Car vandalism

Forgive and forget.

A motor car is just a means of transport and the rougher it looks the better.

Farmer

I don't share that perspective. For many people a car is not just a means of transport, and damage to it can be a traumatic experience. 

How would you feel if someone scratched up the front of your Naim gear? After all, it's just a means of reproducing sound. The rougher it looks the better. Forgive and forget, right?

I sympathise completely with the OP. I have a WR Blue Subaru STi and would be quite upset if someone vandalized it.

For the many who regard a car as more than just a means of transport, then I'd call their perspective off the mark.

If is a status symbol, particularly so.

Farmer

I think I hear the distant sound of inverse snobbery...

Why? Enthusiasm for cars is no difference than enthusiasm for Hi Fi. It's a hobby and a lifestyle choice to many people. My wife and I love cars, travel to see sports car racing at least twice a year (12 Hours of Sebring and Petit Le Mans). If we lived in England you'd find us at many BTCC and similar events.

I think your narrow-mindedness about it is off the mark. I'm sure the OP feels more like I do since he felt compelled to vent about it here. You've missed that point pretty completely, and I doubt he is getting any solace by you dismissing it as no big deal.

Except that the car is in public view, and the replay is only in view of friends ...

So what? How is that even relevant?

Good, God, Agricola.  Good God! 

Best regards,

Russ

I'm with Agricola here. Probably more extreme. My hatred of cars knows no bounds.

I think he means that status symbols are often (or perhaps best) displayed in public, to get the requisite jealousy happening. This is certainly the case with cars, but doesn't really happen with hifi, except on forums like this one.

The car enthusiasts I know are not in it status symbols. It's more for the love of motoring and mixing with other people of like interest. Just as we all gather here for the love of Naim gear.

Yes, there are those who buy cars for status. They are mostly tools who aren't true car enthusiasts, and don't even know how to properly drive what they have. You don't find much of them participating in car clubs, racing and other driving events, car forums, etc. So whether a car is visible in public or not is irrelevant. 

Car and motorsports enthusiasm is no different than HiFi enthusiasm. It's just another hobby. I happen to engage in both.

Everything we buy says something about us: cars, houses, clothes etc.  I suspect people who buy a car as "just a means of transport" secretly revel in being different from those vulgar people who are proud of their cars.  It's still showing off - just in a different way.

Vandalism by definition is simple a destructive act. I find such acts, whether against a vehicle, a building, a garden or a work of art extremely unpleasant. It is about selfishly denying somebody else the pleasure of that object-and not just the owner.

I'd probably be less annoyed if it was stolen rather than vandalised.

Bruce

I do feel for you D as i have had cars damaged so many times i have lost count.  The worst one was about 10 years ago up at Villa park. I made a BIG mistake in leaving my BMW parked in one of the side streets when i should have used one of the official car parks. Some animal had done my side window and then tried to get the radio out with what must have been a crow bar. Facia was F...ed and the glass was EVERYWHERE and i do mean everywhere. it was sunday nite and they could not get a new piece of glass until monday lunchtime. And to make matters worse we had just lost 1-0 to Chelsea in the cup semi-final.

Mista h

What does it matter if you like cars or not?

An act of vandalism caused by; a person unknown, for unknown reasons, against someone they don’t know is imo completely senseless.

Jealousy, if this was the motive, may become very destructive from the emotion but it doesn’t justify causing actual damage, and [to a total stranger] anguish, stress, and a lot of expense simply because the anti-social idiot lacks the intelligent to control their own peculiar actions.

Meanwhile, my own 13 year old car, that I’ve owned for 10 years, has a routine wash and polish every month, the paintwork looks lovely, in fact I probably enjoy polishing it more than driving the thing, these days it costs too much to drive the price of fuel.

But if a brainless wonder ever 'keyed' it, I’d be very upset too.

Debs

fantastic debs,you are the 1st person i know that polishes a car,and to do it every month WOW.

If ever you decide to move to London do let us know as i feel sure i can get you a job at my local car wash. By the way can you speak Polish ?

mista h

We don't just rise and shine around here, we wash, rinse and shine!

Debs

p.s. i also like to polish my bicycle, my LP12 platter side, and my 3 cats  

Dear Russ,

To be clear, I don't see an act of vandalism as being anything other than criminal, and therefore to be condemned.

But in a situation where there is a wide and increasing difference between the wealthy and the poor, such acts continue. This should be no surprise. Though it does not alter the fact that the behaviour is criminal.

If a person has a smart car, then it is only sensible to take great care where it is left.

For many years I had a Volvo 240, which in cost terms was about the same as a Jaguar of the same sort of size. It never got vandalised, even leaving it in some quite scruffy places, as the car did not look ostentatious. After eleven years of ownership, when the car was twenty one years old, it had no rust, and only a few small scratches. It was a means to an end, as transport, being big enough [as a saloon] to get a double bass into. Paradoxically the bass in question was ten times the value of the car!

Nowadays, I don't run a car at all, and am mightily releaved at not filling up the fuel tank from time to time!

Farmer

Rather than reply to individual comments, I would just like to say that I am really just very annoyed at a senseless act of vandalism.  I don't really care why it was done, but would think the usual cited 'reasons' are : boredom, just to show off to others, 'because I was dared to', jealousy of someone else's possessions, etc, etc.   To me, it just shows a lack of respect for the property of others.  I suspect it was probably done by some teenage boy on the way home from school, as it occurred while we were out collecting my 5 year old grandson from his school.

I don't change my car very often, but when I do, I usually buy a new one, so that I can have all the features I desire.  Yes, I do like my new BMW 320D, but I also liked the 9 year old Volvo it replaced.  It was in a public place not to be 'shown off', but because we were visiting my eldest daughter and her family.  They don't live in the middle of 'sink estate', but in a small semi-detached. It's a nice car, but if I really wanted to show off, I could have  bought something more ostentatious, such as a Ferrari (provided it would fit in my garage, of course!), but I'm a boring old fart and wanted something fast, quiet, and comfortable.

To say that it was in public view to flaunt it is arrant nonsense.  If that were the case, it would by Agricola's reasoning, be perfectly OK to spray graffiti on the outside of someone's house because 'that is on public view'.  It's not the first car I've had 'keyed', BTW, and even when the car was several years old, and no longer looked 'posh', it still made me very angry.  SWMBO was equally angry last summer when some idiot removed the all the flowers from the rose bushes in our front garden one night.  Probably the same twit who has a habit of depositing his chip wrapper in our garden.  I think we must just be at the point when he's finished eating them on the way home from the boozer. 

When I was a kid, living in a council house in Lancashire, it wouldn't have occurred to me to do any of these acts of vandalism, although I can recall some who would.  Seeing someone else's good luck didn't make me want to take it away from them, but only gave me resolve to have the same some day.

To blame vandalism on increasing rich/poor disparity is far too simplistic.  What are we supposed to do?  Never go anywhere unless you can garage the car at the far end of the trip?  Never use a supermarket car park?

I am pleased for those of you who no longer need a car, but until my family decide to live in a small area, then a car is, for me, a necessity.  I LIKE to see my grandkids frequently.

Dear Dungasin,

Please read my post above yours. It makes clear my view on the criminality of the vandalism.

It also explains that in a society where many will never have the chance of ownership of a smart car, jealousy will occasionally provoke such an act as you have been on the receiving end of.

Your smart car is seen as a symbol of the divide between the wealthy and the poor. Probably if you met the perpetrator of the act in a public place and ended up having to talk to each other, the personal interaction would have over-come the difference, but vandalism against a smart car is depersonalised, and therefore easier for a poor person to justify in a twisted sort of way, which of course does not in any way justify it. But such acts will never be eradicated in a society of haves and have nots.

Farmer

It beggars belief that any item of personal property being wantonly vandalised could be dismissed as, "well, it's only a <insert description here>, it doesn't matter and it's understandable). 

What is understandable is that it can happen, it's not nice, it goes much further than *merely* the physical damage, you shouldn't take it personally and the best way to get past it is to get over it. Thoughts along the lines of "I wish I'd caught them doing it" are understandable and have gone through my head a few times down the years. But it's better that you don't!

I am sure in my case the person that did me just wanted the radio to make a few quid for his next fix.

Anybody who has ever been to Villa will confirm the area around the ground is a total and utter Sh1t Hole.

Had something similar at Anfield once. Decided to park some ways from the ground and walk in. no sooner had i stopped the car than this bunch of young oiks came over and said.....mind ya car for ya mister.....as i had played this game before i knew the drill,so i gave them half the money and made it VERY clear that they would get the rest when i got back as long as my car was all OK. I know it was wrong to give these kids money,but to me a few quid out of my pocket was better than a big garage bill.

Mista h

You mean the part about forgive and forget, and that by roughing it up they made it better. 

SWMBO had a go at fixing the scratch with a BMW touch up paint.  Lo and behold, the colour of the touch up is several shades darker than the paintwork of the car (although it is the 'correct colour'), and made the scratch much more visible than the white basecoat previously visible in the scratch mark, so I'm in the process of booking in the car to the BMW body shop to have it fixed properly.

As an addendum, the front number plate had fallen off this morning, and when I checked, it and the rear plate had only been affixed with those double-sided sticky things!  Needless to say I have been to the dealers and had harsh words with them about this.  They apologised profusely and said it was an error on their part.  (now properly screwed on).   Alas, they (BMW Derby) don't have a body-shop, so to comply with the warranty terms, I have to deal with BMW Chesterfield.  

So sorry to learn of your misfortune DG, and I sympathise. This sort of petty vandalism leaves a nasty taste, it's like an attack on you personally.

The sticky double-sided tape the garage used to stick on your number plates must be totally different to that used on SWMBO's car; the other day I had to swap number plates with her (a long story) and it required a great deal of leverage and swearing to get the blessed stuff to let go.