Hard-times for Hoons
Guys in the modified car community are a friendly bunch. If we ever decide to create a meet, it’s generally for the purpose to walk around, talk shit, make friends and admire cars, usually with strict rules in place. In my first-hand experience over the past 2 years or so of attending car shows/meets I’d argue that car guys are some of the nicest people you’d ever meet. Eccentric? Maybe. Dangerous? Hardly (for the most part). There is however a select group of individuals in this community with far less innocent intentions. These are the drifters, the street racers, or as mainstream programs so elegantly coin, Hoons. Members of the car community, completely separate from individuals such as these have suffered vilification at the hands of media defamation. the label of the Hoon now stretches to anyone owning a modified car. Lowered? Hoon. Body kit? Hoon. Wider wheels? You can bet your ass you’re a hoon. Now sticks and stones, what little harm can a label have right? Wrong. Programs such as A Current Affair (as a serial offender) have added fuel to the fire and resulted in the criminal profiling of automotive enthusiasts, especially young, male drivers in the age range of 16 and 25 years (Armstrong & Steinhardt, 2004).
Being the sarcastic individual that I am Defect Notice, as the name of this blog, was explicitly chosen. The major fear of every car guy is to be issued with one of these little yellow ‘defect notice’ tickets leaving a car show for ‘dangerous modifications’ or for far more arbitrary reasons. As Armstrong et al discusses, many car guys will wear the defect notice and accept it, an illegal mod is a risky move and if that involves a fine, so be it. However, if you are pulled by an officer for example and defected for say, not having the H pattern printed on your shift knob, you are bound to be upset and more than a little pissed off. Sound ridiculous? It’s legitimately happened more than once. http://www.boostcruising.com/talk/764301-Defect-Notice.html.
Now, I’m not here to argue that drifting should be legal on public roads and that Australia’s current Anti-Hoon laws are wrong. I completely agree, public safety is of huge importance. Currently you can receive a roadside sanction from street racing, aggravated burnouts, engaging in a police pursuit or by speeding by more than 45km/h (Roads and Maritime Services, 2014), which is fair enough. If you are stupid enough to actually commit one of these acts in a public street, you deserve what’s coming to you. What’s not okay however is the profiling of all young car enthusiasts as hoons, resulting in harassment from police and a general bad time. Take this example from Armstrong et al (2004)
P1: “so they drove up in the (imported Japanese model), it’s got fairly dark tinted windows, the police pull them over and he puts down the window, police sees that it’s a 50 year old, and he goes, ‘oh sorry! Have a nice day, drive on’. I mean where’s the justice in that?”
P2: “Yet if it was the son driving, it would have been ‘get out of the vehicle, pop the hood’, and you know.”
What doesn’t help is the falsification and repetition of information. A Current Affair specifically have been accused of fixing opinion polls, setting up stories and constantly replay the same ‘Hoon footage’ from the month before hand. Don’t believe me? Here:
· https://www.facebook.com/streetfx/posts/10155803744585112
· http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/02/04/aca-and-nsw-police-digging-a-hole-over-fake-hoon-story/
Now I love cars and if you are reading this you probably do too, and unfortunately for me I fit in the 16-25 hoon demographic. However, I have never been arrested, defected or had an accident in any car, modified or not, and I know for a fact I’m not alone.
References:
Armstrong, K & Steinhardt, D 2004, Understanding street racing and ‘hoon’ culture: An exploratory investigation of perceptions and experiences, Centre for Accident Research and Road Safety, accessed 10th October 2015, http://acrs.org.au/files/arsrpe/RS050004.pdf
Roads and Maritime Services, 2014, Street racing and other 'hoon' offences, RMS.com.au, accessed 12th October 2015, http://www.rms.nsw.gov.au/roads/safety-rules/offences-penalties/street-racing-hoon-offences.html
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