Big oil forced that shit onto you instead of going the far superior EV route from the beginning. Now EVs are finally taking over and I'm happy my kids never have to get fuel grease on their hands and suffer those nasty fumes at gas stations. Shifters were needed for an inferior technology to work. I liked it as an experience when I learned to drive. But cars are mostly transport due to failure of better public transport infrastructure. I don't care whether they're fun. I drive for fun on the Xbox or maybe in a GoKart every few years.

Oh that felt good to rant.

All hail the Unimog!

Laughs in Allison 18 spd

It’s been difficult to find manual transmisssions for a couple of decades here in the US. That ship has sailed.

While most of my life I vowed my kids would learn manual, I gave up on that idea because

• manual transmission cars are rare and disappearing
• automatics now are more fuel efficient
• CVT are reliable and even more efficient
• EVs don’t shift

My kids started driving in a world of automatics and will soon be in a world with no transmissions

I still hate to this day one of my parents cars. The gear shift is on the side of the radio and the radio controls(what isn’t touch screen) are underneath.

Daddy needs his coffee.

Seriously, the automatic is so much better for using a truck as a tool. I still drive a stick right now and I'm lucky I miss rush hour most days because we start and end early, one job site.

I'd never choose a manual for dealing with taking tools and materials around the Metro while the assholes I'm trying to service cut me off in stop and go traffic.

And IMO we need to start racing EVs, leave combustion for the 20th century old timer events

oshit I have been bamboozled by a shitpost

As a classically trained driver I’ve found automatics make people drive worse because they have to think less. And they already barely think.

• Wanted to Start on a Steep Hill? We had a Tool for that: it was Called "Flooring the Gas while letting go off the Clutch"

IT AIN'T NO GOOD MORNIN' WITHOUT THE SMELL OF NICELY BURNED CLUTCH

US: predominantly automatic transmission, low speed limits

Germany: predominantly manual transmission, higher speed limits and no limits on around half of autobahns (motorways)

US road deaths per capita twice of Germany.

Draw your own conclusions.

I have never owned a car with an automatic transmission, and I am proud of that fact

Handbrake start? Pffft.. what a noob.

It's called the parking brake and it's for parking. You have the pedal for when you're driving. You can use that while leaving from a hill, it's really not that difficult, you just hop from the brake pedal to the biting point on the clutch.

I mean it'd be sort of a bitch on the clutch if it's like a 40 degree hill and it's a rental and it's the first time you're even moving it at all and you've no idea of where the biting point is, but you should never be in a position where that's the very first time you drive a specific car. And after having driven a car once, you ought to know the biting point.

Thus, "handbrake start"? Noob shit.

• 3rd gen (former) taxi driver

edit my dad also taught me how to switch gears without the clutch without raping the gearbox. all about giving it a bit of gas while it's off gear to match the rpm's. it's rather trivial once you get the feel for it, but you need to understand the rpm range the gears can do obvs and not downshift while on high rpm or something like that

When car companies start charging for heated seats.. that’s why I stop buying brand new cars and go for older ones

My Volkswagen flashes a message when I put the key in the ignition; "Depress clutch to start"

So I tell it that the majority of Yanks don't know how to use it and it starts every time.

You guys do realize this is supposed to be a parody of boomer bullshit arguments right?