Mustang Silly

Back in 2002, GM took the Chevy Camaro out of production due to poor sales. I read an editorial in the Detroit Free Press that tried to explain why the Camaro's sales were low, especially considering that it's eternal rival, Ford's Mustang, was still doing well. Unfortunately, I couldn't find it now, but the gist was that the Mustang had some subtlety while the Camaro was too showy, a point they illustrated by refering to the song "Bitchin' Camaro" by the Dead Milkmen. I believe the way they put it was that the Mustang is a cool car for cool people, while the Camaro is the car that tries too hard for people who are desperate to look cool.

At the time, that seemed to me to be an accurate assessment. The Mustang of that era was a fairly modest car, an evolution of a design first used in the late seventies. While the Camaro contemporary was a gaudy vehicle that somehow managed to be sleek but not sexy. So I was totally in line with the editorial board of the Detroit Free Press and the Dead Milkmen.

But I'm not so sure anymore. If you don't follow automotive news on the Internet, let me explain. Owners of impressive cars often get together, for car shows, or more informal gatherings such as the Cars and Coffee series. And when people leave these gatherings, they often can't resist the temptation to lay some rubber. And since many people who own powerful cars cannot drive them nearly as well as they think they can, these burnouts often result in the driver losing control rather embarrassingly. And because there are usually a lot of people around watching this parade of impressive cars leaving the meet, there are a lot of people on hand to see the embarrassed driver, and usually at least one person recording it on their phone. It goes on YouTube, goes viral, yada yada yada.

What's weird is that the car driven by that bad driver is usually a Mustang. I'm not sure why: the Chevy Camaro and Dodge Challenger offer cars of similar design and power, and the Camaro is currently selling better than the Mustang, so you would expect that there would be plenty of Camaro crash footage too. But it's more likely to be a Mustang. And that's led to a bunch of memes on the subject. And that has led to one celebrated case of a Mustang owner who claimed he wanted to sell his car because he was sick of the memes.

In my own experience, I have to say that there may be something to this idea that Mustang owners are a little different. I mean, I think we all start to notice differences in the behaviour of drivers based on their cars. Even if you don't know much about cars, you've probably realized that you have to give SUV's a wider berth, because there is a good chance they haven't noticed you. And similarly, you realize that BMW and Mercedes drivers will notice you, but won't care. And I find that Mustang drivers are more likely to push the limits. When seeing one of them, I do subconsciously ready myself for aggression.

I don't know why there'd by a difference, since both cars seem to have a similar gaze-upon-my-masculinity style to them. But somehow the recklessly aggressive are opting for the Mustang. That's a little troubling for me. Mustang vs. Camaro is one of those dichotomies where you're drawn to one or the other, and I've always had a preference for the Mustang. But I have a much stronger aversion to the culture around it. So now I'm not sure which I would prefer out of these two cars I'm unlikely to ever own.