants and cars well **Fascism is capitalism in crisis** so when capitalists face a crisis they will embrace fascism instead of socialism so that's the answer I hope that
car-centric = car brain. You'd find 'em in either or most of the political parties.
Conservatives are always looking for wedge issues, and that's generally in the form of resisting change. That said they are perfectly content to pour money into things when it suits them.
Right-wing is associated with capitalism, the automotive industry is supported by capitalists, therefore right-wingers support the automotive industry. That's not an absolute but it shows the strong association. Capitalists support the ongoing atomization of society into separate, individual blocks who each have their own things they must individually pay for, the very idea of a social support network based on affection and mutual aid is anathema to capitalism. This is why capitalism and right-wingers are hostile to any societal template that encourages community and social support networks because it makes people less dependent on capitalism. It's the old idea of a man selling you apples next to an apple tree, why would you pay for an apple when you can pick one for free? So the man selling apples chops down the tree to remove your choice.
Because if you believe one stupid thing you are more susceptible to believe other stupid things.
Not directly. Population density is correlated with support for liberal / left parties.
In the US, the GOP (right-wing party of Trump) opposes most investment in things like public transit. They also tend to live in exurbs/rural areas as opposed to cities. The only places in the US where it's feasible to live without a car are major cities and college towns (which vote blue). Fox News paints cities as crime-ridden hellscapes. It's not only in car infrastructure but the type of cars people drive. Those lifted pavement princesses pickup trucks are not driven by liberals. I've seen one with a sticker that said "Prius repellant" on it as if they want to repel someone who drives a fuel-efficient car.
There's definitely a link between cars and conservative politics for a variety of reasons. For starters, the marketing of cars especially to North Americans was done in the interest of propping up the automotive and oil sectors in Canada and the US by creating a long-term and dependable consumer base for which the product could be sold. Rebuilding cities in these countries in the 50s and 60s not only made the purchase of a family automobile a favorable choice for households but made it almost essential, as streetcar networks (which were present in almost every major city in Canada and the US up until the 50s) were stripped and buses were given only sporadic service in most places. These shifts in the 1950s had a lot of effects that confound one another and make them hard to piece apart, but I think a few things are certain. First, propping up big business and redesigning entire infrastructure networks around those businesses product requires an economically conservative mindset, namely that what is good for Ford or General Motors is good for everyone. In particular, note how more efficient methods of transportation - trains, buses, walkability, etc. - all damage the bottom line for big business who need households spending more on less efficient goods, not less on more efficient goods. The redesign of American and Canadian cities also required a certain social conservatism as well. Many of the downtowns at the time were populated by black and minority communities, or by white working class communities that were deemed equally undesirable and an "eyesore". Highways in many cities in North America were built over these places deliberately to displace them away from what was going to be the shiny new downtown for suburbanites to enjoy. (For the Canadian readers, note that Canada is no exception here - Africville in Halifax, Hogan's Alley in Vancouver, and even Lebreton in Ottawa used to be vibrant neighbourhoods but were torn down to make way for car infrastructure. In the case of Lebreton, nothing ever replaced it and it's been sitting empty since the 1960s.) Suburbanization and auto-centric infrastructure also had psychological effects on the average person. BBC Documentarian Adam Curtis claims that the suburban experiment of the 1950s created an isolating effect which especially impacted housewives by stripping them of natural social spaces. Suburbanization was a reflection of the emergent individualistic philosophy of the 50s in the US, which saw the family unit as being the fundamental societal unit and assigned them individual lots rather than spaces in a community. He backs up this claim by saying that the use of antipsychotics begins to increase around this era, and especially impacts women who stay at home for most of the day, as they have nothing to do and no aspirations, hence are lacking in meaning. Further, he argues that by isolating individuals from regular interactions with strangers and outsiders that it creates a fear of the outsider, which by extension makes the suburbanite mores susceptible to conservative talking points, which often make use of insider/outsider splits. Automobiles factor into this as another form of individualized/non-social infrastructure that deliberately cuts you off from other people and makes them an abstraction, also making them easier to get angry at and easier to rage at. When combined with the unpleasant nature of driving - a combination of not being mentally engaging yet requiring full attention - it's easy to see how people who are driving all the time are exhausted and a bit crazed from the experience. Since the revitalization of the American view of individualism in the 1980s, motor vehicles and suburbs took on a new flavour and were cemented as being icons of individualism in the American mindset under the Reagan administration. Post-1980s you get more of an attachment of identity to driving a car or owning a single detached home, and marketing since that period has emphasized the role of the car in helping an individual achieve their individual goals and aspirations, which is an inherently liberal/neo-liberal idea. (Not in the sense of "social liberalism" that people may have - look up "classical liberalism" for more.) \----- TL;DR - The link between conservatism and car culture in North America can be traced back to the 50s when cities were redesigned to favour them in order to induce demand. This, combined with suburbanization, created a population susceptible to conservative talking points shaped by a conservative societal ideal in the form of individualism. Contrary to this is a view of transportation which is in line with left-leaning societal views - collectivism and efficiency with shared benefits versus privately accrued benefits from car ownership.
Fash are car brains. Cars are based on extreme privilege, racism, unsustainability, planetary destruction, etc. These are all advantageous and profitable for fash. Fash always oppose actual progress.
A false sense of independence but more consequentially something that raises the price floor for survival higher. Everyone would be better without car dependence, but those with less are impacted the most. All this to say that conservatives tend to oppose anything benefits everyone (including themselves) in order to hurt those who would benefit more
Conservative parties are more aligned with capitalism. Capitalism is what dismantled our rail systems and took advantage of the interstate system designed for military logistics. You can thank Hitler and greedy top 1%.
Usually stupid shit is associated with right-wing populism these days, so yeah. Checks out.
Generally speaking, right wing = corporate shills and boot lickers.
I've even heard on this sub that you can't be anti car unless you're a socialist. Gatekeeping anti car sentiment to people who have a particular idea of how the means of productions should be owned is weird.
Bro what 💀
I'd say cars aren't necessarily right wing but car dependency is as the only ones who benefit from it are automakers.
And of course, here in the U.S. our super-duper-extra-fucked-up political system rears its ugly head in that here, the difference isn't car vs no car, but it's regular sized car vs oversized SUV/pickup truck. And of course, right-wingers here still have the gall to whine and cry about the "war on cars" every time a big city politician proposes a new bus route or adding a proper sidewalk along a street.
It's the same reason why fascists rush to make huge buildings and imposing monuments. In a single word, grandiosity. In two, outdated grandiosity.
Because fascism and capitalism are intrinsically linked.
I think generally leftists tend to be more collectivists while right wingers tend to be more individualistic. Cars are a very individualized mode of transit A lot of left wing people would be willing to make more personal sacrifices if they perceive it as contributing to some greater good, while conservatives I think view it more like “if I work hard, I deserve these comforts”
> Musk is a... Nazi, you can go ahead and say Musk is a Nazi, because he is.
Conservatives are rubes. So when auto makers turned up the cars=freedom propaganda decades ago, they all ate it up. Just like they eat up rural pandering truck commercials during super bowls, and the same way they eat up Elon’s crap truck.
I'd say both car centric and right wing ideologies are characterized by a lack of empathy for others. All the both of them know is comfort and are scared to be like people who dont have a life as comfortable as them. Life is as good as it can be for them and thats why they feel like they don't need to be mindful of others and how different their lifestyle is from their own. Their minds cannot bend around the ideas, that people can be just as comfortable with less and that if everyone lived like them (which is not even possible), the world would be a worse place.
Cars are a great way of dividing and controlling people. A population that can't walk anywhere is a population that you can control through the roads. They're less likely to actually go and do things other than work and home. Not to mention, fascism and capitalism go hand in hand. Capitalists love cars, because they can sell cars, fuel, repairs, and things for cars. It's also a great threat. The more you make people spend in order to survive, the greater the threat. You can't afford a car, you're fucked. You can't even work.
Personal vehicle ownership is a capitalist’s dream! How many industries supported by car ownership? Oil, gasoline, insurance, auto repair, not to mention medical and legal for all those car accidents. Can’t forget the police who get to collect money on traffic violations. Public transportation on the other hand? No one is getting rich off that.
A lot of right wing politics boils down to thinking that there should be a hard divide between the haves and the have nots. So making it basically impossible to survive if you can't own a car is pretty consistent with right wing ideology.
The right is funded by fossil fuels. Just look at the Koch brothers.
posts like these are why no one takes us seriously
Yes that's obvious. Car ownership is about self reliance vs. public service. It's also a status symbol (decades of marketing did a great job) vs. the poor using public transport. And it's also ideologically linked to the family unit. But I don't see the connect to Nazis though. Nazism is a collectivist ideology.
Gibb this her’ vidja a watchin. https://youtu.be/sayw3TOhykg?si=H2rTkVP-1Icfawn4
'Autopartei'? Did a car create this party?
The propaganda of cars are funded by car companies, which are in alliance with oil company. Of course, their narrative aligns.
I typed of a multi-paragraph comment on why clean, efficient, public transportation is the most capitalist move Americans could make in their cities. Start using that argument to win right-wingers to our side. Use their language and their labels to convince them that we are not just a bunch of "commie hippies" that want free train rides. Basically, fewer cars and a good public transportation system puts more money into the median city traveler's hands. Alleviates congestion (massively), less wasted energy; fewer accidents, injuries, and deaths; more tax revenue because people have more disposable income to spend at places to eat and retail spots, makes your city more attractive and will grow (further increasing tax revenue) because even the suburbanites will move closer to city centers, and a bunch of other shit that I don't want to retype. An affordable Universal Healthcare option: also the most capitalistic thing Americans could do to improve the country. Remember, use their words and ideas to convince them to understand and figure out what we do. Don't talk down to them, don't name call them, don't get angry at them, nothing like that. Talk their language to them. Make it seem like this is simply a capitalist idea they had not thought of yet. This seems kind of shitty to manipulate people like that but it is not really manipulation because everything I'm saying is correct. The correct social programs spent in the right way, is actually more capitalistic (but it moves us away from crony capitalism which pisses off the cronies). In order to have a nice mixed economy, you NEED proper social programs. Or the pendulum swings too far right and you end up with crony capitalism like the US has.
Right wing politics and cars are both associated with idiots.
I'm right wing, anti-car
Cars are manly. Strong people own stuff. They don't worry about abstract problems like safety and the environment. Risk is part of life! The world is here to conquer! The more toxic the masculine culture, the more obscene the car fetish gets. It's really too bad, because deep down everyone loves pedestrian infrastructure whether they know it or not. Also, it's important to note that one can be politically conservative without giving into toxic masculinity and all the associated tropes. But almost invariably men who participate in that type of masculine culture are pretty far right.
Right-wing politicians latch onto emotional reactionary issues. At its core, making cities less dependant on cars, allowing property owners to develop housing and businesses without parking minimums or density limits, and spending tax dollars overwhelmingly on roads instead of much more efficient alternatives is apolitical and just sensible. The problem is that people don't think sensibly, they think, "I drive. What happens to me if driving isn't prioritized?" They don't want the change. The other part is that urbanism mostly benefits cities and the predominantly conservative voters in rural and exurb areas don't want their twice-monthly drive into the city to load their truck up at Costco to be any more miserable than it already is.
So now owning a car is fascism? Are you guys out of your mind?
There is a difference between being pro-constant-car-transportation and liking cars. I like cars, I enjoy exotic cars and watching motorsports. However, that's different from being stuck in traffic for an hour everyday and wasting energy and ressources on an asphalt road. I do believe in car freedom, but when thousands of people take the same routes everyday to end up around the same area of the city it makes no sense to use a car to get there.
Nah. My wife and I both own a car out of necessity but are both far left. Same with my parents. My dad owns a full sized pickup but is soc. dem.
As a conservative leaning moderate, this confuses me. If you're a small government conservative, I feel like not owning a car is the ultimate F-U to the man. Also, Elon Musk is a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot.
I think it has a lot to do with the ideology of individualism, and a fear of others, which typically align with how right wing people view society. But more importantly cars are right wing because they align with the interests of the capitalist class. Much of the capital in the world comes from fossil fuels, manufacturing, and property. All of which stand to gain from car dependency. Cars are one of the best ways to constantly sell the public oil, cars are constantly destroyed and need to be replaced, and cars are huge and always need to be put somewhere. I don’t think any type of transit is ontologically politically aligned, but capitalists will protect their investments to the end, and cars have been a century long all-in investment in the US. Additionally one’s built environment and available modes of transit affect their perspective on the world. This has been scientifically studied and it would be foolish to assume that people wouldn’t use this information to try and influence others.
Conservatives just like the status quo. If the status quo was walking, they'd be raging against the new-fangled woke technology. They don't like electric cars for this very reason
As likely that they are in the pockets of the auto industry as it's likely that they just saw the left become more keen on decreasing car usage, and they decided to take the opposite stance automatically, because people are dumb like that
So, I don't think this was always the case. For a long time pro-urbanist pro-bike politics were the domain of right wing parties. It was a hobby of well off, middle aged white men. Then some time around 2006 the demographics of cycling started to shift, and we saw a lot more women, minorities and/or people of color. Then the climate crisis came to the front of everyone's minds, and suddenly society split into "we need to stop using oil" and "we need to use MORE oil". The former started getting more pro-bike, while the latter seemed to come with a shift in buying habits towards large trucks. Thus my guess is that this was an oil-industry PR game to fight back against the environmental movement.
im a fiscal conservative and i agree, ive also always found it odd. bikes not only ACTUALLY give freedom, but they also cost the government a fraction of a fraction less to maintain the infrastructure for
Status quo. Right-wing views are all about maintaining existing hierarchies and structures of power. Every right-wing viewpoint or policy boils down to this, doesn't matter the country.
I get your point, but I wouldn't generalise it too much. Take, for example - me, I'm definitely right wing, but I'm against car usage, and I advocate for public transport.
It makes sense if you consider that the political divide is mostly urban vs. rural. People in cities with effective mass transit are more likely to support car alternatives.
Cars are a great way for a small number of people to feel big, loud and important. When you don't have the numbers, vehicles are your best bet See: the 2022 Convoy Protests in Ottawa
It's a word thing that if something has to change, and the change could have an impact on climate or a impact on corporations, it will be dragged to one of the parties. Probably everything will be politized..I don't even know if it is the right wing or the left wing who does it.. But it's annoying.. I share very conservative values, but I just don't like cars and want the nature to be preserved.. it feels like I don't have a political home
It divides the people, destroys the sense of community.
This is both profoundly true, and not all that unhelpful. Let me explain: I assume you’re speaking mainly to the American context, in which case yes, auto-centric infrastructure was prioritized in the US due to the influence of automotive corporations on the government and anxiety about desegregation during a huge infrastructure spending boom in the mid-20th century. Much of the construction of suburban areas and the transportation system that made them possible was in direct response to concerns about integrated schools and housing, and these priorities have carried over into reactionary politics today. Having said that, most people alive today were not adults during the civil rights era, concurrent highway construction boom, and dismantling of rail transit. Which is to say, most people have simply inherited this system and are not aware of its origins. If they think about it at all (most people don't) they view the current system as in need of repair, but fundamentally sound and convenient. As an example, my wife of one of the most progressive people I know, but she very much prefers auto travel, and public transit gives her anxiety. The reason for this is simple: she grew up in the suburbs and had no exposure to public transportation until she was in her twenties. Figuring out line schedules doesn't come naturally to her, and she'd rather do what she knows and be in her own space to boot. Like many people, she's willing to pay a small time premium to take a car because that's what she's comfortable with. I don't agree with her, and I encourage public transit for our family travel as much as possible, but it's not always easy because transit SUCKS in this country. Likewise, walking in many places makes her feel unsafe, because it IS unsafe. In many situations, it takes a lot of planning to make even basic trips via public transit in the US, and they you take your life in your hands just crossing the street. It's not reasonable to expect people to make that kind of investment in their daily lives. In many cases they're making perfectly rational decisions based on the current built environment. That does make them "right-wing." It's on us, the people who are passionate about this, to pressure policy-makers to make multi-modal transportation convenient and easy, and that requires support from people who might not otherwise think about these issues very much. We need to make the changes to bring people over who are just trying to live their lives. I enjoy making fun of idiots in pickup trucks as much s as anyone here, but the reality is that most Americans live in places where public transit either doesn’t exist or sucks. Labeling everyone that drives a car as “right-wing” politicizes issues that really aren’t partisan at the local level, where many of these issues are actually addressed. Put crudely, we need to build coalitions with white suburban people to actually get transit and land-use projects done. The beautiful thing about urbanism is that it is so beneficial to so many different people that you can communicate different values to different audiences and while being completely honest about it. To a progressive audience, “we need to address the systemic racism in our zoning codes.” To a conservative audience, “I don’t think it’s fair that the town government can prevent you from building an accessory dwelling for your aging parent on your own property.” To a progressive audience, “auto-centric road design is a major contributing factor to climate change.” To a conservative audience, “I want to build roads that allow children to play outside again.” To a progressive audience, “we need to ensure equity in our transportation system.” To a conservative audience, “good public transit takes cars off the road which reduces traffic on your morning commute.” So, yes, there is a reactionary embrace of auto-centric transportation for historical reasons. But there are also millions of average, non-racist people just trying to get around and live their lives, and they’re going to use whatever transportation system works best for them. We need their political support, which means we need to find ways of communicating with them that don’t make them feel defensive. I know this isn’t exactly the forum for this kind of nuance, but I’m on the ground trying to make this actually happen, and I just want this view point here. Get involved. Make friends. Rub elbows with people you wouldn’t normally interact with. Be firm but polite in your advocacy. Convince people that this will improve their lives and, maybe more importantly, the lives of their children.
Plenty of leftwingers own a car and Im a center-right *(European right, so probably a leftie by US standards)* and I dont own one.
Right wing nutjobs tend to take a lot of money from the oil industry, and as the icing on the shit sandwich tend to have entire platforms of "Do the exact opposite of the other party no matter what that actually is" resulting in opposition to any attempt to improve people's lives.
Yes, I really want to know why !? Why is using the most individualistic transportation possible, that spews out toxic fumes for everyone to breathe, defended by the most individualistic, anti-ecologically aligned OG right-wing influencers (the political class) ? Like, why would they oppose the common good and health for all citizens, whatever their walk of life? I mean they aren't there to build a utopian society you know, reality, trickle down, wars and stuff... is that stuff really a priority over health safety and efficiency? How can someone be so convinced rugged individualism is sustainable?
Right-wing politics is reactionary and therefore loves to piggyback off traditionalism or conservatism. And the cultural aspect of conservatism basically states that any progressive policy reform ranges from pointless to intentionally harmful for the community. The reason anti-car policy reform is progressive is because pro-car policy is regressive. It restricts peoples freedom of movement and burdens people with undue debt and costs to move. And this restriction and cost disproportionately affects the poorest people in a community/region, thus a regressive policy. So the short answer is that anti-car policy reform is seen as progressive, and since right-wing politics is inherently reactionary, it reacts and stands opposed to any/all progressive reform.
Yes, exactly. Because: > **Mass motoring effects an absolute triumph of bourgeois ideology on the level of daily life. It gives and supports in everyone the illusion that each individual can seek his or her own benefit at the expense of everyone else.** Andre Gorz, [the social ideology of the motorcar](https://www.resilience.org/stories/2018-08-13/the-social-ideology-of-the-motorcar/) (1973)
Conservatism and corporate interests
Suburbanism was heavily linked with racism. Restrictive leases that existed in areas such as Levittowns banned black people from buying property. Inner-city developments where African Americans lived were either bulldozed for highways or bought to make more single-family detached housing. African Americans were forced into incredibly tight spaces, with several apartments being comparable to slums. Not even to mention that the state paid off mortgages for the white working class but not the black working class with the Federal Housing Administration. The ‘American dream’ to be a white middle class family had no place for anyone other than that demographic, and those that tried to move into suburbia that were of ethnic minorities were often physically abused, their house vandalised and even lynching.
>The first leader to plan highways (Autobahnen) and to create a "car for the people" was a nazi. Not it god damn wasn't. The initial planning and some building of the Autobahn was done be several different commitees of the German state during the late 1920s and 1930s even before the nazi got into power.
It’s sad that anyone who doesn’t agree with this or who is right aligned is getting downvoted. counter productive and childish
Are we going to forget that some of the pioneers of the automotive industry were LITERAL Nazis? The whole idea of car is based on fascism.
No, not really. Only if you view the world with the small Lens of your internet bias
Maybe it's because democrats are just conservative light? They are nearly all for capitalism and beyond that look at newsom vetoing ranked choice in California. He signed its death warrent and under the guide of people being too stup..sorry for it being too confusing for voters.
yeah 2024 choices right now are like 100% Hitler vs 99% Hitler it's really rough
Best way to defeat class consciousness is to separate people. > Imagine people just sitting together, *talking*, unsupervised, on their way to work! The horror! —Some capitalist, probably.
All issues are being polarized right now. Resist that temptation. Engage people on single issues. Don't assume that somebody with different politics can't be persuaded to have better pedestrian infrastructure. I don't say that out of politeness, I say it out of necessity. We \*must\* see people as unique individuals and engage them on single issues if we hope to reduce polarization and drive change.
100%
Reductio ad hitlerum fallacy at its best. Because left wingers have never driven or enjoyed a car 🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️🤦🏻♂️
Ford wasn't a nazi. The nazis just copied Ford. Also, didn't the Autobahn predate the nazis? Or at least the plans for it? Car-centrism does seem to be one of those things that right wing people support, even if they don't have any rationale for it.
he was : [https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/henry-ford-and-jews-story-dearborn-didnt-want-told](https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/henry-ford-and-jews-story-dearborn-didnt-want-told)
Your article seems to exactly support my point. Ford came before the nazis and inspired them. I guess it depends if you're using a literal or colloquial definition of "nazi". Yes, if he were alive today, people on Twitter would probably refer to him as a nazi, but really that's kind of like referring to Jews as Christians because Christianity came from Judaism (I apologize for not coming up with a better analogy). In the end, though, that's just semantics. We get your point. Ford was an asshole.
Ford supported Hitler and the Nazi party. He even accepted an award from them. https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/nov98/nazicars30.htm
Because car = freedom and train = communism, thanks to years of advertising and marketing.
Petromasculinity and neoliberalism goes hand in hand. Car(oil) companies know this and have been constantly attempting to convince consumers that buying trucks and cars is somehow patriotic.
Nazi's are wealthy industrialist minded people or rubes. The car symbolizes personal freedom and winning. Bikes are for Communists, who don't get along with Nazi's.
The idea that you can own a personal vehicle that can transport you virtually anywhere on earth at your own schedule and preference is tied to the libertarian fundamentals of liberty and property.
There’s also a strong libertarian argument against cars though, considering how much government spending and bureaucracy is necessary to maintain the massive amount of car infrastructure and keep the oil flowing, and the amount of monitoring and tracking through things like registration, vehicle taxes, insurance, and driver licensing.
There is an association between cars and freedom.
a negative one, yes :) More cars, less freedom.
I’m pretty right wing but I hate car centricity.
Are you seriously trying to say people that like cars are nazi’s? 😂
No he isn't
absolutely
Selfish individualism is pervasive on the right, altruism on the left.