So, the Crysler super bowl commercial, which I loved and said "hell yea" to when it aired started a controversy with some (now potentially former) friends. lol
I was like, "oh yea, great commercial", they were like, how dumb .. now Fiat owns 100% of Crysler, it's an Italian company pretending to be an American car company by using an American rock idol who's sold out to a foriegn company.
And so the "discussion" commenced.
Their point - with Mr M's recent full acquisition completed, Crysler has been more Italian than American and is now 100% Italian, hence no vehicle they make or has been designed for a while is American. To say the Viper is an American super car is dumb since the company is Italian, it's another Italian super car. And so their point goes.
This wasn't in terms of putting Chrysler down or the Viper, but their finding it funny that Chrysler is relying on people being stupid & not knowing its really an Italian company advertising themselves as American.
My point - ***? The buy out was predicated on terms of Fiat keeping Chrysler inherently American, it was about increasing its market, not changing the company/cars. They've announced that Chrysler will end up in a Netherlands holdings company this year, so then is it not even Italian then? In a global economy it takes more than overall ownership to designate what "car industry type" the car is. Would you say a Bugatti is a German car? Would you say that a Range Rover or Jaguar or Aston Martin are American cars (from when Ford owned them)? Is Mazda an American car? If an American car company designs a car with an Asian designer and builds it in Mexico, what is it? Where do you draw a line on this ... to me it's about who is designing and building, what the culture is that's adhered to in the design and targets, heritage is a part, etc.
When I say that Ralph has confirmed now Italians were involved in the gen5, they say of course he does, look at the commercials, they are marketing as American & Ralph is saying what his Italian boss tells him to say. Argh.
As I think about it in retrospect I don't know who's right or wrong, or if either are, it's probably somewhere in the middle, like most things.
Is the gen5 an "American" exotic .. is SRT an American performance car division? I still think they are, but is it because they are, or because I want them to be? To many I know it's a big "who cares", I've always taken a bit of pride in the American mustangs & vipers I've owned, which of course is why my buds were breakin my balls over this topic, because thats what buds do. lol
I was like, "oh yea, great commercial", they were like, how dumb .. now Fiat owns 100% of Crysler, it's an Italian company pretending to be an American car company by using an American rock idol who's sold out to a foriegn company.
And so the "discussion" commenced.
Their point - with Mr M's recent full acquisition completed, Crysler has been more Italian than American and is now 100% Italian, hence no vehicle they make or has been designed for a while is American. To say the Viper is an American super car is dumb since the company is Italian, it's another Italian super car. And so their point goes.
This wasn't in terms of putting Chrysler down or the Viper, but their finding it funny that Chrysler is relying on people being stupid & not knowing its really an Italian company advertising themselves as American.
My point - ***? The buy out was predicated on terms of Fiat keeping Chrysler inherently American, it was about increasing its market, not changing the company/cars. They've announced that Chrysler will end up in a Netherlands holdings company this year, so then is it not even Italian then? In a global economy it takes more than overall ownership to designate what "car industry type" the car is. Would you say a Bugatti is a German car? Would you say that a Range Rover or Jaguar or Aston Martin are American cars (from when Ford owned them)? Is Mazda an American car? If an American car company designs a car with an Asian designer and builds it in Mexico, what is it? Where do you draw a line on this ... to me it's about who is designing and building, what the culture is that's adhered to in the design and targets, heritage is a part, etc.
When I say that Ralph has confirmed now Italians were involved in the gen5, they say of course he does, look at the commercials, they are marketing as American & Ralph is saying what his Italian boss tells him to say. Argh.
As I think about it in retrospect I don't know who's right or wrong, or if either are, it's probably somewhere in the middle, like most things.
Is the gen5 an "American" exotic .. is SRT an American performance car division? I still think they are, but is it because they are, or because I want them to be? To many I know it's a big "who cares", I've always taken a bit of pride in the American mustangs & vipers I've owned, which of course is why my buds were breakin my balls over this topic, because thats what buds do. lol