Skip to Content
Streetsblog Los Angeles home
Streetsblog Los Angeles home
Log In
Ad Nauseam

Ad Nauseam: Toyota’s (Passive-Aggressive) Ransom Note to America

Toyota wants you to know that it's here for you. And not just as a
car maker, as the company explains in this spot, ironically entitled
"Community."

Like GM before them, Toyota wants to make sure you realize just how much their company means to you. Here's our voice-over:

"We acknowledge you are coming to despise automobiles,but your nation depends on our industry for so many jobs that, even ifwe only manufactured cardboard cut-out cars that you had to carry downyour few remaining walkable Main Streets, you'd still need us,America."

Accompanying the ad is the aggressively cloying and patently manipulative "Beyond Cars"
web site --
which if nothing else should serve as an irresistible culture-jamming
target. What do we see, Toyota? For starters, we see a world where your product doesn't kill people.

And you? What do you see?

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog Los Angeles

Friday’s Headlines

Metro K Line North, potholes, South Pasadena, Pasadena, trees, car-nage, and more

March 27, 2026

Metro Board Unanimously Advances K Line North Light Rail Extension

Mayor Bass backed off of her push for indefinite delays requested by some mid-city residents opposed to tunneling under their homes

March 26, 2026

Why Cities Need More “Agile” Streets

When projects are routed through a full capital-improvement workflow, solutions tend toward expensive, permanent interventions - not alternatives that might achieve 80 percent of the benefit at 10 percent of the cost

March 25, 2026

Wednesday’s Headlines

ICE, speed cameras, Ohio Avenue, North Metro K Line extension, SB79, streetlight repair, DIY, Olympics, car-nage, L.A. River path gate, and more

March 25, 2026

Monrovia Seeks Input on Draft Bike Master Plan

The deadline for public comment is this Friday, March 27 2026

March 24, 2026
See all posts