What The Hell Is Going On With The Biggest Tesla Fan Planning To Drive At A Kid With A Tesla?

Wmckid Top
ADVERTISEMENT

If you’ve been on Twitter the past few days, you may have noticed a peculiar thread being referenced and getting some attention. It’s notable because it’s one of those rare times on Twitter where a person puts out a public call for a child to run in front of a car so someone can “make a point.” Huh, you may be thinking to yourself. That’s unusual.  Maybe you’re even thinking a very reasonable what the fuck is this? That’s a healthy reaction. I’m going to try and explain what is going on here, and I’ll go ahead and say right up front that, no, I don’t actually think anyone is going to get hurt, but at the same time everything about this is, well, idiotic. Let’s dig in, I guess.

Here’s the tweet that got all this started:

The thread continues, including this tweet that should make anyone with a spouse and child feel a nervous pang of pain in the pit of their stomach as they imagine this conversation:

After this tweet, we get one that explains what the hell is going on a bit more:

Okay, so for those of you not a member of the sexless sex-cult of hyper-intense Tesla and Elon Musk fandom, TESLAQ refers to people who are perceived as being vehemently anti-Tesla, and in this very specific case, TESLAQ is referring to Dan O’Dowd, who has started something called The Dawn Project, which has a stated goal of “Making Computers Safe for Humanity” and has undertaken a campaign against Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) Beta software being deployed on public roads.

The Dawn Project recently released a video of tests they undertook that appear to show Teslas not detecting child-size mannequins and running into them:

I don’t have all of the details or parameters of the test, but we have seen emergency braking issues with Teslas before, but to be fair, it’s hardly just Teslas that have failed tests like these. Here’s a picture of a Honda knocking the crap out of a mannequin from a AAA test, for example:

Hondasmack

Now, I’m not saying that I don’t think there’s real problems with the way Tesla has been deploying their FSD Beta, because I definitely do. I also think Level 2 and Level 3 semi-automated systems from any manufacturer are inherently and conceptually flawed. At the same time, I think the Dawn Project’s portrayal of Tesla FSD-controlled cars as malevolent automatons that “will indiscriminately mow down children” is needlessly and counter-productively histrionic.

You know what else is needlessly and counter-productively histrionic? Whole Mars Catalog trying to make some misguided point by conducting an emergency stopping test with someone’s kid.

I think, of course, that Whole Mars Catalog – whose real name is Omar Qazi – is quite deliberately trying to get attention by tweeting things like this:

Again, I’m sure Omar’s goal is to not hurt anyone here. Based on tweets and my discussion with him, he’s planning on using a mannequin for a test, and for his test with the actual kid, the plan is to not have the kid actually walk out into the road, but walk toward the car but not leave the sidewalk:

Of course, this is still a shit idea. It’s deeply stupid, will prove almost nothing, and the only thing that it will really demonstrate is the remarkable depths an obsession can take people. And it’s not like anyone can guarantee the kid will be perfectly safe: it’s still a kid walking toward a moving car, which, yes, happens every day, but it’s never a zero-risk situation. Only in this particular case, it could be completely avoided.

I’m not a particularly safety-focused parent, if I’m honest. I routinely drive my kid in archaic cars with minimal safety equipment. I let my kid use knives and run around in gravel and jump off logs in forests and all that crap. But putting a kid in this sort of position to try to half-assedly make some point in service of a for-profit company that doesn’t have anything really to do with you? Fuck that.

Tesla is an unusual company regarding the level of loyalty it seems to inspire in its fans, which sometimes manifests itself in ill-considered, possibly dangerous stunts like this. Remember the jackass who used his wife to test Autopilot’s emergency braking a few years back? People who own Fords or Toyotas aren’t doing this, and while Tesla fans may point to this as a positive, it’s not. If the way you feel about a company is making you put your loved ones in the path of a moving car, something is fucked up, period.

I’ve interacted with Omar before. We once had a debate on YouTube. To Omar’s credit, he’s always been receptive to talking to me, even if we tend to disagree on, well, pretty much everything. I spoke with Omar about this, and as usual, he was willing to discuss it with me (my texts are in orange):

Convo1 Convo2

In the exchange, it sounds almost reasonable. And he admits that the framing of it is an attempt to grab attention and get the video to go viral, which is hardly a shock.

I’m fine with doing a test with a mannequin, on some sort of closed track. It’s good to do these tests, to try and see how the system reacts. That’s fine. But that’s not what’s happening here, it’s not why we’re talking about this at all.

Nothing that’s going to happen here is going to appreciably help anyone, on either side. One test isn’t going to prove shit, because there are so many variables involved here. The use of an actual kid is irresponsible and stupid and exploitative, and I hope Omar realizes that before he’s planning to do this test on Saturday.

It’s not private people’s responsibility to test semi-automated driving hardware on people’s children. Tesla needs to do these tests, and regulatory agencies need to be watching them. If you ever find yourself so emotionally invested in any carmaker to the degree where you actively are seeking to put a kid in even potential danger to prove some sort of point, then that means it’s time to step back and really evaluate what the hell has gone so awry in your life to bring you to this point.

This isn’t normal, or good or smart or useful or anything. Even the best outcome of this test will result in no minds changed.

The question of how to implement semi-automated driving in public roads is an open and ongoing issue, and showing once that a kid who almost walked in front of a car didn’t get run over proves nothing. Portraying semi-automated driving systems as bloodthirsty child-eaters doesn’t help anything either.

I know it’s a big ask, but this may be one of those times where the only thing to do is put emotions aside, stop hoping Elon will notice you and fall in love, stop injecting undue drama into the situation, and be a fucking adult.

It’s no fun that way. But it’s the only way to get through this idiocy.

And, to that dad considering doing this test, from another dad: if you want to give your kid a healthy bit of risk and controlled danger, take him to a go-kart track instead. Go have some actual fun, for you and your kid. Get some ice cream. Send me the bill and I’ll even Venmo you for the ice cream. Just don’t play into this idiotic game.

About the Author

Mercedes Streeter

View All My Posts

84 thoughts on “What The Hell Is Going On With The Biggest Tesla Fan Planning To Drive At A Kid With A Tesla?”

  1. Seems to me that, being Bay Area-based, this would be a job for Adam Savage with his extensive experience with tests on human analogues and connections to things like closed courses and research facilities.

  2. 6. Driver will be father of child

    This is my favorite part of the safety controls, because if it fails, it will clearly scar the father/child relationship for life, and if it succeeds, it still very well may do the same.

  5. It’s not private people’s responsibility to test semi-automated driving hardware on people’s children. Tesla needs to do these tests, and regulatory agencies need to be watching them. If you ever find yourself so emotionally invested in any carmaker to the degree where you actively are seeking to put a kid in even potential danger to prove some sort of point, then that means it’s time to step back and really evaluate what the hell has gone so awry in your life to bring you to this point.

    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
    This. ThisThisThisThisThisThis.

  6. Honest question, why does it need to be a kid, why not avoid that entire minefield and find a little person who is also a Telsastan? I’m willing to bet the car doesn’t give a fluff either way.

    Also to be contrary, I vote we ban AEB, I will also vote to ban TC, ESC, Cruise Control, Automatic lights, wipers and transmissions.

    Okay maybe not all of those but, can we stop advertising it as helping you when distracted (thinking about your ad Subaru…) and instead as a tool for when something unexpected occurs ahead of you. We mustn’t normalize poor driving behavior by telling consumers its fine to be on your phone, the car will stop itself before you mow down those kids.

  7. “Wanted: Little person to walk towards my Tesla as it drives at 5mph”

    Problem solved. But I guess that’s not exciting (read: stupid) enough for Twitter Wars.

  9. God said to Abraham, “Kill me a son”
    Abe say, “Man, you must be puttin’ me on”
    God say, “No, ” Abe say, “What?”
    God say, “You can do what you want Abe, but
    Next time you see me comin’, you better run”
    Abe said, “Where do you want this killin’ done?”
    God said, “Out on Highway 61”–Bob Dylan

    1. It’s 2022, we can do better than that.

      Mount the pig on a Roomba.

      *I’d even go one step further and roast the pig beforehand. I don’t know if anyone’s sensors are looking for something approximating human body temperature, but either way, if the test goes well, you’ve got barbeque to celebrate with after.

  12. I once had to emergency stop my 2007 Ford F250 (with the mighty 6.8 L V10 Triton engine – yum!) as I was pulling away from a stop sign and 3 teens walked right out in front of me. Other than me almost having a coronary, no harm was done. So, if Omar is correct about his Tesla stunt, my experience conclusively proves that automatic braking is totally unnecessary, as my manual braking performance saved 3 children from certain death. Case closed.
    /s

    1. I came up to a light doing about 45 in the unoccupied far right lane out of three. (Southbound SanteFe at Windemere) for those in Metro Denver ) Light turned green a few seconds before I hit the line – other cars hadn’t started out yet – I was cruising through. Just as I got to the line a pedestrian who had chosen to run across the road as the light turned green and who had been hidden by the other cars at the line… darted out in front of me.
      Four wheel disc brakes and good reaction time saved the idiot’s life.

  13. Okay but can we volunteer other peoples’ kids for this?

    “You think it’s okay to bully these other kids Billy? Walk in front of the Tesla and think about what you’ve done.”

  14. Hey, Omar, if you can’t find someone stupid enough to fork over their kid for your “experiment”, maybe you could just use your little old grandma.

  15. Alright, so they tested it against a person in a chicken suit. What about actual chickens though? Should the chicken community have hope of ever being able to cross the road safely?

  16. I agree with be an adult. Asking your kid to walk in front a moving car is a bad parent.

    As Phuzz mentioned, let the ding-dong walk in front a car driven by someone. If he gets hit, call him a putz.

  18. What I don’t understand is what Elon Musk ever did to attract so many devoted followers. To me, the proper reaction to Musk’s way of being in the world is to be moderately disgusted by him. Yet, there are legions of people who seem to almost literally worship the man, as if he were some sort of benevolent demigod. What is going on in those people’s heads? I truly can’t fathom it.

    There’s some kind of flaw in the human psyche that makes many if not all of us susceptible to cults. If they can exploit that bug, an unscrupulous leader can hook people’s minds in such a way that they will actively work to police their own thoughts and reinforce their own loyalty, at any cost. If the cult leader or his (usually his) predictions fail, it will actually reinforce the belief that the followers have in him. His followers will twist themselves into pretzels to find a way to validate their beliefs.

    It’s bizarre. A little fascinating, but in a scary sort of way. What is the flaw that causes people to become cult members? How does it work? Could I become a victim one day, all unknowing? I wish I knew. I feel sorry for the people who get roped into that stuff, though.

    2. Cultural evolution has outpaced biological evolution in humans by leaps and bounds.
      Traits we gained as apes like othering and herd mentality help a social species survive.
      Problem is surviving has become so easy now that these old mechanisms of survival no longer serve the same purpose.
      The drives are still as strong but now focused on the frivolous.
      Corporations, politicians and sociopaths (you can throw religion and nationalism in there too) have always known how to prey on them.
      And now with the ever expanding prevalence of social media more people are becoming easier to exploit.
      Couple all that with our cultures obsession with prominence and this is what we get.
      So.. the biological drives that helped early humans survive a lion on the savanna are the same ones sending toddlers running out in front of Tesla’s to “prove a point”.
      Musk is just the biggest ape in that particular troop so all the other apes want to groom him and eat his flea’s.

      At least, that’s my opinion.

      1. I’m no Musk fan, but I don’t think he is the devil incarnate either. Due to his fame all his stupid ideas, comments. And tweets get magnified like a billions times. But cut him some slack here I don’t think he suggested or requested this dipshit do this. Frankly if everyone just went on this feature and reported it as violating decency standards or promotion of violence we’d see a lot less of this shiy.

    3. Best I can figure: Early coverage of Musk was an almost breathless promotion of a polymath genius who setout a plan as a young man to fix the key issues facing humanity then systematically revolutionised payment systems by creating PayPal, transport and emissions by founding Tesla and then space exploration by founding and actively working on rocket science at SpaceX.
      Easy to see how people might initially have gotten drawn into this narrative.
      Of course, this all falls apart pretty quickly once you look into each of these cases, and you end up with a smart, driven individual with good timing and excellent self-promotion, with some increasingly troubling emotional issues layering over done questionable interpersonal skills and perhaps a few unpleasant legacy views from his upbringing.
      But one of the keys to this idol worship (or any worship really) is NOT checking the details, so here we are.

    4. It’s bizarre right? These days we can see people making all kinds of ****ed up choices (flat earth,etc) so we shouldn’t be surprised.
      Yet i still get surprised

    6. They are part of a death cult that believes the world has a coming apocalypse and that electric cars will somehow save us from it. When you believe dumb shit like that, a leader can look like a savior to be worshiped.

  21. If he was planning to walk in front of the car himself, I’d be thinking “that sounds like a dumb idea”, but adults often put themselves in dangerous situations, it’s their choice.
    A kid though? That’s just irresponsible.

  23. The knee jerk reaction to something like this is to once again question how adult men (they are always men) that are successful enough in life to afford a $50,000-$150,000 luxury car have so little sense of purpose that they devote their lives to stanning for a distant and impersonal company that doesn’t care about them in the least.

    But then I look at my closet full of Minnesota Vikings jerseys and find that I have nothing much to say after all.

    1. Except that if the Vikings didn’t have fans, they wouldn’t exist. I’m one of those weirdos who thinks professional sports are kinda dumb, yet even I can recognize that the relationship between a sports team and its fans is much more of a two-way street than between an auto manufacturer and the people who buy their cars.

    2. I’m with you.

      And then I got to the “closet full of Minnesota Vikings jerseys” comment, and I’m ***really*** with you. Maybe this year (next year? the year after?)???

      1. Hey if it can happen for the Cubs it can happen for anyone…just hope it’s during my lifetime.

        Not extremely excited for this year’s team at the moment but ready to be pleasantly surprised!

    4. Well let’s just say they have good enough credit in low interest times to qualify for a loan. I predict a lot of repossessed Tesla’s along with every other brand soon.

  24. I don’t get Musk-love. Its weird and creepy. The man is a liar. The only things he promotes are what he thinks will serve his best interests.
    He has lied about FSD capabilities. He lied about hyperloop and started it solely to stymie the development of a high speed rail system in California. He just lies.

    Who the hell would honestly trust their child to something that he was in charge of and he deemed safe enough for our streets?

    2. He sounds oddly like another idiot that does nothing but lie and is beloved by millions. Many of whom would take a bullet for him while he laughed at their corpse. It’s a sickness in this country and I don’t know the cure.

    1. I’m sorry, Mr Musk is single-handedly (well, with the help of his dad, I guess. Ew) working against the evils of under-population. He cannot spare any of his children.

Leave a Reply