From the Hirp

A sticker on the bumper of your car. At some point it has become an acceptable platform for people to share their views on anything and everything. When what they should really do is get themselves a blog or, and better yet, just not try to share their views. If it's used to support your favorite sports team, impress us with your bizarre taste in music, say something witty or something especially vulgar. Then I'm all for a bumper sticker.

Otherwise it's cowardly. These people who use the back of their car to spread their, or more accurately, someone else's rhetoric. Be it the pro-choice sticker, or pro-life, anti or pro-Bush, even religious. You see that on someones car, and you see the car of a coward. How else do you describe someone who puts something on their car for the purpose of spreading a message yet not give those who disagree a chance to challenge them on their opinion? You are TRYING to get a reaction. Don't get mad or do something petty like press charges if I run you off the road. You wanted a reaction, so accept it. At the very least ,someone who wears a tee shirt with something controversial is allowing anyone who sees it a chance to call them on it. 99% of people won't. They'll walk away telling their friends what they'd like to say to the tee shirt wearer. And that's fine. Confronting strangers is kind of looked down upon by society anyway. But the guy, or girl, in the shirt allows you the opportunity to say something. Just as the guy with the funny tee shirt allows you to smile or laugh.

Now let me be clear, for the most part I think bumper stickers are tacky. And I have some ideas for some very funny, and crude stickers I wouldn't mind selling. I know I'd see them on the back of 92 Mustangs or an IROC. But there's something neat about the college kid in the beat up Festiva who knows the car is a piece of shit, so they cover the back of it with bands I've never heard of. Sometimes you recognize one band among the masses, and some how feel a connection with this driver. Or the simple sticker with a sports team. Or supporting a candidate during election time. But, the people who kept their "Kerry, Edwards" or "Bush in 04" stickers on, are the same people who keep their Christmas lights on their house till July. Idiots. I respect that they are such big fans that they are willing to put a sticker on a $25,000 car. Those are acceptable, to me anyway.

My favorite though? The soccer mom driving the Escalade with a "support the troops." Yes, you're SUV that sucks up oil and pollutes the atmosphere faster then I can say Florida recount, is really a very impressive way to support the troops. But be honest, get a sticker that says "someone's son died so I could spend $140 to fill up my tank instead of $155" And I think I've mentioned the "ribbon" stickers before. But I'll say it again. To have your yellow ribbon next to a ribbon supporting the Chiefs, some how cheapens the message of one of the ribbons. Really, you support the Chiefs as much as the troops? This is supposed to impress me that you are such a patriot? I just Love that. Or "No Jesus, No Peace. Know Jesus, Know Peace." That one really gets me thinking. I mean, they borrowed from an old civil rights cry and made it fit their religious beliefs. And now I'm stuck behind them at a red light, watching them yell at their kids as I ponder God and my place in the world.

But the stickers that take the prize. The kind that will one day lead me to pushing your trunk up your ass at a red light. The pro-life stickers (side bar, if one side of the argument is pro-life doesn't this imply the flip side is anti-life??) Anyway, you have what is probably the most controversial hot topic of the past 20 years being addressed on the back of a car. I just can't see how anyone thinks their bumper sticker is going to sway someone's opinion on the matter. And for the most part, the pro-lifers or anti-choicers, don't exactly use any sort of tact. "Choose Life" is the tamest message I've seen. But, "Blacks didn't choose slavery, Jews didn't choose Genocide, Babies don't choose abortion." I mean come on! Get out of your car and let's have a chat. It's amazing that everything these days is so PC with the exception of what you can say when speaking out of your exhaust pipe. But my favorite, the pro-life sticker next to the NRA sticker. See, these are the people who might buy my "pardon my driving but your girlfriend is blowing me" sticker.