Studies show – the manual transmission ain’t dead quite yet!

The Wall Street Journal & The Drive shared some data that the manual transmission is making comeback! Albeit small… but mighty. In 2021, the take on new cars with manual transmissions was less than 1%. Just about totally flatlined. But now so far in 2023, that number has spiked…. all the way to a whopping almost-2% lol. 

While 2% hardly constitutes a battle-ready army…

It’s 100% more than 1% lol… and that shows the rumblings of a movement! What is ‘that movement’ exactly? Well – at the dawn of a blatantly forced EV revolution… where we’re being told what the future is & not to question it… and where we’re being shamed into compliance in nearly all facets of life… some people are waking up from the matrix, pulling the cords, and resisting.

Now both the WSJ & The Drive have good articles referencing that the manual transmission uptick is being driven by the youth. But to me, the numbers don’t fully add up. What they’re calling ‘youth’ here, seems to include everyone from teenagers… to people in their mid-40s. That’s a pretty large age-bracket. And the point is: I don’t think this is so much about any specific age-demographic… I think this is a psychographic. Meaning – there is a shared mindset going around, regardless of age. And your age might put a perspective-spin on it… but doesn’t change the movement. Let’s break it down…

If you’re on the younger end of the driving-age spectrum… say 18-30ish.

Odds are – your experience of the world-so-far has been on a mostly shitty, steady decline since childhood. Let’s just be real. You’ve been segregated, divided, labeled, lied to, censored, taught to resent the other side… and taught to resent yourself too. The pressures of influence & envy is the heaviest weight on your shoulders… and you don’t even know it’s there because you can barely remember a time before social media. This is your ‘normal’. But think for a second: What in this world has gotten more awesome since you’ve come of age? The only things that have really flourished in your lifetime… are electronic devices, inflation, (and pandemics)… all of which keep you inside & in front of a screen, soaking up more propaganda. None of this is your fault, but it is your fight. 

Now let’s take the mid-30s-50ish crowd…

I’m in this group. We came into the world in the 80s. That’s how the world was presented to us. Think about that…

Sports cars, t-tops, pop-ups headlights, Testarossas, gasoline, real car racing with real car racers, MTV, magazines, rock & roll, electric guitars, Motley Crue, Skid Row, Beastie Boys, NWA, pyrotechnics, the fall of the wall, American pride, space shuttle launches, EPCOT, the rad-era, the fashions, the colors, the movies, stand-up jet skis, Powell Peraltas, BMX bikes, Blockbusters, record stores, hobby stores, Trapper Keepers, The Goonies, Back to the Future, malls, Marlboros, radar detectors, Spring Break in Daytona, Porsche only made sports cars, and McDonalds fries were cooked in straight beef fat. *deeeep inhale...

In other words, the 30s-50ish crowd… has had about enough of this shit…

Since we’ve entered adulthood, we’ve seen America lose the punk-rock-edge that we were born into. We’ve seen literally everything become political… and politically manipulated. We watched social media destroy humanity & industries. We’ve seen big corporations buy-out all the smaller ones, and everything become generic. And thus, we’ve watched the world around us lose authenticity, one bite at a time. We’ve also watched pop culture push talentless idiots to the top of the charts & timelines. And we’ve seen algorithms reward total ignorance. We’ve seen fun & freedom become paralyzed by lawsuits & legislation. We’ve watched people become lazier & lazier… and more & more spooked, compliant, self-righteous, self-absorbed, and pathetic. And now – a lot of us are starting to wake up, open our eyes, & remember how it was… and we’re fu¢king done with it. If you flipped a switch in 2000 and woke up in 2023, it would seem like an April Fool’s joke. But this ain’t no joke… it’s been a slow death by 10,000 cuts. Like boiling a frog. 

So back to my point – I don’t care what the numbers say, this is not about age…

Rather, what we’re seeing with manual transmissions is a movement at a psychological level. A resistance to conformity & apathy… shared amongst all ages with a similar mindset. At this point, even the uptake of something as trivial as a manual transmission is becoming ‘a stand’ that confronts a much larger societal problem. That is: We are TIRED of ‘being connected’ in a digital sense, and we want to ‘be connected’ in the REAL sense.

When you buy a manual transmission vehicle, you are making the choice to actually DRIVE when you drive. You’re making a conscious commitment to BE IN THE WORLD when you’re behind the wheel. To have time with your own thoughts. And time to reflect & decompress &… just DRIVE… for the sport & escape of it. People make all the excuses under the sun, but there is hand-down absolutely nothing that can connect you to that moment like grabbing the next gear.

See – Elon Musk, Ford, GM, Audi, and all those guys… they don’t think we want to DRIVE anymore. But apparently they don’t know all of us like they think they do. And they don’t know that we’re actually EAGER to give up some convenience… for more experience.

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