this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2026
413 points (97.3% liked)

Fuck Cars

16497 readers
1539 users here now

A place to discuss problems of car centric infrastructure or how it hurts us all. Let's explore the bad world of Cars!

Rules

1. Be CivilYou may not agree on ideas, but please do not be needlessly rude or insulting to other people in this community.

2. No hate speechDon't discriminate or disparage people on the basis of sex, gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, or sexuality.

3. Don't harass peopleDon't follow people you disagree with into multiple threads or into PMs to insult, disparage, or otherwise attack them. And certainly don't doxx any non-public figures.

4. Stay on topicThis community is about cars, their externalities in society, car-dependency, and solutions to these.

5. No repostsDo not repost content that has already been posted in this community.

Moderator discretion will be used to judge reports with regard to the above rules.

Posting Guidelines

In the absence of a flair system on lemmy yet, let’s try to make it easier to scan through posts by type in here by using tags:

Recommended communities:

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] capital5@discuss.tchncs.de 33 points 4 days ago (3 children)

Addiction to speed is a part of it. I think being trapped in a car actually creates a lot of psychological issues. Another one that doesn't get mentioned enough IMO is claustrophobia. All these psychological issues are probably big contributors to road rage.

[–] jerkface@lemmy.ca 4 points 3 days ago

I think the stronger effect is the opposite. When humans use tools with fluency, they temporarily become part of the body plan. You feel it when a hammer or a sling become "part of your body," and it feels good. A person in a big vehicle doesn't feel claustrophobic, they feel like a giant metal juggernaut.

[–] psx_crab@lemmy.zip 11 points 4 days ago

Car gave people power, the larger it is, the greater the power felt. It is a great way to see if people will addicted to power and abuse it.

[–] Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de 0 points 2 days ago (1 children)

One aspect i never see talked about is that you literally feel like you're going slower in a car, a big part of which is because the outer parts of your field of view are blocked so you only see the things that are moving relatively slower:

[–] capital5@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 2 days ago

Very true, and it has a much stronger effect when there's nothing around you. When you're in a large Asian/European city with tall buildings and narrow roads, everything feels closer so a small amount of speed feels like a lot. On massive American roads where everything is spread out (like the one in the photo), a lot of speed doesn't feel like very much.