Motor Mouth: Are pickups really a plague on Canadian streets?

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Were it not for little things like freedom of choice, the sleaziness of politics, and the fact that we’re talking about the most popular vehicles in Canada, it would be a tempest in the very tiniest of teapots.

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Essentially the story is this: Marcus Gee, an editorial columnist with the Old & Male, whose normal beat seems to be war reporting and the other “pandemic” (opioids), wrote an op-ed piece — you can read it here — calling pickups “a plague on Canadian streets.” Now, never mind that Mr. Gee has about as much business writing about automobiles as I do about, well, opioids. Or that the 20 per cent of recent Canadian sales that are pickups — and the significantly smaller portion they make up of actual vehicle registrations in our country — is hardly a plague. Or that his imagined “rolling coal” crisis — yes, we’ve all seen the YouTube videos, too, Marcus – is really quite rare and more of an American phenomena than a blight on our streets. I truly hope Mr. Gee does better research when he covers drug overdoses, because those poor souls certainly deserve better than we got in this article.  

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All that being said, I do agree with the intent, if not the rhetoric, of his diatribe. The fact remains, whether Mr. Gee is just an elitist nincompoop or not, that many people — too many people, in fact — are driving pickups that don’t really need them. And he’s also correct that said pickups pollute more than smaller cars. As family transport goes, it’s pretty hard to find anything more inefficient than a crew cab.

As true as that all may be, however, it’s none of Mr. Gee’s damned business. Oh, were he actually trying to dissuade said purchasers of unnecessary Sierras and Silverados to opt instead for a Prius Prime, then fair game to him. But you don’t have to delve too deep into his diatribe to understand that swaying minds and using the written word to alter the choices consumers make was the furthest thing from his mind. Far more likely is that he thinks someone should do something about the problem and, unfortunately, when the high-minded think “something should be done” — especially when they start talking about plagues on streets — the call for a ban or a tax is seldom far behind.

Indeed, Gee’s little harangue is nothing more than another of the polemics already far too common these days: I don’t like something so nobody should. Notably absent, for instance, in his tirade was any mention of sport utility vehicles, which occupy just as much space, consume almost as much gas, and are almost as poor at family transport. Why single out only pickups? Is one more socially acceptable in certain circles than the other? Indeed, Gee defeats much of his own argument by noting that electric pickups “are coming soon,” making one wonder if his entire diatribe is just more of the politics of ‘them’ and ‘us.’

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Certainly, that’s what Albert Premier Jason Kenney took from it and damned if he isn’t, like the most cynical of politicians, going to wring every scintilla of leverage out of it possible. His Twitter profile now shows him driving his bright blue Dodge Ram, his shirtless arm out the window in perfect “redneck tan” pose. He of course laments the Globe ’s “temper tantrum” and challenges “Toronto columnists to try getting around this province during a prairie blizzard in a Smart car.”

But, just like Mr. Gee, Mr. Kenney is playing to the most deafening of echo chambers, namely the 40 per cent of Albertans he estimates drive pickups. And even if Mr. Kenney’s circumstances are different than Mr. Gee’s – he seems to be fighting for his political life, as he’s recently been alienating normally loyal conservative voters — it’s the same tired old polemic extremes of excusing or condemning whatever is expedient to your immediate constituency.

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As for Motor Mouth’s opinion of this tempest in the tiniest of teapots, it’s not often — hell, I’ve been trying for almost 25 years — that one gets to quote the American Declaration of Independence in an automotive column. But, if I may be so bold, I think the finest 20 words ever written in the English language are that all men “are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Often lost in that almost perfect definition of freedom is that said pursuit often results in poor decisions and happiness itself is far from guaranteed.

So to all you pickup owners who are, as per Mr. Gee’s condemnations, just using your Ram duallies and F-150 Longhorns as fashion statement, I really do think you’re all dumber than a bag of hammer handles for driving a truck. But, as British historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall — and not, as per common misconception, Voltaire — (almost) said: I will defend to the death your right to drive them. If you’re still not getting the gist of this yet, Marcus, people have the right to buy cars you don’t like.