quote:

I wish I could track down the first guy who thought it would be a good idea to “humanize” the automated-safety provisions in our cars. Sure, the time before when the car would just slam on the brakes or pull the wheel out of your hands with no explanation was frustrating, but it was nothing compared to the unbroken chain of teary apologies that my Accent would burp out every time it made me take my eyes off my smartphone and spill my half-caf venti latte all over my tactical yoga pants.

Eventually, it wore on me so much that I began wishing for a major accident, to possibly get the chance of hearing my contemptuous steed’s dying words and smile smugly as it passed into Hyundai Hell. I began ordering it to frequent the Underroads, where the man-driven automobiles were still allowed to run, burping clouds of hydrocarbons and making clattering rackets as they did in the Old Days. Surely one of these people would crash into my car and write it off, just like in the history books.

As we blew through the spiderweb of rock-based roads beneath the Modernway, weaving in and out of traffic, I waited for the moment that human frailty would end my journey. Surely these drivers were weak, inefficient, tired and made mistakes. But as I looked out the side window, I discovered something wondrous in each car we passed. They were looking out the front window. Driving. Totally absorbed in the archaic mechanic practice. I counted: not a single one was on their phone.

At last, after wasting the better part of the morning in an attempt to create a high-speed accident, I pulled into a roadside bar. There, in the parking lot, I could see grease-stained humans working on their own cars. The very thought was unfathomable: my Hyundai was so complicated, with its millions of miles of wiring and billions of lines of microcode, that it could not be serviced except by the pseudosentient Expert Systems at the heart of each dealerships. How could a mere human being understand such a complicated system? I had to ask, though.

“Do you guys know how to keep my Hyundai from being so polite?”

One of the younger guys laughed, then reached into his pocket for a screwdriver. With a quick twist of his wrist, he exposed a hidden panel beneath the dashboard and pointed to a switch reading “RUDE / POLITE.” Mine was set to POLITE. He flipped it immediately and smiled, waving me onward.

The next morning, I was riding to work when a pedestrian darted out in front of my car. Dutifully, my Accent slammed on the brakes, barking a furious “BLYAT!” from its external speaker array. What followed, sounding like a high-velocity barrage of Russian curses, reduced the pedestrian to tears, and for the first time I knew what it must have been like to drive a car back then.