How long do you suppose it will be before “advanced driver assistance technology” goes from assisting to insisting?
The answer is probably to be divined in the fact that this “technology” isn’t something most people wanted – and opted for. Like heated seats, which people are still free to not pay extra for if they don’t want them. Try buying a 2023 model year vehicle – no matter the make, no matter the model – that does not come standard with “advanced driver assistance technology.” Including cars that are bought by people who almost certainly would not have checked the option boxes for them.
For instance, the Mazda Miata I test drove and wrote about a few weeks ago. It is a sports car in the truest meaning of the term. It comes standard with a manual transmission and while Mazda does offer an automatic, it is not even optional with two of the three available trims. To get one, you must buy the most expensive Grand Touring trim. Point being, most Miatas are bought by people who specifically want to drive them. Yet it comes standard with three “advanced driver assistance technologies” – including what is styled “forward collision mitigation,” a cumbersome term for a “technology” that hits the brakes when the car’s programming decides it’s necessary to stop.
Do people who drive Miatas think this is necessary? Do people who are ambulatory think a wheelchair is necessary? Would they buy one – in either case- if they weren’t forced to?
Of course not.
So why does Mazda (for all practical purposes) force them to? Why does every manufacturer force the people who want to buy one of their cars to buy the “technology” many of them would surely elect not to, if that option were available to them?
The answer to that question is – essentially – the same reason that every manufacturer also forces you to buy a bevy of air bags, which probably many people would elect not to if they were optional.
But with an anticipatory twist.
Air bags are, of course, mandated – there’s that word, again – by the federal government, which somehow acquired the power under the Constitution to decide and decree just how “safe” new cars must be. We take this strange assertion of federal authority that can be found nowhere in the Constitution as a given, for the same reason an abused spouse expects to get beaten up again by her drunken lout of a husband again.
It is what she is used to.
At any rate, there are air bags in all new cars because the federal government insists there must be. It is evident – as regards “advanced driver assistance technology” – that the car manufacturers expect the federal government to insist once again. So why not just make the “technology” standard before it is mandated? People will have already gotten used to it by the time it is made officially mandatory – as the federal government has already made clear is in the works. The car industry having already gotten used to being treated like an abused spouse. Maybe this evening there won’t be another beating if the turkey pot pie is one the table, hot and waiting.
But why is the federal government so keen to mandate “advanced driver assistance technology”? The answer to this question ought to be obvious. It is to further the end-goal of taking the steering wheel out of the driver’s hands. The brake pedal, too. At least, whenever the driver attempts to drive in a way that is contrary to the way the government insists he drives.
One of the “advanced driver assistance technologies” styled “speed limit assist technology” gives us a preview as it is already embedded in pretty much every new car. If you exceed whatever the speed limit is – anywhere – the car is aware. A warning icon shaped just like a speed limit sign will typically flash in the instrument cluster, turning angry red whenever you are “speeding.” It is a mere over-the-air-update away from “assisting” to insisting. It is the specifically intended end-goal of this “technology.” You won’t be able to “speed” because they car won’t let you.
Und so weiter – as the German saying has it. As for instance when there is a climate emergency – and the government decides no one (except essential government workers, of course) shall be allowed to move.
The car I am currently test driving has another permutation of “advanced driver assistance technology” styled a “drowsy driver alert” system. If it thinks you’re falling asleep at the wheel or not paying attention to the road, it pesters you with a flashing icon that looks like a cup of coffee, urging you to stop for one.
Even if you do not need one.
One of the problems with “advanced driver assistance technology” being it is “advanced” in the sense that EV “fast” chargers don’t cost time. The “drowsy driver” system depends on the monitoring of eye movements – who wants this “technology” in their car? – as you drive but if the sensors aren’t seeing clearly you still get hassled by the “technology.” What happens when it transitions from assisting to insisting you stop for a “break” you don’t need?
Keep in mind that, beginning with the 2026 model year, all new vehicles must be fitted with a kill switch, per the federal government – which has somehow discovered the “constitutional power” to shut down your vehicle any time it likes.
The car may do that anyhow, without the government even having to throw the switch. Some of the “advanced driver assistance technologies”rely on sensors – on cameras – built into the car’s bumpers, for and aft. When these cannot see – because of ice or snow or fog, even – the “technology” no longer “assists.” When people have been conditioned to fear driving without “assistance,” it may not be necessary to insist.
Either way, it amounts to the same thing.
. . .
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Far from being analogous to the hoary old tale of drunken lout husband and abused victim wife, the current situation is a direct result of the rise of wimminz power and the subsequent subservience of simp cuck men.
The nanny-safety-control state in the west is primarily female and built on the female agenda, even when and if some of its ‘leaders’ are male.
I have a 2014 Ford Transit Connect wagon. The only “assist” it has is a backup camera. No sensors, no other cameras, no bluetooth…it even has a traditional ignition key. I intend to drive it until I die. My wife has a 2021 Audi Q5. More sensors than an Apollo module. I can’t do any work on it, and my local shop won’t touch it. The Transit has already outlasted three of Wifey’s “fancy” cars…I imagine it’ll outlast the rest of them. Too bad I don’t have vented pleather seats…
Hi Steve,
I feel the same way about my ’02 Nissan pickup; it has a computer for the EFI but other than that, it is remarkable mechanical. It even has manual roll-up windows. Systems are serviceable, by me – for free. For example – I need to adjust the parking brake. It involves a locknut, an adjuster and a wrench. Ask anyone who works on cars made after circa 2015 what it’s like – and what it costs…
On of the last sort of light driver’s cars has been ruined…..the Porsche Cayman GTS driver’s assists are too intrusive even when everything is turned off…they still cut in.
It’s brother the 911 has been compromised with electric power steering assist, it gives less feedback then it’s old hydraulic steering rack.
see @ 6:50 in video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FB7NWWw4mo
I have come to hate electric assist steering, 2018 Grand Cherokee. “The Wanderer” should be its theme song.
From a mfg engineering point of view, it’s great! Modules of sub assemblies that drop into the final assembly process with no extra steps – bolt in the steering rack, plug in the electrics, done! No hydraulics to hook up, fill, bleed, test for leaks. Dash assembly process similar, no more mechanical/vacuum HVAC controls. Pop in the electronics, hook up the wire bundles, ready to drop into final assembly. Even the parking brake is electric now.
Marketing sells all this as the latest and greatest, you the buyer are left wondering “WTF did I just buy? How do I turn it off!”
Some capitalist conservative, with enough incentive, will figure out a bypass way around all these nanny state (not-so-) safety features….then sell them to you (cash, under the table).
(American) ingenuity at its finest.
I’m not betting on “conservatives” finding end-rounds around state mandates. By there nature, they’re subservient to authority. I’d do my betting more on the “anarchists” building something new. Think Cody Wilson and his Ghost Gunner project vs Mike Lindel and his My Pillow.
How does one fight the increasing control Government has on vehicles? Stop buying new automobiles. Anyone who purchases a new car and then bitches about the unwanted features he was required to pay for is part of the problem.
There are plenty of very good newer cars which do not have all this saftety nonsense and the cost of any minor repairs or changes far outweighs the depreciation and undesirability of something new.
I know someone who recently bought a 2006 Golf with a standard transmission and 36.000 miles. After changing the lights, mirror glass, adding 17″ wheels and coilovers, he has a good, reliable, fun car which cost much less than any of these new turds available.
The best way will be to stop buying government. Way to expensive when not having a government at all is much more affordable/livable.
“Forward collision mitigation” should be renamed Carjacker Assistance Technology. Image this scenario – the thief steps in front of your car, which obediently stops, and you can’t drive around him to get away due to “lane keep assistance”. How thoughtful of govco to make it so easy for the criminal class, being outstanding members of that class themselves.
I wish I was a computer hacker. The fun you could have with these stupid cars. One thing I suspect is that major blocks of software for these “features” is likely reused from car to car to car. Look at the dashboards these days. They are screens. They no longer follow any type of form. If they are reusing screens, they are reusing blocks of code.
If I’m not mistaken, many automotive controls are written in C# and they communicate over a CAN bus.
That’s the extent of my knowledge of this whole thing. I believe that can comment out the blocks of code so that the car can still function and ignore the kill switch or any of the “assistance” features available.
Legislatively, state governments can disallow enforcement of the federal mandates directly or indirectly. For instance, Tennesee does not have state inspections or emissions inspections. All you do is register your car. Texas *until 9/23 will only have emissions inspections. In Oklahoma there are no inspections at all. The bottom line is that states have more jurisdiction than you might think. Let’s go Brandon.
But why is the federal government so keen to mandate “advanced driver assistance technology”?
Why? Because Mommy Government, that’s why. Collapse already! I fell asleep with the TV on and about 3 or 4AM there was a 1 hour infomercial for a fucking hose! A garden hose! I felt quite defeated that people are so stupid that this company poured who-knows-how-much money into selling hoses to retards. I give up. Seriously. It’s getting bad out there. Most drivers prove that every time I take a road trip. If they’re not mucking around with a cell phone, they’re obviously stoned. (in my state, anyway)
I had to go around someone one time, who was driving so damned slow, he could have walked. I was thinking to myself, “damned buddy, the roads are not that bad”, as the roads were a bit snowy in town. When I looked at the guy, he was driving with his knees, while holding his cell phone between the steering wheel, and texting. Guess he was not that great at multi-tasking. And pulling over did not even occur to him, either.
Mormons should sue over that coffee cup icon! Triggered!
Re: rest stops, sketchy would be a good day here in WA. Drive I5, it’s like Grapes of Wrath meets the Twilight Zone at any rest stop.
We’re from the government and we’re here to help.
You know you need help.
Some assistance is necessary from time to time.
We insist that you be assisted at all times.
Rumors are, AOC will run a fund-raising raffle.
Winner gets an assisted shower.
That’s Big Gov, son, lending a hand.
Big Gov usually doesn’t normally have the courtesy to offer a reacharound.
Except that in the process of the government “assisting” us, they always manage to f- something up, and make a perceived problem infinitely worse. But I think that is the whole point…
I’ve been watching old ephemeral films, most of them produced in the 1950s through 70s. A few have been about highways and the Pennsylvania Turnpike in particular. When the Turnpike opened they set up rest stops every 25 miles. These were not just a piss bucket and vending machines, they were actual Howard Johnson’s restaurants and gas stations. Today most of them are like food courts, although the last time I went through one half the storefronts were empty.
https://www.paturnpike.com/traveling/service-plazas
Now compare that to most interstate rest areas. Plenty of them are dirty, vandalized and pretty sketchy after sunset. Not a very relaxing and inviting space if you’re getting sleepy. Now I understand there’s not going to be as much activity on I 70 in Southern Utah, but seeing “van life” up close and personal while waiting to use the disgusting pit toilet isn’t going to encourage catching a quick nap.
The Turnpike is by no means a well run highway (the sky high tolls basically pay for the defined benefit pension plan, and those service areas have a built in price premium), but it is amazing to me how we went from a system that had much less use but could support full service restaurants to a clogged highway network that can’t keep the toilets clean.
This is how we end up with this modern dead man switch. Instead of encouraging people to know their limits and take a break, the solution is to set off an alarm clock. Thanks for nothing.
YouTube has video of Russians driving through towns and out on the highways. Cameras in cars tell the stories.
Cars slamming into something or another car or truck or careening into the ditch quite frequently.
One recorded incident was of three amigos stopping trucks on the open road to hijack the truck and leave the driver with no horses. Other truckers stop and assist the accosted trucker, the three thieves are then pummeled heavily and left in the ditch knocked out cold. The car they are driving is rolled into the ditch. You asked for it, you get it in spades.
A comment from a trucker here in the USA said the thieves were lucky, here, they’d be dead.
The super 7 was the ultimate anti nanny state car, (that is why the prisoner drove one in “The Prisoner” series), give the finger to the nanny state, buy one.
They are small, very light (1200 lb.), tube frame construction, the frame weighs 100 lb., no air bags, ABS, no driver assists, no safety features of any kind, mechanical art made for one purpose to go fast, the closest thing to an old F2 car for the street, very fast, more fun then any other car, a new Ferrari or Porsche can’t give you the same driver’s experience.
The super 7 gets more attention, more thumbs up, gets photographed more, then any other car, partly because it looks so different, plus it gives a finger to the nanny state.
A super 7 clone a Donkervoort had the record lap time for street legal cars at the Nurburgring in 2003, 2004. 50/50 weight balance, some had engines with no computer, just points and condenser,
No power steering or power brakes, some had no heater, no doors, some had no windshield, no roof (some had a convertible top), the ultimate analog driving experience, buy one. You are the prisoner now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAwNfgvF_Ww
They already made a movie about what life will be like in your 15 minute city coming soon…..
The Prisoner
Indeed, there are chilling parallels between the authoritarian prison that is life in the 15 minute city and The Prisoner, a dystopian television series that first broadcast in Great Britain more than 50 years ago.
The series centers around a British secret agent (played by Patrick McGoohan) who finds himself imprisoned, monitored by militarized drones, and interrogated in a mysterious, self-contained, cosmopolitan, seemingly idyllic retirement community known only as The Village. While luxurious and resort-like, the Village is a virtual prison disguised as a seaside paradise: its inhabitants have no true freedom, they cannot leave the Village, they are under constant surveillance, their movements are tracked by surveillance drones, and they are stripped of their individuality and identified only by numbers.
Much like the 15 minute city, The Prisoner’s Village gives the illusion of freedom while functioning all the while like a prison: controlled, watchful, inflexible, punitive, deadly and inescapable.
Described as “an allegory of the individual, aiming to find peace and freedom in a dystopia masquerading as a utopia,” The Prisoner is a chilling lesson about how difficult it is to gain one’s freedom in a society in which prison walls are disguised within the trappings of technological and scientific progress, national security and so-called democracy.
Perhaps the best visual debate ever on individuality and freedom, The Prisoner confronted societal themes that are still relevant today: the rise of a police state, the freedom of the individual, round-the-clock surveillance, the corruption of government, totalitarianism, weaponization, group think, mass marketing, and the tendency of mankind to meekly accept his lot in life as a prisoner in a prison of his own making.
The Prisoner is an operations manual for how you condition a populace to life as prisoners in a police state: by brainwashing them into believing they are free so that they will march in lockstep with the state and be incapable of recognizing the prison walls that surround them.
The prisoner drove a Super 7 car because it is an anti establishment car.
check out the Super 7 and life in the 15 minute city
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osNmf_zmSyE
Your last car should be a Super 7 as an act of defiance……..
190 hp Westfield Super 7 clone vs Porsche GT4 and Nissan GTR. Oulton Park 2016
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fn9-2de6hro
“Air bags are, of course, mandated – there’s that word, again – by the federal government, which somehow acquired the power under the Constitution to decide and decree just how “safe” new cars must be.”
Here in lay the fundamental problem in the USA. The fedgov has inserted itself into every facet of life. Elected uniparty congresscritters, 9 robed robbers, and unelected bureaucrats have taken lincoln’s bloodlust for power and completely destroyed the “land of the free”.
“The fedgov has inserted itself into every facet of life.”
Including, now, professional golf. Since rich guys knocking a little ball into a hole in the grass is a matter of “Homeland Security,” dontcha know.
https://tinyurl.com/3zee7wce
“Should the leaders behind the [LIV Golf-PGA Tour merger] ignore his request, ‘any of the tools at our disposal, including subpoenas and hearings, recommendations for action and legislation are all on the table,’ Blumenthal said.”
Blumenthal should’ve been prosecuted under the stolen valor act. But since he’s on the good side of the two tiered justice system…
Okay, thanks for the 2026 model year news. Wife would like a new car very soon, so it shall be a 2025 model. However, as if the hooks for the remote kill switch aren’t in there already! (Yeah, who am I fooling???) – I try not to think about that stuff… (being fooled and all)
Anyway, all of this is really making me look at buying an old car from the SW somewhere. I absolutely cant stand all the automatic shit out there. From washroom faucets to all the stuff on cars.
Actually, I have a hard requirement that I *will not* buy any car that does not have direct connection from steering wheel to front wheels, nor brake pedal to brakes. (Eh, I should also say the same thing about gas pedal to throttle, so accuse me of being milquetoast…)
However, as if the hooks for the remote kill switch aren’t in there already!
Someone should ask Michael Hastings about that. Oh wait…
What happens if and when these “driver assist” features in cars fail and the car crashes into, say, a police car or ambulance, or even hits a pedestrian or bicyclist? Will the driver be sued even though he had no control over such technology, or will the manufacturer be sued? The autopilot system in many newer vehicles has failed, resulting in crashes.
‘beginning with the 2026 model year, all new vehicles must be fitted with a kill switch’ — eric
These “drowsy driver” eye movement sensors are a prototype of “drunk driver” monitoring, brought to you by your rum-soaked Congress Clown in 2026, like it or not.
Reportedly, most of these systems will monitor behavioral cues — eye movement; reaction time; spasticity — rather than making you blow into a tube, which could done by someone else (and thereby ‘hasten the spread’ of deadly covid).
Algorithms, in other words — a primitive version of artificial intelligence. Does your car think you act tipsy? Does the redness of your eyes (or, Dog forbid, your nose) trigger the infrared sensor? Did the Cloud just cast a no-confidence vote against you? Then you’re grounded, buddy.
America being the land of enterprise, one can bet that the coffee cup image in the top photo soon will bear a Starbucks logo — which morphs into a raised, blinking middle finger if your car says ‘no.’ Then you crawl abjectly back into your hovel, with even your dog laughing at you.
And we’ll have fun fun fun
‘Til the commies take the T-bird away
— Beach Boys, Fun, Fun, Fun
Hi Jim,
Here’s something else that this kill switch in new cars could be used for…..considering that Big Pharma has tremendous influence over the government, this kill switch could also “mandate” that drivers who DIDN’T take the latest “vaccine” made by Pfizer NOT be able to drive.
Well……one could be a smart ass, and come up with the idea of developing glasses that have eyes on them. Then that way, you always “look” awake and alert, and could fool the sensors. For every Big Brother, draconian law out there, someone will find away around it. It is why gun control does not work, and it is why prohibition did not work, either. For every “solution” to a perceived “problem” the government has, someone will find a way around it.
Full Measure had a story last year about the self driving feature in cars failing, resulting in crashes. The majority of failures were in (surprise, surprise) Teslas, but the government seems to do nothing about it, let alone have saaaaaaaaaafety standards for that technology. Instead, they seem determined to STILL ram faulty automotive technology like that down our throats….
https://fullmeasure.news/newest-videos/unchecked-tech-06-15-2023
Oops, it’s the autopilot system in cars that have been failing. The majority of these failures are in Teslas.
How does “forward collision mitigation” work in a standard transmission? Does the automatic braking also engage the clutch?
I try to turn off all of the “assistance” in my car, but I can only dial the collision mitigation down to a low sensitivity setting. Turning it off activates an annoying light on the dash.
Most of the time, the collision mitigation stays out of the way, but the system seems particularly sensitive when approaching Nissans.
Brie Larson will be the new Borg queen.
As I stated before, “assistance” like that could get you killed up here. Driving along on a snowy, icy road, and the camera “senses” something and slams on the brakes unexpectedly. All of a sudden, you are in a fight to keep from ending up in the opposite lane, where you could end up hitting another vehicle, ending up dead, killing another driver, or ending up in the ditch somewhere. And if you hit someone because of the “assistance technology” over riding your own good driving, are you then, at fault for causing the accident, when you had no control over the vehicle’s not-so-safe, “safety” maneuvers? Will you get sued by the other driver? Or can you sue the manufacturer for the safety technology you had no control over? Or are you forced, as the owner of the vehicle, to sign a legal document that you will be responsible for something you have no control over when you drive said vehicle off the lot? Hmm, I wonder what the vehicle would do if you covered the camera with old fashioned duct tape? LMAO, it would probably disable the whole vehicle, I imagine. Or you would have to endless listen to the nanny warning shilling that it is blocked. Borrowing a movie line: What a stupid world….
Just curious, if you cover up the sensors both inside and out does the nagging stop? Luckily my Chevy has none of that and a 4 barrel carb to boot.
To paraphrase a quote I read of Bastiat, “If people are so stupid and evil as to not be allowed to live their lives unfettered, why is it that the proposals of politicians, bureaucrats and social do-gooders are always considered good? Are they not also members of the human race?”
Mark:
I’ve often thought about this very thing. Somehow, the “progressive” way of thinking says that human nature (which they insist more government is needed to control) is somehow repealed as soon as someone’s paycheck changes from one supplied from a private enterprise or directly from a customer to one provided by tax funds collected at gunpoint.
I’m not saying all government workers are evil, but the ability to control people does tend to attract an outsized share of psychopathic personalities.
I could not say it better than CS Lewis:
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber barons cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
This is where the world is heading, and it’s very depressing:
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/8-signs-that-the-futuristic-control-freak-agenda-of-the-globalists-is-rapidly-moving-forward/
The globalists that control all the governments are a satanic death cult….far more evil then the slaves they breed, rob and control. The slaves need to co operate and exterminate the evil control group.
“conditioned to fear driving without “assistance,”
While texting.
If I were younger, I might abandon all interest in driving unless I just had to. Which is kind of where I am now, with my advancing years and infirmity, not because late model cars are such crap, and too pricey.
“According to a data analysis performed by the Insurance Information Institute, 43% of 16-year-olds had driver’s licenses in 1997, by 2020, that number had fallen to 25%. This trend seems to also hold true even for older members of Gen Z, only 80% of Gen Zers between the ages of 20 to 25-year-olds had licenses in 2020, whereas 90% of the same age group had their licenses in 1997. …
One reason for Gen Z’s lack of interest in cars and driving is the rise of ride-sharing services and other trending modes of public transportation such as electric scooters and bikes. These services provide a convenient and affordable alternative to owning and maintaining a car, especially for those living in urban areas or on college campuses where the modes of transportation are readily accessible. With a touch of a button, they can summon a ride from their smartphone and be on their way.”
SOURCE:
https://www.foley.com/en/insights/publications/2023/05/data-deep-dive-gen-z-less-interested-owning-car
I think the real reason is kids socialize on screens now instead of in person. It’s quite sad really.