Kick the Tires and Light the Hater Fires

Don't despise the South's golf cart culture. Join it.

 

They see us rollin'... they hatin'...

If they filmed a modern day Gone With the Wind, I’d like to imagine that Rhett Butler shows up to the Wilkes’ residence in the beginning in his 6-inch lifted, custom Bonnie Blue EZ-GO golf cart, drawing disdainful looks from all the beaus trying to court Scarlett. Later, Charles Hamilton would challenge him to a duel in the smoking room because Rhett insinuated that real Southerners shouldn’t be driving their trucks to the neighborhood pool.

And, of course, in the grand finale when Rhett tells Scarlett he frankly doesn’t give a damn, he would flip on his LED underbody lights and drive off into the fog, leaving Scarlett tearful and wondering how she would get a ride up to the Piggly Wiggly later.

While not as sacred as sweet tea or college football, the golf cart culture is quickly becoming one with Southern culture, and similar to how I imagine a boorish Hamilton would grow irate with a cruising Rhett, plenty of our brethren generate irrational ire when they see the four-wheeled armada roll by in their neighborhood.

Golf cart culture has become an arms race in some neighborhoods, particularly in the Charleston area, where our middle age crisis takes the form of trying to out-lift kit, out-LED, out-stereo, and out-custom paint our friends with our carts. If you add that deafening subwoofer to your ride, rest assured Bob will have a new inset Yeti cooler next week on the back of his cart to one-up you.

Looks like freedom.

    The golf cart critics—ah, let’s just call em haters—are correct that we don’t need these absurd methods of transportation. Yeah, I mean, we could just drive our cars to the neighborhood pool. But who wants to do that? While we don’t need em, there’s nothing like a sunset cruise through the hood with the salt breeze running over your bald head. Or pulling up on the big cornhole game with the boys and creating a makeshift bar out of all the golf cart front baskets. Or running the kids to school instead of having to battle the outrageous car pickup line. Or taking a quick trip up to the grocery store and whipping your whip onto the sidewalk for a few beers at the bar nearby. It just feels right, and it makes all those daily activities a lot more convenient.

So, why not make those rides as sexy as possible?

While in the San Francisco airport, my wife overheard a woman discussing their relocation options, and Charleston was one of them. But she said, "There are too many people with golf carts there. They're lazy; they drive their carts everywhere. They're walking their dogs with their carts."

Okay, well, I mean, she's not completely wrong. But if we could just get her on the back of one with a cold drink in her hand and country music blaring as we head up to the pool, she might start guiding little Maggie on her midnight dumps from the comfort of her EZ-GO as well.

The problem with golf cart hate is that haters can’t formulate valid arguments against them. They grasp for any nugget to criticize, and sometimes to the insensitive extreme (some haters tried to cite golf carts as a problem over this tragic story on Folly Beach instead of focusing on the real culprit, which was the drunk driver in a car traveling at 65 mph).

Here, let’s break down the common complaints:

•           “They’re dangerous!” So is every vehicle you operate. Golf cart accidents don’t even make a blip on the radar when compared to real traffic injuries and fatalities.
•       “People let their children drive em!” If they let their 12 year old drive their pick-up truck, would you want trucks banned? Or do want the parents punished for sucking at the parenting thing? That's how it's supposed to work.
  
•         “They drive em at night and you’re not supposed to!” Almost every custom golf cart looks like a low-flying UFO at this point, complete with headlights and taillights. But if it’s a completely dark cart, and you strike it with your car, that’s on them.
•          “They drive em slow on main roads!” Most states forbid carts on any road over 35 mph unless they’re classified as a low-speed vehicle. And this seems to be a fairly made-up complaint; in the past 10 years driving around the Charleston area, I’ve yet to see a golf cart operated on a road with a speed limit higher than 25 mph.
•         “People are drinkin’ beer on em!” Well, okay. Sure. Obviously operating a golf cart while completely shipwrecked isn’t a good idea. And it’s illegal. That’s why there are laws against it, same as with cars, and no one ever seems to blame the car in the DUI accident.
•          “They’re driving em all over the HOA-owned path near my house!” You don’t own the path and it’s built for carts, Karen. Okay, maybe this is a very specific complaint to where I live, but stay in your lane, ma’am! And no, my Tyler Childers is not playing too loudly on my speakers.

What we’re basically left with after shredding all these complaints that foolishly eliminate personal responsibility/blame and place it on a vehicle: They’re just mad they ain’t in the club. They’ve been stuck in the car line at school for an hour and they’re mad little Bailey just got swept away in a matter of minutes on her mom’s Precedent. They’re pissed they had to park far away and walk to the pool and a cart is just chilling right there on the sidewalk by the gate. They want to be on that night ride pumping out Tupac and sporting that rainbow fade LED underbody, laughing and hollering and pounding a White Claw, not knowing what adventurous trail they’ll be going down next.

Dramatic picture is dramatic.

But don’t hate. Join the cult. Yeah, we know we’re ridiculous. We know we’re superfluous. We know we’re pouring money down the drain for something unnecessary. We know we’re tacky. We know we should be mocked. We mock ourselves. The same way we mock our own drawls and our redneckish behavior and our unhealthy food and how we dress. When you can laugh at your own absurdity—and our golf cart culture is absurd—you feel truly comfortable with yourself.

I’m not arguing the golf cart culture is distinctly Southern. I’m not saying it’s a Southern tradition. But we sure are heading on that trajectory at a smooth 21 miles per hour. Why not grab a beverage and hop on the back seat?

Don’t hate what you don’t understand. Bicyclists on busy roads are a far more valid and satisfying target (this is a highway, Gary, not a route for your Spandex parade). Besides, if I gifted you a golf cart right now, would you turn it down or would you start looking up LED kits on Amazon?

Yeah. That's what I thought. Let’s go cruising for friendlies.