Volume 6, Number 15  Friday, April 29, 2005

Don't Tread On Me

I was driving down the interstate the other day, minding my own business, when I pulled up alongside a Jeep Wrangler.  On its spare-tire cover was the message, “It’s a Jeep Thing ... You wouldn’t understand.”

Having seen such a message before, I paid it no mind.  Then, moments later, I went to pass a Jeep Grand Cherokee.  Its back window bore a window sticker with the same message:  “It’s a Jeep Thing ... You wouldn’t understand.”

Perhaps it was seeing these two declarations back-to-back, or possibly I was just feeling contemplative, but suddenly this prickly proclamation raised some serious questions for me.

First off, what is a Jeep Thing?  I mean, if I’ve got to guess what you’re referring to here, how can you reasonably expect me to understand?

But beyond that, why wouldn’t I understand?  Do you think I’m stupid?  Do I seem incapable of comprehending four-wheel drive?  Or do you just loathe me because I’m physically behind your vehicle and I can read?  Maybe what’s really going on here is that you’re just being coy, and you don’t even want me to understand, because by my not understanding, your Jeep-driving, low-self-esteem-having self can feel superior to me.  Is that what you’re really saying?

Here’s another question -- what motivates people to put such a message on their vehicle in the first place?

Don’t get me wrong -- I understand the theory behind a bumper sticker.  And though I must confess to never having slapped one on a bumper myself, this is largely because my preferences in automobile personalization tend toward window stickers, where I display my allegiances (my university, my fraternity, my Philadelphia Eagles); Jack in the Box Antenna Balls (the Holiday Ball (Jack with a little scarf and earmuffs), the Millennium Ball (Jack with a New Year’s party hat and noisemaker), Sports Balls (Jack wearing a batting helmet and blowing a bubble, or Jack wearing a football helmet and eye black) or the standard-issue Jack Ball); and once, years ago, a personalized license plate (which read “THE-RAT”, and kept getting stolen).

So if you want to use a sticker or an antenna ball to declare your allegiances, or brag about your honor student, or show your sense of humor, or just help you find your car in a crowded parking lot, I’m with you.

What I don’t understand -- and perhaps it’s a Jeep Thing -- is why you’d want to use your vehicle to insult other drivers.  Maybe I’m just too much of a pacifist, but the back of your car seems like a strange -- and potentially dangerous -- place from which to pick a fight.

First of all, what if I already drive a Jeep?  Are you saying that I still wouldn’t understand?  Of course you aren’t -- in your worldview, the mere fact that I drive the same brand of vehicle as you endows me with some sort of magical understanding, regardless of how unintelligent I may be.  In fact, it would seem that you’re now counting on my understanding to not take your silly little sticker as an affront to my Jeep-owning person.

But speaking of persons, what if you piss off the wrong one?  Getting away from Jeeps for a moment, what if you think you’re really clever, and you have a window sticker on your Chevy truck of Calvin peeing on the Ford logo, or a sticker on your Ford truck of Calvin peeing on the Chevy logo?  (As a brief aside, I eagerly await the day when I finally see the more forthright version of the Calving Peeing sticker, which will read, “I’m a low-class, obnoxious redneck, I’m probably drunk right now, and I have a completely irrational hatred for Ford/Chevy.”  At least that way, they could leave poor Calvin out of it.  But I digress.)  And then what if you drive past a Ford/Chevy driver who’s in a foul mood and is sick and tired of having his beloved Ford/Chevy logo peed upon, and he decides, in a fit of road rage, to run you off the road?

Or to make a more Jeep-centric point, what if there’s a woman on the road, distraught over the actions of her Jeep-obsessed ex-boyfriend, who, upon seeing your “It’s a Jeep Thing” tire cover, is reminded of how her inability to understand the Jeep Thing, and his unwillingness to help her understand the Jeep Thing, drove the two of them apart, and decides to take out all her pent-up anger and aggression on you and your little Jeep Wrangler by broadsiding you with her brand-new Hummer?

You’ll wish for some understanding then, I bet.

But rather than wait for that fateful day, why not reach out for some understanding now?

Friends, what the world needs now is more understanding, not anti-social window stickers starting arguments with total strangers.  So how about a new sticker, one that says, “It’s a Jeep Thing … If you don’t already understand -- and I’m not suggesting you don’t -- perhaps I can explain it to you.  Just honk, and we can pull over at the next exit.”?

Either that, or a sticker that clarifies what exactly the thing is that’s a Jeep Thing.

Maybe we can even get Calvin in on the action.