to think that 4x4 drivers are the most selfish w@*&(*&s ever???

[redrobin]

It makes my blood boil! They drive their big childcrushers whilst on the phone, they tailgate other smaller cars, they use enormous amounts of petrol, they block up roads, they look threatening...how can people choose to drive something like that? Do they have ha a selfish gene, do they think they are just better than other people so rules don't apply to them, or are they just thick?

(NOTE this is only about town drivers, i appreciate that they are useful in the countryside).

Sometimes, I think Jeremy Clarkson is winning.

scary - i would have thought that he is male and therefore is totally infallible! (at least this is the case in my own DH's mind!)

Weirdly scaryteacher, I lived in Brussels for 20 years and never felt the need for a 4x4. And even more weirdly, my Peugeot 206 scores 5 on the passenger safety ratings vs 4 for a Range Rover.

arf. good on you spicey for resisting the temptation to conclude 'so ner'.

We had the 4x4 before we moved here, so kept it, and as I have said DH gets to work on foot, the tram and the metro. The 4x4 is used for off roading, trips back to UK (to the country), and for glider towing/retrieving from fields etc. It's an LPG car, and I use my Saab, as I am vertically challenged and prefer the driving position in that. We don't wish to change either of our cars, as we both like what we have.

I must say Spicemonster that I don't like going on the Ring in the Saab, as I nearly got totalled by a lorry at the Jezus Eik junction the other day. I feel a damn sight safer in the Range Rover with DH driving when on the Ring in the rush hour. However, in the UK Plymouth and the occasional trip up to Hampshire and the M25 was the nearest I got to crowded road conditions...unless it was the lorries on the roads in Cornwall.

Redrobin - my DH is not encouraged to believe in his own infallibility, but rather in mine,; it makes his life so much easier!!!

lol at this thread

does ANYONE in the whole WORLD think they are a shit driver?

I cannot reverse park

Doesn't matter if I'm in the mini or X5.

I just can't do it. I'd prefer to park 10 minutes away and walk rather than attempt to reverse park straight outside where I need to be.

It's funny i came across this thread because i wanted to express my annoyance about some 4x4 drivers.

I do see them as a pollution problem, but like someone said, there are also smaller cars with big fuel guzzling engines too that are always over looked because people wouldn't think they are fuel guzzlers just by looking at them. So if you pick on one you have to pick on them all.

What i do hate about them is people, especially women, seem to get a big ego boost out of driving one. An example is yesterday, i was crossing on a zebra crossing and was already half way across carrying my 18mth old dd when a woman in a great big silver 4x4 came speeding thro ugh. She didn't even hesitate either but just looked at me as she drove through as if to say "i am too important to stop for you."

Also this afternoon i was driving down a B road near me and there are road works going on meaning my side of the road was blocked. The only way through was based on the kindness of other drivers stopping to let us through. As i came to the road works i noticed that six or seven cars in front of me had already gone through so i thought i would wait and give the other side (who had right of way) a chance to clear a few cars. As i stopped i looked in my wing mirror and noticed the princess in the 4x4 behind me was putting her arms in the air in anger and her car was already almost on the other side of road because she wasn't expecting me to stop and was just gonna charge on through. It was funny though because she had to move her car over so she was behind me because the people coming the other way couldn't get past her!

Things i have noticed is they rarely stop and let you through if the road isn't wide enough for two cars instead just come charging through. Then they hardly ever do a hand gesture to say thank you. Alot don't stop at roundabouts because they know if they get hit there is a high chance their car won't be that damaged but an ordinary car will squash like a tin can. There does seem to be an 'attitude' about people who drive them which is terrible. I think there are plenty of wankers out there on the roads but 4x4 drivers have an air and grace about them.

Sometimes, I think Jeremy Clarkson is winning.

I love clarkson

If people who live in the countryside "need" big 4x4s, how did they ever get by before 4x4s were commonplace? I'm guessing the people who drive X5s around market towns never had muddy Land Rovers with no creature comforts ...

BTW Anyone see the piece in the paper about 4x4 drivers outraged about attempts to limit their offroading in the Dales? The ancient green lanes are being destroyed by them. Offroaders' argument is that since they were designated for horese-and-cart use 300 years ago, there should be no problem with an off-road car.

MsSparkle - I feel I must respond to your despairing post re this annoying woman in her 4x4. That would annoy the hell out of me too. Unfortunately people like her do give us 4x4 drivers a bad name. But pleeese do not generalise us all in this category. I drive on the verge of country lanes so that "town" cars do not have to get their precious wheels dirty, I also do this when in my Focus as a force of habit. I give way to most cars in town as I use my friendly (backward) country etiquette there. The problem is stuck up bad drivers are more noticeable in 4x4s, but I have seen as bad behaviour driven in smaller cars. You probably wouldn't have been able to see her expression so clearly if she had been in her Porsche Boxter.

allfalldown- 4x4's have been common place in the country side for many,many years. After all that is what they were designed for So why not use them for purpose?

I think your post comes across as very patrionsing, how much do you know about rual life??

MsSparkle...

ROFLMAS!!! 4x4 drivers 'don't stop at roundabouts' because they 'can squash other cars like tin cans'

What country are you in? No, sorry, what PLANET are you on?

If people thought they could get away with that sort of behaviour, there would be ALOT more 4x4s on the road

hahahahahahahaha

nicecupofwine...when you drive on the verges where do the pedestrians go? ah...they don't walk on country lanes because of that. (speaking as someone who has a house in glencoe and can't walk anywhere with my pram because of the 4x4s on the very narrow, non pavemented singletrack road outside my house)

ms sparkle, i loved your post btw.

(if inzi and youcannotbeserious are laughing at you, you are onto a winner!)

Redrobin - in the country pedestrians are rare in our quiet lanes here in the south, to get to my home it is miles from anywhere, which is why I am excused from the OP AIBU rant. However I am purely outraged at the mentality of some people and how they can generalise so stupidly.

How funny, you're still banging on about 4x4's.!
What annoys me about non 4x4 owners is that they see a small handful of people driving said cars and suddenly the entire population of 4x4 owners drive like "wankers", don't stop at zebra crossings, think they are more important that others and all the other absolute bollocks that is being spouted. It's utter tosh. I drove a mini for 10 years, then borrowed DP's car, then a toyota yaris and then onto a rav4 - a 4x4. So - what, i suddenly think I'm more important that other people and change the way I drive becasue my car is described as a 4x4? NO, I don't. Stop tarring a handful of bad drivers with the same one, bad brush. It's ignorant and dull. Is it not truer to say that the idiots that didn't stop on a pedestrian crossing or whatever would be an idiot in whatever car they were in? That not all 4x4 drivers buy a 4x4 to keep up with the Jonses (although I'm sure some do).

I reckon MsSparkle reads the Daily Mail.

and perhaps pedestrians are rare because of the cars on the quite country lanes?

our house is in one of the most pristine parts of the highlands, i had so looked forward to walking with my baby, until i realised how unsafe these quiet country lanes are for pedestrians. i actually feel safer in the city because there are at least pavements. But that's not really anything to do with 4x4s, its any car, at least the 4x4s are actually valid up there. so actually i am now starting to ramble. sorry nicecup, i seem to have lost the plot...think my own nice cup of wine is starting to take effect, i'm losing my own argument!

I'd say

I am just going my own experience's from 4x4 drivers.

Nicecupofwine, that would have annoyed the hell out of you? Why? Because a driver was actually being patient and conciderate on the road by thinking that the people who had kindly given way to six or seven cars had been patient enough so decided to let them through?

I'm guessing you would have just charged on through going on your responce like the princess behind me. Well if there were more patient, conciderate drivers out there the roads would be alot better for it.

change that for nice bottle of wine (hic)

MsSparkle - the way I read it, NiceCupofWine is agreeing with you... She'd be upset if someone had tried to barge through from behind.....

I guess i read it wrong then. Sorry.

I used to hate 4x4 drivers but I don't because sometimes it's either that or an mpv if you have lots of kids and I'll be honest I've never been tailgated by a 4x4.

AUDI drivers are a different kettle of fish entirely, they are speeding, tailgating, cut-you-up, impatient scum.
Everytime someone is up my arse, without exception, it's an audi. They're nobs cars and have replaced the BMW as my most hated car drivers.