The other day, I was walking on the gravel\/dirt road I live on.  It\u2019s a back road that might see a dozen cars in a day.  As one such car passed us, I noticed that a kid was at the wheel in dad\u2019s lap.  Proud dad, happy kid.<\/p>\n

What is it with that?  Why, of all the adult things, do parents push their kids into that one?  Mis-asked the question.  It\u2019s not the parents<\/em>, it\u2019s the dads<\/em>.  And usually, it\u2019s their sons, not their daughters.<\/p>\n

Given that men are worse drivers than women (ask the insurance companies \u2013 why do you think young males pay such a high premium?), perhaps it makes sense: boys need all the practice they can get.  But surely it would be better to take them to a go-cart track.<\/p>\n

Proud dad, happy kid.  I get the impression it\u2019s not practice.  Is it a rite of passage to manhood?  But women can, do, and should drive as well.  There\u2019s nothing gender-specific about driving a car.  So why would it be a rite of passage to man<\/em>hood?<\/p>\n

Maybe it\u2019s the vroom vroom that confuses men.  It\u2019s a surrogate roar.  They think they\u2019re intimidating when they make a lot of noise.  (Actually they\u2019re just annoying.  As hell.)  And they want to be intimidating because \u2013 ?<\/p>\n

Or, also, attendant with a roar, maybe their primitive brain triggers the production of adrenaline, and the adrenaline makes them feel good.  Perhaps that explains the appeal of the Indy.  And the adolescent males who take the mufflers off their trail bikes.<\/p>\n

Or maybe it\u2019s the speed that confuses them, makes them feel like they\u2019re chasing prey (or fleeing predators) and again, their primitive brain produces feel-good adrenaline.<\/p>\n

So why doesn\u2019t their modern brain recognize this and veto the primitive response?  Noise and speed matter little to homo sapiens <\/em>living in the 21st century.<\/p>\n

Proud dad.  Happy kid.  Oh aren\u2019t you the grown-up.  No, you\u2019re not.  You shouldn\u2019t be behind the wheel until you\u2019re sixteen and then you should approach the task with fear and trembling.  Driving is not fun.  A car is not a toy.<\/em>  One wrong move and you could kill someone.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The other day, I was walking on the gravel\/dirt road I live on.  It\u2019s a back road that might see a dozen cars in a day.  As one such car passed us, I noticed that a kid was at the wheel in dad\u2019s lap.  Proud dad, happy kid.<\/p>\n

What is it with that?  Why, of … <\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,43,150],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-feminism","category-gender-issues","category-men","item-wrap"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1032"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3435,"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1032\/revisions\/3435"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hellyeahimafeminist.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}