Do people hate your car?

Ever since I purchased my Leaf I have had the most infuriating and odd thing happen when I drive my car. I always park out in the middle of nowhere in the parking lot at my local stores. That way people stay away from my car, easier to park, and I can certainly use the exercise. I have not had any problems for the most part doing this ever... Until I bought my Leaf.

I buy a Leaf and park the same way and I cannot tell you how many times now I have had someone park next to me in the middle of nowhere and then SLAM their car door into the side of my car. I now have at least 4 door dings/dents on my car now because of this. I can hardly drive my car to a store and park in a parking lot an not have someone hit my car.

At this point I can only assume that the Leaf brings some sort of response from people that they don't like the car, the look of the car, or the fact it is an EV. I don't know the motive, but very clearly something is going on where I have seen this issue with this car. I am just about afraid to drive it anywhere because of this now. It is seriously that bad and that often I am having this issue.

Have any of you noticed aggressive behavior toward your car? At this point I actually avoid taking my car to parking lots because it is so bad which means I can hardly drive the car for it's intended purpose.

MalcolmReynolds said:

Have any of you noticed aggressive behavior toward your car?

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Never. We have had the LEAF for over six years now and I am not aware of a single door ding on the car. That is true even though electric cars are rare here and big diesel trucks are common.

In fact, I've had a lot of positive interest in the car from people I meet in parking lots over the years.

I'm sorry to hear that you are having this issue. Where do you live?

I live in Colorado. I have never had an issue before either that I can recall. So I find this very odd that I am having this issue with the Leaf. The fact that the people that are doing this are going out of there way to park out in boonies just to park next to my car is equally strange. Sometimes that happens that would happen before, but not a lot.

Do you have any bumper or window stickers on the car?

Nope, nothing like that on the car at all. Nothing that would make it attract attention other than is it a Leaf which does admittedly look pretty odd.

I live in a very "Purple" area, with democrats, republicans, greens... my car, however, is pretty much ignored. You might actually be safer parking in the more densely 'populated' spaces near the stores and their security cameras.

I have never seen anything like this before. So I thought I would ask if anyone else was having any issues like this.

FWIW, I've expected incidents, but none have materialized. What I have noticed is that the outer regions of larger parking lots tend to attract people who aren't there to shop. I'm fortunate (sort of, anyway) to have a Handicapped placard, as it lets me park close to stores, but in spaces with buffer zones (for van access) around them.

When I had my Leaf, the only behavioral issue I've noticed is that people would never get behind me at stoplights. I would look in the mirror and actually see people leaving me alone in my lane to join several others in the other lane. My guess is they think I'll accelerate away at a snail's pace (this is when Leafs were more common than Teslas). They got a surprise as soon as that light turned green.

Now that I drive one of the most anonymous BEVs in the world (eGolf) I don't notice any behavioral changes from people. I was even waiting for someone to leave a nastygram complaining about my "cheating diesel" but that never happened.

Where I live, no discrimination here. Everyone gets dinged. I just don't know why people just fling their doors open without a care. It is very aggravating.

RegGuheert said:

MalcolmReynolds said:

Have any of you noticed aggressive behavior toward your car?

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Never. We have had the LEAF for over six years now and I am not aware of a single door ding on the car.

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My experience is basically the same as RegGuheert's except I've only had a Leaf since end of July 2013...

I also try to park further away from any cars and high traffic areas, to avoid door dings. I started doing that after I got so many dings on my former 02 Maxima, including a chunk a of paint being taken out on a plastic trim strip (original black color of strip was easily visible). In another case, I saw fresh silver paint on the edge of another crap SUV's door from them dinging me. I was angry.

My former 04 350Z got a noticeable dent from a door ding.

I have minimal dings and might've been a few already on the used Leaf I drive now.

Are there very many other Leafs in your town? Maybe they think you are someone else? I have not had any issues here. Some people have a real negative mind-set against electric and economy vehicles. They equate them with 'tree-huggers' and other like-minded people. I grew up in a town where the logging industry was a major part of the local economy. Many of those people had a real hatred for 'environmentalists' and others that interfered with their ability to work.

I don't think It has anything to do with the Leaf..... I have also experienced this... I have like new Mazda Miata, and park all alone in the back of mall parking lots.

every once in a while I get an old clunker that was repainted black with a paint brush next to me, and the car is filled with every possession the idiot has. I then find ding marks that match the guy's doors opening... I want to find a brick and donate it to his driver's seat.

I really think that that action is a purely aggressive thing to do for one who has nothing else to do..

Thanks for the replies everyone. I live in a decent sized city so there are other EV's here including Leaf's. My local Domino's uses Leaf's for delivery vehicles. But not so many that someone would mistake my car for someone else. Now that you mention it I don't know that I have noticed another blue leaf like mine when I am out.

It may be like some of you have said people just don't care, and they just don't pay any attention and fling doors open. Just never saw it happen so many times to one vehicle in such a short time. It makes me sick because there isn't anything I can do about it.

I have noticed the same thing regarding people coming up behind me and then you see them looking for a way to get into another lane out from behind me. I don't mind that too much because I generally am that guy that is easy and early off the throttle and not in a race to get to the next light.

MalcolmReynolds said:

I have noticed the same thing regarding people coming up behind me and then you see them looking for a way to get into another lane out from behind me. I don't mind that too much because I generally am that guy that is easy and early off the throttle and not in a race to get to the next light.

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That might be because they expect an electric car to accelerate like a golf cart. However, we know the truth.

This is true, I don't think most people have any idea just how quick these cars can be if you choose to use the fun pedal in fun ways...

This is pure guesswork, but could it be coming from resentment over Colorado's substantial EV subsidy? I worked with a guy with very strong conservative opinions, and while he would never stoop to violence or vandalism, he was always pretty generous with his disdain for the inequity of governmental support for liberal darling issues. He was pretty sure that the provision of ONE outdoor L2 charging post constituted criminal favoritism of a tiny minority of employees, for example.

Levenkay said:

This is pure guesswork, but could it be coming from resentment over Colorado's substantial EV subsidy? I worked with a guy with very strong conservative opinions, and while he would never stoop to violence or vandalism, he was always pretty generous with his disdain for the inequity of governmental support for liberal darling issues. He was pretty sure that the provision of ONE outdoor L2 charging post constituted criminal favoritism of a tiny minority of employees, for example.

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I think that's part of it. In today's political climate, there are seemingly no issues too trivial for battle-lines to be drawn. Ironically some of these EV incentives were passed during periods of Republican control and for good reasons. But that doesn't seem to matter anymore. For people to be politically aware and engaged can be healthy but in our time it has turned pathological as so many people are viewing the left/right conflict as something which can only be ended with the total destruction of the opposition. And so many people are running their intake of information through that filter. I fear for our future.

Well the people that appear to be "attacking" my car are far from economically advantaged considering they are driving something that they don't mind slamming into the side of another car. So I don't know if that is any indication of any political slant or if they would even be aware of the EV incentives.

The CO incentives were greatly scaled back in reality. You used to be able to buy a previously owned EV and get a tax break. Now the incentive only applies to brand new vehicles. And sadly brand new EV's are out of reach of the average or lower income person financially anyway. So I would imagine if you look at the stats the state is probably processing less incentives than they did before even if the amount per vehicle went up. So I would hope anyone looking at this topic would think about what it really means for the state and for the average consumer.

So I don't know if this is political or not. I do agree the extreme left and right political scene is so bad now that I think most average people or independents are just "checking out" and not getting involved. Which appears to make the entire system more extreme when the only people participating are out of touch with average people and foaming at the mouth.

MalcolmReynolds said:

Well the people that appear to be "attacking" my car are far from economically advantaged considering they are driving something that they don't mind slamming into the side of another car. ...

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Sure there are all kinds of other reasons people do these things. Plenty of times it's just envy, or spite. Particularly if you park far away to avoid door dings, it brings out the spiteful side of some folks and they'll park right on top of you because "**** you". I did that a few times with a previous vehicle when it was new. After a few encounters with the "**** you" police, I concluded that it was less at risk by parking where cars were present but scattered rather than further away where my ding-avoidance intentions were clear.