PHQOPEC

I wish I could capture and post on my monologues all the faces of all the Prius drivers that pass me on my bicycle.

I'm pretty sure there's this silent competition going on...Prius drivers are one-upping every other straight gasoline car out there, and they know it. That's why they put on vanity plates like LES GILT, PHQOPEC, or bumper stickers like "Stop Terrorism -- Drive a Hybrid." But I am one-upping every one of them, and they know it. I know it, because the looks I get from them are unmistakable.

If these drivers were really so fucking concerned about oil dependence, war, global warming, etc., etc., they'd be demanding living arrangements that aren't so god damned dependent on a vehicle. It doesn't matter what the power source is...you still have a 3,000 pound concoction of steel, rubber, toxic heavy metals and toxic fluids usually motoring a solo white occupant across six lanes of asphalt or steel reinforced concrete.

It isn't the car that's the problem. It's the American driving it, who thinks that because it's a Prius they have the right to live thirty two miles from work, the right to solo motoring alongside two hundred million other solo motorists. If every one of these were a hybrid, would we really be any better off? Would we? We'd still blow a few hundred billion man-hours stuck in traffic, we'd still retain all the social problems of suburbia, we'd still squader all our national energies on vehicle dependent sprawl that has no future, and we'd still be as fat and as depressed a nation as ever.

We would gain very little. But we'd think we were saving the planet, now wouldn't we?