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Comment by dexihand | Hacker News Reader

Cafe standards.

That’s part of the picture, but the US also has a considerable “my vehicle is an extension of myself” or “my vehicle is a major pillar of my identity” thing going on. That’s how we ended up with so many pavement princess trucks and SUVs shoehorned in where a minivan or hatchback would’ve been a better fit.

Years ago Chrysler did some research on who was buying their SUV's and it wasn't very flattering. The terms narcissism, insecurity, status seeking and aggression all came up.

https://washingtonmonthly.com/2001/12/01/bumper-mentality/

> narcissism, insecurity, status seeking and aggression

So Americans?

This is sadly not exclusive to America. In Holland when a neighbour gets a new car the whole street comes out to ooh and aah about it and for a week you hear nothing but gossip about how he managed to buy another few car after only 27 months, he must be moving up in life. Yuck

The height of hoods is at least in part because of pedestrian safety standards. I believe these originated in Europe, but I could be wrong.

Higher hoods are worse, not better, for pedestrians.

to put this in perspective;

a lower hood will strike somewhere lower on the body like the legs, and bounce them off the hood (absorbing some impact)

a higher hood will strike somewhere closer to the head and torso, causing substantially more damage, and cause you to go under and get crushed by the wheels, so at a minimum level damage is much more severe.

and this is for adults. they're basically death sentences for shorter people and children.

>I believe these originated in Europe

Not this kind of higher. The EU stuff was about lifting the hood's sheet metal off the engine block so that there is more of a crumple zone instead of pedestrian's head kissing engine block

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