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How do you guys like that Saturn ad?

Started by Trudi Marrapodi · · Last activity · 18 posts · 1,191 views

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rec.bicycles.soc
Published
16 September 2004
Last activity
22 September 2004
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Trudi Marrapodi
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  1. Anyone seen the ad for that one Saturn model that plugs its dent-resistant
    finish? A series of "things" are shown crashing into a parked Saturn,
    including (as if it were just another "object"😉 a cyclist. He crashes into
    the car, flips over and hits his (helmeted) head against the hood as he
    gets flung onto it.

    The message of the ad: It doesn't matter what your car collides with, the
    finish won't have a scratch or dent afterward.

    I thought to myself: Would they have shown a pedestrian running into the
    car and getting flung up onto the hood? No. Would they have shown a child
    on a bike (even one in a helmet) cracking into the car and getting flipped
    over and flung onto the hood? No.

    But it's perfectly OK to present an adult cyclist--at least a helmeted
    one, I guess--as just another obstacle that your car might happen to
    collide with (or that might happen to collide with your car...hmm, wonder
    why), but be reassured not to worry, he will slide right off your hood
    without leaving a mark.

    Please. Tell me I'm not the only one who gets angry watching this! I'm
    sure the auto manufacturer's excuse is "It's very clear in the ad that the
    accident is the cyclist's fault because he slams into a parked car (yeah,
    like most cyclists have a problem avoiding parked cars). We're not
    encouraging any driver to think of adult cyclists as just another nuisance
    they might run into on the road that might scratch or dent their car."

    Yeah. Sure. They show a cyclist in quick cuts with other "objects" such as
    shopping carts and so on. Yeah, he's just another "thing" that might ruin
    the finish of the car owner's precious baby by catapulting himself over
    its hood.

    Sigh...
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

  2. I'd be mad about it, except idiot wrong-way cyclists ramming cars isn't
    uncommon.

    "Trudi Marrapodi" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    Anyone seen the ad for that one Saturn model that plugs its dent-resistant
    finish? A series of "things" are shown crashing into a parked Saturn,
    including (as if it were just another "object"😉 a cyclist. He crashes into
    the car, flips over and hits his (helmeted) head against the hood as he
    gets flung onto it.

    The message of the ad: It doesn't matter what your car collides with, the
    finish won't have a scratch or dent afterward.

    I thought to myself: Would they have shown a pedestrian running into the
    car and getting flung up onto the hood? No. Would they have shown a child
    on a bike (even one in a helmet) cracking into the car and getting flipped
    over and flung onto the hood? No.

    But it's perfectly OK to present an adult cyclist--at least a helmeted
    one, I guess--as just another obstacle that your car might happen to
    collide with (or that might happen to collide with your car...hmm, wonder
    why), but be reassured not to worry, he will slide right off your hood
    without leaving a mark.

    Please. Tell me I'm not the only one who gets angry watching this! I'm
    sure the auto manufacturer's excuse is "It's very clear in the ad that the
    accident is the cyclist's fault because he slams into a parked car (yeah,
    like most cyclists have a problem avoiding parked cars). We're not
    encouraging any driver to think of adult cyclists as just another nuisance
    they might run into on the road that might scratch or dent their car."

    Yeah. Sure. They show a cyclist in quick cuts with other "objects" such as
    shopping carts and so on. Yeah, he's just another "thing" that might ruin
    the finish of the car owner's precious baby by catapulting himself over
    its hood.

    Sigh...
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

  3. "Trudi Marrapodi" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    Anyone seen the ad for that one Saturn model that plugs its dent-resistant

    But it's perfectly OK to present an adult cyclist--at least a helmeted
    one, I guess--as just another obstacle that your car might happen to
    collide with (or that might happen to collide with your car...hmm, wonder
    why), but be reassured not to worry, he will slide right off your hood
    without leaving a mark.

    Cars are bigger, faster, more massive that bicycles, so when a bicycle runs
    into a Car, which is most often the case, the Bicycle flips over the car.
    As a Bicyclist you need to accept this, and your inferior position in terms
    of Physics on the street.
    Just accept that Cars are more massive, and through their weight around.
    Get angry, you'll be dead soon.

  4. Trudi Marrapodi said:

    Anyone seen the ad for that one Saturn model that plugs its dent-resistant
    finish? A series of "things" are shown crashing into a parked Saturn,
    including (as if it were just another "object"😉 a cyclist. He crashes into
    the car, flips over and hits his (helmeted) head against the hood as he
    gets flung onto it.


    Anybody who buys a Saturn for any reason at any price is stupid enough
    not to be troubled by that ad. What next - will Goodyear show a bike
    being run over and crushed by the same car and then brag that you can
    run over 100 bikes before getting a flat?

    -paul

  5. Mong Yek said:

    Cars are bigger, faster, more massive that bicycles, so when a bicycle runs
    into a Car, which is most often the case, the Bicycle flips over the car.
    As a Bicyclist you need to accept this, and your inferior position in terms
    of Physics on the street.
    Just accept that Cars are more massive, and through their weight around.
    Get angry, you'll be dead soon.

    Trudi's point, completely missed herein, was that cyclists are
    people, not just propulsion mechanisms for Things That Might Scratch
    Your Valuable Paint Job such as shopping carts.
    It's strange to read this commercial's synopsis, since my mind is
    full of adverts showing cars and stairs and mailboxes and peletons and
    little kids in a hospital waving, all featuring some cyclist who could
    wear a different yellow shirt every day for two months.
    Shall we contact Saturn? Sometimes a company's ad agencies aren't
    even communicating with their marketing department.
    HTH

    --Karen M.
    doesn't Saturn still sponsor a cycling team?

  6. Found this on another cycling website:

    http://www.saturn.com/saturn/contactus/customer/index.jsp?nav=4200

    You're welcome!

    --Karen M.

  7. "Paul Cassel" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    Anybody who buys a Saturn for any reason at any price is stupid enough
    not to be troubled by that ad. What next - will Goodyear show a bike
    being run over and crushed by the same car and then brag that you can
    run over 100 bikes before getting a flat?

    Huh? What's the big deal about Saturns?

    Dave

  8. In article <[email hidden]>, "Robert

    Haston said:

    I'd be mad about it, except idiot wrong-way cyclists ramming cars isn't
    uncommon.

    Yeah, but this guy isn't a 40-year-old riding his 10-year-old's little
    bike (to my experience, what most of these wrong-way guys look like). He's
    tricked out in a helmet and cycling clothes a la Armstrong. Not likely to
    be representing a wrong-way Corrigan.
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

  9. In article said:

    "Trudi Marrapodi" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    Anyone seen the ad for that one Saturn model that plugs its dent-resistant

    But it's perfectly OK to present an adult cyclist--at least a helmeted
    one, I guess--as just another obstacle that your car might happen to
    collide with (or that might happen to collide with your car...hmm, wonder
    why), but be reassured not to worry, he will slide right off your hood
    without leaving a mark.

    Cars are bigger, faster, more massive that bicycles, so when a bicycle runs
    into a Car, which is most often the case, the Bicycle flips over the car.
    As a Bicyclist you need to accept this, and your inferior position in terms
    of Physics on the street.
    Just accept that Cars are more massive, and through their weight around.
    Get angry, you'll be dead soon.

    And you miss the point--which is to protest the whole "might makes right"
    attitude that many drivers seem to have about cyclists.
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

  10. In article <[email hidden]>, "Ken [NY)"
    <[email hidden]> wrote:

    [snip]

    Quoted message said:

    I am sure that others were angered, but it never occurred to
    me until you mentioned it. It's advertising, plain and simple. Make
    believe.

    It reflects societal attitudes, though. And that bothers me.

    Quoted message said:
    Quoted message said:

    Yeah. Sure. They show a cyclist in quick cuts with other "objects" such as
    shopping carts and so on. Yeah, he's just another "thing" that might ruin
    the finish of the car owner's precious baby by catapulting himself over
    its hood.

    Sigh...

    Good day. Or as John Kerry would say, bonjour.

    Ken (NY)

    "I think it was the right decision to disarm Saddam Hussein, and when
    the President made the decision, I supported him, and I support the fact
    that we did disarm him."
    --John F. Kerry (ABC News, 5/4/03)

    Could you keep the politics out of it, please? Thanks. (And for the
    record, I'd say the same if you were supporting Kerry, the Queen, or
    Zontar from another planet.)
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

  11. Raoul Duke said:

    "Paul Cassel" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    Anybody who buys a Saturn for any reason at any price is stupid enough
    not to be troubled by that ad. What next - will Goodyear show a bike
    being run over and crushed by the same car and then brag that you can
    run over 100 bikes before getting a flat?

    Huh? What's the big deal about Saturns?

    Dave


    True junk through and through. Rumor has it that GM was tired of
    finishing last in all multi car comparo's done by the car rags so they
    put 2 billion to make Saturn so that would finish last.

    Most folks today know that Saturn is GM. Thus the ploy failed.

    -paul

    --
    paul DOT cassel aT
    gMail dot COM


  12. Quoted message said:

    Just accept that Cars are more massive, and through their weight around.
    Get angry, you'll be dead soon.

    Way to be the Uncle Tom of the cycling community jackass.

    I for one will be slashing the tires of every Saturn I see.

  13. What's a cyclist doing crashing into a PARKED car? How is that an
    indictment of the car company? If a cycling dumbass can't avoid a large
    stationary object, he should consider some other mode of transportation.

    --

    alan

    Anyone who believes in a liberal media has never read the "Daily Oklahoman."

    "Trudi Marrapodi" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    Anyone seen the ad for that one Saturn model that plugs its dent-resistant
    finish? A series of "things" are shown crashing into a parked Saturn,
    including (as if it were just another "object"😉 a cyclist. He crashes into
    the car, flips over and hits his (helmeted) head against the hood as he
    gets flung onto it.

    The message of the ad: It doesn't matter what your car collides with, the
    finish won't have a scratch or dent afterward.

  14. "alan" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:

    What's a cyclist doing crashing into a PARKED car?

    I almost ran into a dumpster once in an alley. Did I ever feel like an
    idiot.

    --
    Warm Regards,

    Claire Petersky
    please substitute yahoo for mousepotato to reply
    Home of the meditative cyclist:
    http://home.earthlink.net/~cpetersky/Welcome.htm
    Personal page: http://www.geocities.com/cpetersky/
    See the books I've set free at: http://bookcrossing.com/referral/Cpetersky

  15. alan said:


    What's a cyclist doing crashing into a PARKED car? How is that an
    indictment of the car company?

    The car company HIRED the cyclist to crash into a parked car for
    an advertisement. The idea being that idiot cyclists will crash
    into your car, so you need a plastic car to prevent dents from
    all the stupid cyclists. That is what some people find offensive.

    Mitch.

  16. Well, there certainly are plenty of stupid cyclists out there, just as there
    are stupid motorists, stupid shopping cart users, and stupid pedestrians.
    In that sense, the ad addresses reality. Are you trying to say that there
    are no idiot cyclists? Because I'd have to disagree with that, if only
    because my own son managed to crash his bicycle into a parked car, doing
    $700 in damage.

    --

    alan

    Anyone who believes in a liberal media has never read the "Daily Oklahoman."

    "Mitch Haley" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
    news:[email hidden]...

    Quoted message said:


    The car company HIRED the cyclist to crash into a parked car for
    an advertisement. The idea being that idiot cyclists will crash
    into your car, so you need a plastic car to prevent dents from
    all the stupid cyclists. That is what some people find offensive.

  17. In article <[email hidden]>, "Ken [NY)"

    Quoted message said:

    On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 21:12:21 +0100, [email hidden]
    (Trudi Marrapodi) claims:

    Quoted message said:
    Quoted message said:

    Ken (NY)

    "I think it was the right decision to disarm Saddam Hussein, and when
    the President made the decision, I supported him, and I support the fact
    that we did disarm him."
    --John F. Kerry (ABC News, 5/4/03)

    Could you keep the politics out of it, please? Thanks. (And for the
    record, I'd say the same if you were supporting Kerry, the Queen, or
    Zontar from another planet.)
    --
    Trudi

    Just a sig line.
    Similar to:

    Quoted message said:

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

    Good day. Or as John Kerry would say, bonjour.

    And bonjour to you, too. Vive la France, les pommes frites, and Heinz ketchup.
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

  18. In article said:
    alan said:


    What's a cyclist doing crashing into a PARKED car? How is that an
    indictment of the car company?

    The car company HIRED the cyclist to crash into a parked car for
    an advertisement. The idea being that idiot cyclists will crash
    into your car, so you need a plastic car to prevent dents from
    all the stupid cyclists. That is what some people find offensive.

    Mitch.

    Yeah. And do you really think that they'd show anything colliding with a
    *moving* car on a TV ad for the car? Not likely. That would raise the
    issue of whether it might, just might, be the driver's fault. They don't
    want that to even occur to you. But chances are that a cyclist who goes so
    far as to wear cycling togs and a helmet isn't the bumblingly incompetent
    kind who's going to go cruising into your parked car as it sits in your
    driveway.

    And even though stupid kids and pedestrians exist, I predict you will
    never see one running into a car and getting flung up onto the hood in a
    commercial for said car--not even if the car is parked. Why? Because
    people would scream bloody murder. But somehow, it's OK for an adult
    cyclist to be depicted having an encounter with the car and being flipped
    over and flung against the hood on his head.
    --
    Trudi

    "Cleveland still rocks."--Me

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