Love it, hate it? How about its maker? NYT dissects the cultural effect of the Cybertruck

When the New York Times puts a journalistic scalpel to an automobile review — here, the Tesla Cybertruck — one should expect an essay that’s less about crankshafts and more about psychology.

Reporter Joseph Bernstein’s Styles feature called “A Culture War on Wheels” is a deep dive into the culture created by Elon Musk’s monstrous experiment in mobility, and there’s nary a reference to horsepower or 0-to-60 times.

Instead, the author tries to examine the polarizing effect of Musk’s $80,000 invention and the attitudes it has effected not only from a breed of “macho” males, but from women and kids as well. The reactions to the machine by owners and gawkers go beyond “pretty” or “ugly,” Bernstein suggests; they have to do with politics, social standing and status, and projecting “cool.”

“Consumers have long expressed their personalities and lifestyles through their cars — think of the midlife crisis Corvette,” he writes. “But for many years there has not been an automobile — or any consumer product, really — that has provoked such strong reactions, that has carried so much loaded cultural meaning. It all starts with Mr. Musk.”

Indeed, the piece takes pains, sometime struggling with the effort, it seems, to draw parallels between the enigmatic Musk and the 6.000-pound wedge of stainless steel, regarding both as “attention seekers loved by some and loathed by others.” The author quotes an engineer who says, with great insight, “The Cybertruck is very hard to separate from Elon Musk, because it’s not really logical.”

In a comparison that itself might not seem quite logical, Bernstein at one point refers to Chrysler’s PT Cruiser from 25 years ago, the ungainly retro hatchback that he says “regularly tops lists of the ugliest cars ever made, but it was a hit with consumers.”

He goes on to quote Clotaire Rapaille, an anthropologist and marketing consultant whose research for Chrysler on consumer psychology influenced the design of the PT Cruiser.

“We had people who hated it and loved it,” she said. “And that was enough to create a market. You don’t need everyone to love you. You just need enough people to love you to make it a big success.”

The reasons for purchasing a Cybertruck — some of them mentioned above — have been exhaustively chronicled since they started rolling out of Tesla’s plant late last year. Somewhat surprising, though, is the fascination it’s inspired among onlookers.

As Bernstein observes, “To the legions of passers-by who owners say want to touch their Cybertrucks, sit on their Cybertrucks, and take selfies with their Cybertrucks, the vehicle isn’t a political or cultural flashpoint. Instead it’s something rarer: A genuinely novel piece of mass design.”

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