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The War on Cars @thewaroncars.bsky.social

Powell rightly notes that military aesthetics have crept into vehicle design, with deadly consequences. It's much like the way in which weapons manufacturers, having exhausted military sales, expanded into the consumer market, selling a paranoid fantasy to Americans — with deadly results.

Comic showing a pedestrian being hit by a an SUV, black and white illustratrion. Below that is a child playing with a tank and a truck. "As consumers fetishized bigger, more powerful toys, SUVs and trucks adopted higher grilles of military design — pedestrian fatalities have dramatically increased. In a vehicular design context, safety rarely considers those outside the vehicle. (Why should that concern a driver whose entire aesthetic is a child's rejection of communication, reciprocity and legal accountability."

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    The War on Cars @thewaroncars.bsky.social

    Powell created this in 2019. Reading "About Face" again now, as masked agents of the state patrol American cities and disappear people to foreign prisons, cuts differently.

    Illustration of driver wearing sunglasses and black ballcap with American flag on it sitting behind a windshield of a vehicle. "Within this, there's a surface masculinization of every detail and accessory, black becoming the clear color choice to pari with those sweet wraparound Oakleys: unknowable, devoid of identifying characteristics, a man-child's unaccountable extension of power."
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