The Saturn Commercial That Accidentally Advocated for a Car-Free World
Listen, I need to put some rumors to bed: I really don’t hate cars. It’s true, I resent being forced to use a car for every function of my adult life. But there’s so much to love about cars. The technological quirks, the meeting of form and function in daily life. The engineering challenges, and the ways that brilliant minds have overcome them. I celebrate the car for what it says about human ingenuity and determination.
What I don’t love is how modern American life, and most American cities, are built to prioritize personal vehicles over all other forms of transport. We seem obsessed with keeping this lifestyle going, despite disastrous effects on our individual and global health . Add in the expense of owning and maintaining a vehicle (and the burden that puts on poor people especially ), coupled with our crumbling and neglected infrastructure, and it all starts to feel a bit dystopian.
That’s why I love this old Saturn commercial, featuring the redesigned L, the Vue crossover, and the final generation of the Ion. It highlights how we live for our cars, rather than for ourselves and each other:
