I’m really not trying to change anyone’s mind. Some people love VWs, and that’s fine. I’m just not one of them.

Sure!

You have shitty taste in cars.

No, it’s called the law of probabilities. As in, if you buy an inferior product, there’s a greater probability of it failing on you.

I drive a Mazda. Which, admitedly isn’t as good as a Honda or Toyota, but is definitely lightyears ahead of any German car when it comes to “not being a piece of shit that will strand you on the side of the road,” or “will buttrape you with Sriracha for lube” in parts cost, or “is the world’s shittiest Rubic’s Cube”…

Read the reliability reports? First of all, from whom? Second of all, do you really think that the so-called reliability reports have considered cars that are more than a few weeks old? Lastly, do you really think that any publications’ “reliability reports” can outweigh 25+ years worth of knowing people whose VWs…

If Europeans had a lock on fun cars, I’d be an enthusiastic supporter of public transit by now. Thankfully Japan and America figured out how to make fun cars that aren’t pieces of shit.

I’m not trying to convince anyone else. That would be pointless. I don’t care what other people like or don’t like. Tom asked a question, and I responded: I would not ever consider a GTI, plain and simple. VWs are pieces of shit.

It’s a car praised mostly by people who don’t own it and will never have to live with it longer than a week. VW builds flawed, unreliable cars, and until they prove otherwise, which would take at least a decade if they started today, I’m not touching one unless it’s free.

Seems to be an issue with a lot of new cars these days.

General (watercooled) VW hatred. I’ve never known a modern VW that wasn’t complete garbage.

Dieselgate is part of it, but a much larger part of it is that every last car VW has built since they started using radiators has been a poorly built, nightmarishly unreliable piece of junk.

If you like cars that break down, I suppose.

I probably wouldn’t drive a GM unless it were free either.

Eh, I could see some markup for a “hot, new” car like a GT350. For a relatively common car like a Civic Si, no.

I don’t care for the way VWs drive, and I don’t trust VW Group to build a car that’s not an unreliable pile of shit.

I wouldn’t drive a GTI unless it were free. I mean entirely free, like, not just the car, but fuel, insurance and maintenance covered too. Basically, a company car. That’s the only way.

Yay, manuals! Boo, turbo-fours!

But not Plano.

I used to live in that area, and Plano absolutely fucking sucks. There’s no way in hell I’d leave Southern California for North Texas. I’d rather die.