Here's two Sunday stories on the psychology behind auto marketing and design.
General, and SUVs.
If you drive an SUV, a sport utility vehicle, you may be feeling a little defensive these days.
According to some, you're not only unpatriotic and un-Christian, you're ruining the environment. You're also selfish and stupid and dangerous - a rollover waiting to happen.
So, are SUV owners sheepishly surrendering to more sensible cars? Hardly.
As 60 Minutes reported a few months ago, there's no end in sight to America's love affair with size and horsepower. Correspondent Morley Safer reports.
Ah, the thrill of the open road - if you can find one. Roads are more and more congested and the vehicles they carry grow ever larger. Today, the family car is no longer a modest station wagon, but a Suburban, a Yukon, or an Excursion or a Land Rover or an Escalade.
By and large, SUV owners seem a contented lot, lording it over the common herd, proud of the status symbols they captain to the shopping mall or the grocery store.
Urban and suburban guerilla groups, like an outfit called "Earth On Empty," are waging a losing battle, ticketing SUVs and citing drivers for their selfishness.
In California, a group called "Changing the Climate" uses bumper stickers to make its voice heard. And then there are the TV ads.
On the radio you can get another earful from the hosts of NPR's "Car Talk" - Tom and Ray Magliozzi. On their Web site, the Car Talk brothers feature nine downsides to driving an SUV, including "Other people on the road may hate you." SUV owners are not amused.
“They hate us,” says Tom Magliozzi. “All the vitriolic responses that we get.”
But the Car Talk guys' disdain seems futile, even with rising gas prices. With gas still costing less than bottled water, most Americans have shown little interest in more fuel-efficient cars and the auto makers happily comply.
