Bumper stickers have always annoyed me. There have been times when the sight of one of the stupider of these little self-important pronouncements (WOMEN WANT ME; FISH FEAR ME; MY OTHER VEHICLE IS MY MIND) has sent me into a tizzy of indignation. Until recently, though, I didn't know what it was about bumper stickers that got under my skin. Sure, it's annoying that many feature poor attempts at wit (VISUALIZE WHIRLED PEAS; DEFEND YOUR RIGHT TO ARM BEARS) that aren't funny the first time you read them, let alone after seeing them on bumper after bumper over the course of years.

But there's a deeper reason why I think bumper stickers suck: advertisements are already taking over our culture. Here's a pop-up ad for a sketchy mini-spy-camera when I open Hotmail, there's Tiger Woods hawking the new Buick SUV in a pre-movie sales pitch. Best-selling British author Fay Weldon even published a novel last year that was commissioned by jewelry company Bulgari.

As far as I'm concerned, bumper stickers are just another form of advertisement, a further encroachment on my mind's space while I'm idling behind a minivan at a red light. Bad enough are the mundane bumper stickers hawking products or services (BECKY'S DINER, NOTHING FINAH; SKYDIVE NEW ENGLAND!). But much worse are the ads for personal philosophies (QUESTION REALITY; IN THE LIGHT WE ARE ONE), religious beliefs (BORN AGAIN PAGAN; PRAYER: DON'T LEAVE HOME WITHOUT IT), political leanings (DICK + BUSH = SCREWED; LIFE IS THE NATURAL CHOICE), hobbies (GIVE BLOOD, PLAY RUGBY; BALLOON PILOTS DO IT ABOVE THE CLOUDS), senses of humor (I LIKE CATS, THEY TASTE LIKE CHICKEN; FREE TIBET -- ONE IN EVERY SPECIALLY MARKED PACKAGE!), kids' achievements (MANCHESTER JUNIOR HIGH IS PROUD OF MY CHILD AND SO AM I; MY CHILD BEAT UP YOUR HONOR STUDENT), and, of course, social consciences (OUR PROBLEMS ARE NOT CAUSED BY DIFFERENCES, OUR PROBLEMS ARE CAUSED BY OUR INABILITY TO RESPECT AND HONOR OUR DIFFERENCES).

The question is, why are bumper-sticker owners so eager to share these personal facts with strangers? I mean, what do I care if you love your Irish setter? And I'm glad you love Jesus -- or, as your sticker so cleverly terms him, "a Jewish carpenter" -- but why are you telling me? And if you really were a Wiccan with supernatural powers, I doubt you'd advertise it on the back of your Subaru.

The other day I actually winced at an extreme form of this self-advertising. As I drove along, I came across a station wagon (a vehicle notorious for displaying multiple bumper stickers) sporting at least three Alcoholics Anonymous stickers (EASY DOES IT; ONE DAY AT A TIME). In addition, the car had a vanity plate -- a concept worthy of its own bitch session -- that read SOBRMOM. What gives? What would compel this woman, whom I'd never met, to tell me she was a recovering alcoholic?

When I was in college, a professor in the film department told our class that years before, he and a friend had penned the words -- now attributed, on the back of many a vehicle, to Chief Seattle -- "The earth does not belong to us. We belong to it." If memory serves, Professor Ted Perry (who is in no way a Native American) told us he wrote the now-popular slogan as part of a script for a Western movie. So if you have that particular bumper sticker on your car, you've been duped: the words weren't uttered by a wise chief who lived close to the land, but by a pasty white dude for a movie that never got made.

I've never had the Chief Seattle sticker on my car, but for the purposes of full disclosure, I admit that in college, I did have a small, wordless sticker that depicted two Grateful Dead bears riding in a ragtop Beetle over a mountain pass under a smiling sun. In my defense, I didn't actually buy the sticker. My roommate Jim stole it and gave it to me. And I knew it was rude to refuse a gift.

Also, I was lame.

After college, I sold the car for $700 to an Iranian guy in Miami. This brings up an interesting question of protocol: can the buyer of a used car ask the owner to knock down the price for stupid bumper stickers? I say a hard-to-remove preachy bumper sticker (LIVE SIMPLY SO THAT OTHERS MAY SIMPLY LIVE) should be worth at least $50. And a sticker that could cause you real problems of mistaken identity (GUNS DON'T KILL PEOPLE, THEY JUST MAKE IT EASIER; WHEN GOD MADE MEN, SHE WAS ONLY JOKING) should knock the price down $100 or more.

The guy who bought my car didn't ask for a price reduction; in fact, he didn't seem to notice my bumper sticker at all -- he was more concerned with the car's screwy transmission. I wonder if his friends started ragging him for sporting the hippie sticker, or if he started smoking dope so he could better play the part. If indeed that Iranian man is today driving around Miami jammin' Jerry out of my old Jetta with the Grateful Dead bumper sticker, and if I could catch sight of him, it would make up for all the stupid-ass bumper stickers I've ever seen.

Noah Bruce can be reached at noahbruce@hotmail.com..

Issue Date: January 11 - 17, 2002