Is the manual transmission that much better than the auto transmission?

I equate it the dumbing down of America. Kind of a shame that finding a MT vehicle is that difficult. Looked at the Nissan Frontier and found but 2 in the entire country with 6 cyl and MT. Even the Ram 2500 Cummings is no longer offering the MT. God help us all.

 

Noted.

The dumbing down of America is directly related to the availability of manual vehicles.

The things I learn on tacomaworld....

 

AKA "Truth Wiki", AKA "Truck Wisdom", AKA "Time Waster"

Your skepticism is legit though. I don't think America is intentionally being "dumbed down" by manual transmission hating illuminati.

However....the people are getting "what they want" and they are being told what they want, and what they "want" is cheap, easy to make in bulk, and requiring minimal human input.

IMO/TLDR:
We are losing our way. Technology is removing us from experiencing the world firsthand. Many of us are content to never leave the house anymore. Many spend more time staring at a screen rather then experiencing other people or the world around them. A solid majority of people don't care to feel a direct connection to the road and the drivetrain of their vehicles any longer. It's not about the journey anymore. It's about getting somewhere else and avoiding the present. I'm passionate about manual transmissions because I think they are a remnant of our old humanity that we are losing. Some would call the death of the MT evolution. Some might call it "dumbing down". I think it's another symptom of the steady loss of something essentially human- that is making direct connections with our environment. My children will all learn to drive a manual transmission, not because I think it's necessarily that practical, but because I think it adds vitality to their human souls. Maybe it will be part of what drives their generation away from giving up their humanity to the likes of Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos.

Either that, or I and my three pedaled vehicle are dinosaurs, slated for extinction.
Yeah. Probably that actually.

 

Don't know about you, but I'd happily ride my three pedal dinosaur right to the bitter end.

 

A lot of truth here, that is for sure. My wife grew up in the GDR and drove an East German Trabant which only came with MT. To this day she insists on a MT vehicle so we ended up buying a Jeep Renegade. I grew up in a farming town where all equipment was MT. Got my first license in 1967 and to pass the test, one needed to be able to drive a MT. Drove a MT truck in the army and still do today. Don't know what I will do when this dinosaur goes extinct.

 

rebuild.

 

I don't consider it Dumbing Down, perhaps Fattening Up.

 

The good news is that you can park it anywhere with the keys in it and nobody will steal it, because they can't drive a stick. Fattening up, perhaps but definitely DUMBING down. Ask any graduating senior in high school to calculate the square root of a number without their smart phone or calculator. 1% or less will know.

 

Yes.

 

I wouldn't have anything but a manual. Somebody said it a few pages back, but it's a control thing. Regarding taking a bath on it, well I got rid of my 09 Frontier because it had a crappy radio and a crack in the windshield. To each their own, but I'm betting you'd be happier shifting your own gears.