MB

Worth a read as it highlighted the attitude of people here versus most of europe when it comes to flash cars.

Basically he was driving an big posh white merc, and got serious verbal abuse from 3 seperate people for no apparent reason, but directed at the fact he had a decent car Fairly disturbing but not something I am surprised at given the amount of vandalism we see to nice cars.

His point was that anywhere but scum England (and probably Britain) a decent car is something to be admired, not to be envious of.

Interesting.

Nottm_S2

the police should buy such a car

then shoot the abusers

i've got soooo many good ideas

j8mie

I had some verbal abuse only yesterday morning on my rather boring commute into work. The sun was shining, I had the roof down trying to make the most of it, and some knob in a Honda CRV wished to express himself and his dislike for me in my "flashy mota' ".

I just drove off leaving him stuck behind a slow coach. On further reflection I feel sorry for him. He clearly has a sad and lonely existence if he takes delight in slagging other people off for no good reason.

GarethB

Maybe it's CRV drivers?

I had one of them cut me up (pulled from left turn only lane into the right hand lane with no indication, so I pipped) at the next lights I was on the left of this car, the fat ugly woman in the passenger seat leaned out and told me to get "a proper car" amongst other things.

By "proper" I assume she meant something old, battered and with enough space for her no doubt horrendous number of spawn.

Interesting article from Harris. And sadly, more the norm in a country where showing off, with nothing to back it up is a national passtime - I'm thinking 518d with M body kit and wheels.

(S2K4ME)

I also put it down to many other countries buy what they can afford, however in this country we buy what we can't afford. Therefore there are a lot of idiots driving around in flash cars giving a false impression of wealth.

How often do you see fancy BMWs, Mercs, Porsches, Audis etc in not such an affluent part of town. This isn't snobbery on my part but an observation saying people in this country would prefer to have £30k credit debt on a car rather than save for the future or go up the property ladder?

So now, gone are the days where a nice car meant the owner was a successful hardworking citizen but now a statement to say - I need to be part of the Jones' so I've got £XX in debt to give you that impression.

Now people just don't trust what they see so they retaliate with anger and jealousy
I could easily have kept the S and bought a nice BMW E46 M3 for the more practical stuff but I don't work like that. My money goes in to our houses and standard of living.

Polemicist

I've only ever encountered this attitude twice.

The first time was in 1987 and I was in my then two week old company car - a 320i convertible in white with black leather and BBS wheels. I was sat at traffic lights in Newcastle, roof down, listening to Radio 4 and minding my own business, when a fat split-arse shouted from the other side of the street "I didn't knaaa we had yuppies in the Toon!".

The second time was in 1993. My car at this time was an Audi convertible in Laser Red with Ecru leather upholstery and rather underwhelming wheels. I went to meet with a client and as I entered the meeting room, he was looking out at the car park, at which point he said to his p.a. 'Remind me to deduct 20% from the next invoice from Mark - he's clearly earning too much if he can afford to run a car like that.'.

The protagonists were poles apart - one an erudite MD, the other a loser - but the attitude was the same.

May be it's convertibles than bring out the 'best' in people...

LTB

Mental note to self: Remember to add 20% to his next bill.

The Loon

Envy is part of the human condition - we could very easily be talking about houses or handbags on this thread.

Mix in some stupidity for good measure too.

j8mie

I have to agree with you (S2K4ME)

You see far too many people these days (especially young kids) driving round in brand new cars. There's no way they have bought them out right, so it must be on finance of some sort, and that's fine if they are happy to be in debt at such an early age. I would never have dreamt of doing that myself, but if they are happy good for them.

I seriously looked at getting a GTR on finance, but thought better of it, as I'd much rather keep the S and plough my money into my house and get paying that mortgage off. It's not very exciting but I'll be better off in the long run. Just like having a pension, it's not exciting and you don't see the benefit now, but I know so few people in their late 20's and early 30's with no pension in place.

Cars have become the new status symbol these days, and with finance anyone can have a nice mota' . When I was growing up (my God I sound old ) it was always the size of your house, not how nice your car was.

Because it's so much easier to get a nice car with finance it surprises me people can be so jealous about my 8 year old Japanese sports car

JimUK

Must get round to reading the article as evo is on my coffee table but not had chance to read all the articles yet.

I think polemicist has a point, convertibles seems to atract more attention and subsequently more abuse from the tosers. I had at least 3 incidents of abuse when i had the S and all were when I had the roof down. Maybe the jealously thing is more because its a car people would like and either cant afford or have to buy a more practical car (as they have 4 kids) and so are envious of a guy who can?

I remember my dad (he was in corporate banking) telling me about 15 years ago about a customer of his who had just purchased a new Ferrari and parked it in a multi storey somewhere not long after. He came back to it and every panel had been keyed. He had it all resprayed, then sold it