Electric Vehicles

Yup. Some models don’t even have manual releases on the rear doors. If the battery ignites and you don’t have power to open the doors, you’re fucked. You only have about 15 seconds to get clear before you’re cooked by the lithium flames, and that’s not enough time to climb out of the back seat and exit via the front doors. Especially when you wasted the first 15 seconds fiddling with the door handle, because you expected it to actually open the door like it would on any other car.

Even the manual releases are difficult to use. The rear release (if it’s available at all) is hidden under two covers.

Saying “they’re designed with safety in mind” is, at best, misleading. Passing safety tests is the bare minimum. It would be like a contractor proudly boasting that they build all of their homes to code. Congrats, you built them to the bare minimum to be legally considered habitable? Building to code is the minimum to pass pre-sale inspection, not the goal.

Considering that many of these "surveys" report statistics per model or even make, and some companies and models stretch years, if not decades (Corolla, Civic, F-150, etc.), and others are around for only a few years (Volt, Clarity, Ioniq), the results are almost always going to be out of whack.

Also, they probably don't consider: which country/state the vehicle is available in (can't buy Prius Prime and some EVs in the US midwest), the average accident rate for that country/state, demographics, place of use (city/country) etc.

A while ago, I saw that Chevy Volt was one of the most accident-prone cars or something like that. It has been out of production for a few years, and oldest cars were 10+ years old. Probably many resales, hand-me-downs, etc, all resulting in an emergent property of higher accident rate.

When I owned mine, more than once it slammed the brakes on for no reason on the highway. Not quite locking up, but definitely going from 75 to 50 in a couple seconds. For no fucking reason.

Sure it is. And we survive because we don't rely on it and we read and understand that it's not fully capable. If you get in, turn it on, and get in the back seat... well... The gene pool got a little deeper without you in it.

Absolutely, the narrative seems wrong. Yes Tesla cars are fast, but many people driving them are environmentalists and grown ups. Not generally people out to burn rubber in my experience.
I think maybe people are surprised by the speed, because you don't really notice exactly how fast you are driving and accelerating in a Tesla.
There may even be problems with some of the safety features, making people rely to much on them, so they think it's alright to not pay full attention to their driving, expecting to get notices or even to be helped by safety features. Obviously FSD/autopilot is a driving hazard if you rely on that.

I will argue that the controls of the car being on a screen instead of physical buttons is a problem too. That should simply not be allowed for functions that are needed for driving IMO.

People don't become inherently better or worse drivers on average based on the car they buy, so such a significantly bad statistic, twice as bad as average, more likely shows there are actual inherent safety problems with the car IMO.

I mean, what do you expect when you are sitting on more lithium ion batteries than structural material?

Yeah when I was buying an electric car one of the vehicles I considered was the Mustang Mach E. It was nice. My partner at the time drove it first and liked it. I enjoyed the ride in the passenger seat.

Then I sat in the driver's seat.

That was all I needed to say no. The whole feel of being in the driver's seat made me feel like I wanted to go fast and drive aggressively.

I’d prefer actual data though. It’s not like Tesla owners are all old Mustang owners. This is really opinion.

• is it really the acceleration going beyond people’s skills?

• is it distraction from the screen? It did take me a bit to learn it

• are they idiots who trust autopilot too much or even workaround the safeguards?

Sad to see the extra safety was not enough to make up for the high performance.

if they can save money by cutting on safety testing or safety features, and they think they can get away with it, of course they’re going to.

This is an actual demand by Musk. Cut everything that isn't necessary. This is the reason turn signals are on the steering wheel, which actually makes it illegal to take drivers lessons in a Tesla in Norway.
It has also been demonstrated how this is very impractical in for instance roundabouts and impractical basic functions equals potential hazards.

What are you even trying to say?