[fucking_tragedy]

> You're not cool if you smoke, and you're not cool if you don't drive a Tesla.

PM has been trading for more in the last 5 months than it has in the last 8 years.

Cool to who? Tesla ownership is a sign that you have money to spend but are not informed enough to purchase a vehicle that's worth the money. You might be cool in tech circles, but people that know cars will roll their eyes.

[chrisbennet]

Car guy here: None of my car guy friends "roll there eyes" at Teslas. Myself and my "car guy" friends are all Porsche guys who all work on their own air cooled cars - we rebuild our own motors and transmissions, corner balance our cars for the track, etc. Then again, we probably aren't cool though. ;-)

[stonogo]

Have any of your car guy friends driven a Tesla? They're some of the worst-handling cars on the market today. Quick 0-60 times land them in lots of headlines, but the second you have to turn the car, it's really frustrating.

My car friends fall into two camps: those who have never driven a Tesla, and those who have. The former group is optimistic and looks upon Tesla products with naked desire; the latter group has already dismissed the entire company as The Sharper Image of car sales.

[secabeen]

I haven't found a Tesla to have bad handling. I'm not a handling expert, but during a test drive, it met my needs for handling. I'd buy a Tesla for the zero emissions and driver assistance features. The handling as-is is sufficient for me. (I don't recall any of the major automotive publications mentioning bad handling in their reviews. Do you have links to the C&D, R&T or Motor Trend reviews that mention this issue?)

[stonogo]

Very rarely do mainstream auto reviewers talk about this sort of thing. A couple of exceptions are in the case of a car that is damn near dangerous to drive, or a car that is expected to handle properly and fails to excel.

Since the Tesla is a car that competes with luxury cars rather than sports cars, it falls into neither of these categories. A reviewer calling it out for poor handling will thus generate a ton of ill-will and angry comments sections from the 'who-cares' crowd, so they don't bother with it.

Here's an example of what passes for an excoriation from mainstream auto media:

http://www.autocar.co.uk/car-review/tesla/model-s/ride

The phrasing here, combined with a lead-photo of abysmal body roll, indicates to car people that this thing handles like a boat. I've verified this myself behind the wheel.

I understand and agree that this car handles just fine for the mass majority of people, but "meets needs" is kind of a shitty bar to set for a car priced to compete with the BMW M4.

[chrisbennet]

I have driven one (two?) and was very impressed with it's straight line acceleration. I didn't press the handling at all (the owner wasn't the kind of guy who would/could appreciate that) so you may have a good point.

[oldmanjay]

I feel it's important to note that the entire world of "not car guys" spends pretty much every interaction with "car guys" rolling their eyes about everything. Generally speaking, people just don't care about being cool for the sake of subcultures.