What is it with people and Prius hate?

+1 on that corvette observation ... so true

 

People from North Texas can testify to this - people in Dallas don't use turn signals and if you do, other drivers take it as a challenge and speed up or otherwise don't let you pass.

This is one piece of evidence Dallas is no longer a Southern city.

 

I don't think of Texas as a Southern State. I think of it as an alien planet.

Tom

 

But they deport aliens.

 

While not the slowest cars around me, they do tend to be the least aggressive and are MUCH less likely to be speeding by and weaving through traffic. The aforementioned behavior is generaly practiced by Mustang, Camaro, and modified Japanese imports. Generally cars that young kids can afford.

That being said, I remember quite a few times I drove like an imbecile in my 2000 C5. lol

 

Around here the "kid" cars are anything. Must be the area, but my high school parking lots were filled with every type of luxury german and japanese autos. M series BMWs seemed to take the cake with trying to speed off from the parking lot. The cops were hipto this game and usually 2 or 3 motorcycle cops waited just at the end of the school zone so it was still a double penalty, but you couldnt see them. Didn't seem to stop anybody because everyone knew there were only 2 or 3 of them and would wait until 2 or 3 people were already pulled over then fly past at 75mph or so (in a 20mph school zone, 35mph normally).

I would like to say I never did that, but I can't. Well I am not dead at least!

 

Adelaide and Australia must be different. I never noticed any change. I drive a Land Cruiser for work and a Prius for personal transport, drivers behave the same around either. The Cruiser has a big steel bullbar on the front too!

 

I believe the professionals call it "Prius Envy".

I have a coworker who constantly rips on my car (I have an '01 & <3 it!). He asks questions like "how many times do you have to plug it in on the ride home?" or "I saw a Prius with a spoiler... that implies the car actually goes fast..." This is all coming from a man who drives a box on wheels (he has an Element...)

 

Don't take it personally. I've been driving my wife's Kia Sedona van for a bit. People get enraged at the site of a van exactly as if they had Prius derangement syndrome.

I NEVER had this problem in my TL 3.2 Type S, though. Errrr, maybe I WAS the problem in that car. LOL

Speaking of derangement syndrome, my heart rate goes up and my blood pressure skyrockets when I see a Dualie ESPECIALLY when driven my some schmekel with bull testicles hanging from the rear bumper as they list from right to left 180o out of phase with his weaving in and out of traffic...

 

lol - Are you tawkin' ta me!?

 

it's good to know that other people interpret the flash of oncoming traffic to be cops ahead.

I always give a warning to those about to be ambushed by a hiding speed trap. I hate it when a state highway goes from 55mph to 35mph, and the cop is sitting right at the 35mph sign catching people. I realize the legal thing to do is to slow down in the 55 to go 35 when you get there, but realistically that is not going to happen.

At least in Canada they have "100kph ahead" signs and then a "100kph begins" sign. So there is no hiding where the speed limit actually changes.

 

There may be a silver lining to this idiotic hating - less Prius wrecks.

We got a CleanMPG member in the Tulsa area that got rear-ended in his HCH II...2nd one recently.

At least the haters are paying enough attention they probably won't crash, although some are insane enough that's a tentative call.

 

So if I get tailgated when I am driving the Toyota Land Cruiser, I should assume the person behind me hates the car? Hmmm.

 

Paul,
I've had mine for about 15 months; I started a thread on road rage a while ago. Before that I had various instances of road rage, the first one was somehow totally unforgettable to me because it was such a shock (I had my Prius 3 or 4 days), a jacked up 4X4 pickup with 2, 20 something guys pulled along side of me, one gestured for me to role down my window, I thought something was wrong so I did, he then hurled every curse word he could think of at me. The driver then hit the gas (he was in the passing lane I was doing 65 in the right lane), pulled in front of me, hit his brakes then nailed the gas and spewed diesel exhaust all over the place as he sped off. Their have been many others, too many to mention or remember.
I've come to the conclusion that we are reminders that change is in the wind. Some people don't know how to handle that so they blame us for reminding them. Sometimes it's hard to be "ahead of the curve"
And yes my first car was a brand new red '67 GTO (I think it ran about 3400.00), I grew up on a farm and my parents made me save 80 cents of every dollar I earned since age 8. By 17 I could buy that goat and I still miss it, but that was the '60s.
Good luck,
Tony Renier
Green Bay WI USA

 

Look again