I got into a fight this morning.
I was midway through my morning walk with my dog. Hudson. We make the same loop around our neighborhood every day, for the most part, a quiet winding road up and around our little enclave within Coldwater Canon. And then, I walked past a guy sitting in his Bentley, talking on the cell phone while his engine idling.
And that pissed me off.
Few things piss me off like a running engine for no reason. It's not like scientists from all around the world are officially proclaiming that we are in the midst of a global warming crisis, or that The United Nations Council has stated that we have a finite amount of time to bring about changes aiming at combating green house gases and emissions such as those which stream out of exhaust pipes in cars that are running for no reason.
Oh, they have?
Now look, I'm not insane. Were we to be making our morning walk in say, Buffalo, New York in freezing cold weather, then maybe I wouldn't be making such a to do...but this was a 69 degree morning in Beverly Hills, California, and so the following conversation ensued:
Me: Hey. Why don't you turn your car off while you're just sitting there.
(Note to self -- a simple "please" gets you places.)
Douche bag in Bentley: vroom vroom - he guns his engine to make very intimidating manly noise as if to tell me off.
Me: Turn off your car...what's your problem?
DIB: Why don't you get a job so you can find a better way to spend your time other than harassing people?
Me: Are you kidding me? Why don't you take your small penis car out of my neighborhood, you douche bag?
He then peeled away from the curb and yelled out the window at me as I walked away that I probably had some movie deal waiting for me at home, and why didn't I go deal with it, which I found remotely amusing and completely irrelevant.
Now I don't condone anger or violence, or even the use of the term douche bag, but what could possibly be the big deal, and why would someone feel the need to freak out over a simple request to cut an unnecessarily running engine in this day and age? And according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency's press release from the Office of Mobile Sources, emissions from an idling car doesn't just contribute to global warming, it wastes gas. In fact, if you are planning on idling your car for 30 seconds or more, you'll actually save gas by turning the car off and on. With the price of gas these days, that could end up being an entire holiday budget!
The point is we all need to find the simplest and easiest ways to help stop global warming. Turning your engine off while sitting in your car is not only a no brainer, but it can also lead to peace on earth...in my neighborhood, anyway.
(look at all the truly beautiful small cars in Europe-expensive cars, but get terrific gas mileage)
Lets make these big cars as socially unacceptable as smoking cigarrettes. Take away peoples reason for buying them, really.
There is something to the competition to have the best. Lets simply change what people think is the best new thing to have.
Hybrids---NOT Hummers!!!
It all goes to show that merely polluting the environment and being called on it is mild compared to being a woman who likes sex, or a man upon whom fortune has been unkind.
http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com
'It's All About Green Psychology'
And you live miles away from the corner store why? And you drive what when you go there? Got a grey water system? Do you use solar for hot water? Or does all of your money go into remaining in the 'enclave' and away from the daily life most people live?
Your carbon footprint to too huge to take you seriously. You choose to live in a place where oil must be burned for every shopping and eating need, when you could afford to live in much more 'green' communities. Bad choice makers don't get much sympathy from me when they jump on other's bad choices with foul speech and no context.
You could live anywhere, but you want to live where gas is burned each time you need anything. Perhaps your own well deserved guilt is what lead to this blow up. Not yelling at him, but at yourself I suspect.
Of you and Bently Boy, it is hard to tell who is the worst polluter. To me and other real world dwellers, you both look like oil oozing gluttons. Just so you know. Coldwater Canyon Enclave? Polluter's Haven.
makes them rebel and do the opposite.
(see: USA vs. Iraq)
First rule of fundraising: don't needlessly piss off your potential allies, especially over something trivial like the action of pulling over to make a phone call.
It takes more gas to start a car than to allow it to idle a few minutes.
If the phone call prevented the person from standing in a long traffic jam for an hour it was worth it.
In the end you can't be hasseling people and trust they make good decisions. Or you could educate yourself about auto engines and fuel.
I'm not opposed to class warfare, but if you want to get even with rich SOB's, maybe you should be supporting the Writer's Strike?
A link: http://www.wga.org/
If you want to support environmentalism, why not push for increases in CAFE {fuel economy} standards?
A link: http://www.net.org/fueleconomy/
I'm not inclined to judge either of you on the basis of this post, but at best you irritated him into driving off to waste gas elsewhere, which is unlikely to be effective.
Thank GOD you were there to discipline this "douche bag." Good call on the sexist/gendered remarks against his "small penis." It really is the best way to initiate rational discourse on a serious topic.
By the way, if you live in a neighborhood populated by Bentleys, you and your neighbors are probably generating significantly more emissions and impacting the planet much more significantly than someone like me - an apartment dweller with a 4-cylinder station wagon who hasn't had the luxury of an airline flight in 3 years. How many square feet of living space do you heat and cool?
There are many ways to regulate our energy consumption and you nit-pick over THIS? AND THEN have the hubris to blog about this exchange as a self-righteous victory?
Next time please insult the police officer idling his V8 Crown Victoria...And please post about your moral victory when you're done.
1. The man not only disobeyed her, he revved his engine. Result: increase in emissions.
2. The man learned that at least one environmentalist is an arrogant, rude, busybody. Result: one more enemy of the environmental movement.
3. Suzy feels good about herself for confronting that bad man in the Bentley, even though her action was detrimental to the environmental cause. It's more important to Suzy to keep that sweet feeling of moral superiority than to actually accomplish something for her cause.
---I do volunteer work for a couple of large environmental organizations which have been extremely effective. They have literally changed the world, and changed people's attitudes over the years. A cardinal rule they have is that, in this field, you get a lot more done by engaging and educating people than you do by needlessly pissing people off. Confrontation (such as lawsuits, etc.) is only for the most dire situations.
A nice suggestion - you should have been received a little better, I'd say. I've read a lot about shutting off engines (even Click and Clack say turning off at a light is a win-win). Old info, like "5 minutes of gas wasted", do not apply to modern engines. Same with the old fluorescent bulb rule - go ahead and shut off the new ones - it does not take 30 minutes of electricity to restart. More like a couple seconds.