From the advent on of the automobile, the belief that the car is a symbol of social superiority. Many car drivers still consider themselves superior to those who use a less powerful form of transport or a less prestigious type of car. Once behind the wheel of a car, the driver is often - for himself and for others - no longer just the ‘man in the street’. He demands and is given priority, which implies superiority and sets him apart from cyclists and pedestrians.

I've observed as family, friends, neighbors, and acquaintances adopt a new, uptight narcissism upon purchasing a new car, the bigger more powerful or pretentious, the worse they behave. The bullies, upon obtaining some ridiculously jacked-up pickem-up truck became more tyrannical than ever. My neighbor has become a Cadillac-widow ever since her husband bought the new, towering, intimidating "Escalade", it's been nearly a year now, and his insufferable abject snobbery still hasn't waned, and my SMART car driving self no longer rates for even casual greetings or a wave, just a nose up drive by.
Topping the prestige cake is the usurping of the term "entitlement" by the right wing screwballs to kick around the fortuneless.
My own diatribe here doesn't even begin to address the impractical, selfish nature of driving gas-hoggs in our environmental blight, yet there is the most explosive of "protected rights" especially from the RWNJ's you don't want to hear. Again.
Contrasting this where "We're all in the same boat"-ism prevails in urban environments where only some exceptionally accessible situation affords a private car commute. Public transit has a great equalizing effect to some extent, but the further from deep urban areas this gets misunderstood.
Now my statement here gets a bit tongue in cheek-- but those who know realize getting used to some unwanted contact, blowing it off as, hey it's rush hour... only goes over the top when some objectionably odoriferous, perhaps homeless individual "assaults".
I don't miss the days when "express lane" meant a half hour's wait as opposed to one hour's. Next person, a bit of annoyance with the person having difficulty working the PIN pad correctly, then beep, beep, beep, receipt, out, done and home represents progress I can live with.
My own mother was touch-phobic. She complained ad nauseum about the "touchy-feely" sort. This frigidity came from her pseudo-religious mother, and in our family has become far better. My brothers, cousins unabashedly hug at the airport coming and going that would have elicited scowls from grammy. This is considered unwelcome contact, and gets deflected by our family's doctorate-degree holder, and is glaringly evident in casual on-line communiques as well. They are "doctors" and us proletariat family must have an "appointment".
Precisely the syndrome I see in those who buy the overblown new vehicle.