In case you haven’t heard, the Southeast is pretty much being destroyed by a Category 4 hurricane as we speak. My own father, who art in Hilton Head, was forced to evacuate from his home near the coast and retreat inland — all the way to Atlanta, which was the closest city with any hotel rooms available. But the whole city is now sold out, and the closest hotels available are now in Tennessee.
These displaced people have no idea what’s awaiting them at home. They might have nothing left to go home to. But one autocrosser gives zero fucks. He’s ready to chase cones, and those displaced people better not be affecting his “race.”
In the above posting, Jamie Howell demonstrates all of the qualities that the general public thinks Porsche owners possess in spades. While he’s glad that these people are out of harm’s way, he’s really more concerned about his autocross day. I understand his concern — I watched his videos, and he needs all the practice he can get.
He seems like a nice enough guy — here he is doing his best to avoid scaring any apex markers at a Track Night in America at AMP:
But still — is this a complete dick move by Mr. Howell? Or is he just a friendly autocrosser who’s hoping to put on a nice autocross show for some people whose entire lives may have just been taken from them?
You make the call.
That’s some next-level jerkweed shit.
Dick move. Easily rectified by showing up this weekend with bottled water or other supplies for the evacuees. Maybe even a share a bottle of Blantons?
Friggin’ cone dodgers.
Ah, reinforcing the old Porsche/porcupine saw.
Thing is, this is nothing new. Social media just ensures that it is documented, and goes viral.
Surely, in a decade or so, he will look back on this period of his life, cringe, and have learned his lesson. But the other side of social media is that he won’t be allowed to move on.
Well said.
Well said indeed
This is why i don’t have any SM accounts. Why is everything news worthy? Well its not, and the second part of sporty’s post ought to be considered first!
Im starting to feel persons exploiting such indiscretions are worse then most events ive seen posted.
People cant just live their life, Nope here comes Pat Douche with a video/cam right around the corner to save the day! on an event thats all ready happened?! and they do nothing about!
But he owns a PORSCHE, has nifty driving gloves and a lap timer on his phone.
He is one cool dude!
I wear similar gloves when I am baking something and need to take the pan out.
Are you suggesting that he was overcooking it?
Hahaha, nice.
Man, he really is gonna need to make his Facebook more private. And learn how to wear a vest properly.
I think this is less actual malice and more just the mild spectrum disorder many car enthusiasts exhibit.
And good luck to your father. I fared okay today. Lost two trees, my fence, and some paint off the house. Power was only out for like 45 minutes.
any chargers underneath any of them?
glad to hear you did ok!
Why does this belong here? This TMZ now?
Says the person with that username!
Slow news day.
Find a douchey post on social media and turn it into an article?
No news day.
There is news today… VW is recalling 334,000 Volkswagen and Audi vehicles, due to fuel leaks, 83% of which are registered in the U.S.
There are so many recalls these days, that this is almost ho-hum. Even Toyota has had their share.
It’s just another nail in the Teutonic coffin. Anyone who includes a Volkswagen in their final few when considering which new car to buy just hasn’t been paying attention.
Probably the supplier after VAG demanded a 200% decrease in component price.
Would you prefer issues just go unfixed, or fixed on your dime as was SoP in the past for all but the most egregious issues?
The only thing that has changed is that the modern era of ubiquitous communication makes is easier for the end users to figure out that an issue is widespread. Automakers can’t sweep it under the rug anymore, they have to do something about it.
and got it
That is the funniest thing I’ve seen all day. Sure he’s an ass but that is, by mistake I presume, solid comedy gold. Being that out of touch, that’s like something out of a movie.
And yes, I do feel for those poor souls.
that reminds me of the northeast blackout of 2003. on a message board I was hanging around at the time, there was a long thread going on about the blackout. some kid in Iowa was b!tching that he had ordered camera equipment for his photography business and it wouldn’t arrive when expected.
you know, because B&H is in New York. Which didn’t have power. He was ranting on how they were “in violation of their shipping agreement,” and how they didn’t even call him to let him know what was going on. Like he couldn’t turn on the news or go to cnn.com to see hey, most of the northeast has no power. Everyone was trying to get this brat to understand that 50 million people without power, a lot of them with no water due to inoperative pump stations, and so on, but he kept doubling down on how unjust it was that B&H didn’t ship his stuff or even call him about the delay. Then when power was restored to NYC on Friday the 15th, he was still complaining about “no camera.” Then someone informed him that B&H is a Jewish-owned business and wouldn’t ship the camera because they’d be closed on Saturday, he really lost it.
I think he got pounded so bad he left that message board shortly after. he was a real self-centered rich kid d!ck.
I get the feeling that kids the kinda photographer thatd shoot a wooden door in black and white, then call it “art”.
Did you visit his Facebook page before writing this?
Do many people still use Facebook? I never have because the ones I know who most enthusiastically babble about it are low skill dummies.
Hasn’t it become déclassé?
the only reason I have a facebook profile is because if you google my first name + last name you’ll get mostly news stories about a convicted felon. So I have one in case I need to tell someone “no, that’s not me, this is me.”
I don’t post anything to it otherwise.
That is a problem…JimZ. My plumber has an otherwise normal name, but a child molester in the local area has exactly the same name…it did cause him problems and he had to be very clear “not the guy on the news”
I’ve been dealing with the public lately, so this doesn’t even rise to a transgression for me. I guarantee you there were people complaining about being inconvenienced by security protocols while traveling on 9/12/2001.
The airports were closed on 9/12. Just saying.
So they were forced to travel via surface transportation.
I’m actually surprised that nobody has blown his FB post up yet to call him out on his bullshit.
Complaining about a minor inconvenience caused by millions of unknown people’s extreme inconvenience on any public forum is sure to invite a public shaming these days. Especially when someone with an audience has a vested interest in one of those people (Bark’s dad in this case). So yeah, not the smartest thing to say but people aren’t always smart about everything especially when the bad thing doesn’t impact them personally. Is this guy stupid for writing that post? Sure. Does he deserve days or weeks of relentless hounding online, likely spilling over to his personal life once his boss finds out, etc? Probably not.
What is inexcusable is starting a conspiracy theory that the government is lying about the storm’s intensity to further the evil establishment climate change agenda to steal bodily fluids (or something) as the drudge report has. So by all means call the Porsche guy an idiot and just move on cause no one is getting hurt. But please direct all your persistent anger at Matt Drudge since a lot of people listen to him (for better or worse) and in this case, that could actually bring bodily harm.
Jamie Howell? That Thurston the Fifth’s boy?
Shoulda been another Thurston, obviously bad twisting happens when a boy is named Jamie.
I think you guys are reading too much into this.
My take (without seeing the comments or any additional follow-up posts from the OP) – is that the guy merely had plans and wanted to know if they were still on.
Its not like he’s screaming that displaced hurricane victims are cramping his style and shouldn’t be there.
Could it be worded with a little more empathy? Yes. But taken on that one picture / sentence I see his question as pretty much neutral.
Without any additional context, this really didn’t deserve / need a public shaming.
Possible, but I’ve found tone in writing makes a big difference. The tone here tells me he is hoping he’s not inconvenienced.
If that weren’t the case, then how ’bout this:
“Hey, with everything that’s going on with the track because of this natural disaster, I’m thinking maybe we should reschedule this weekend’s event…does anyone know if that’s the case?”
Quit being reasonable. This is the internet.
My manager and I talk about this occasionally. Communicating by written word is extremely difficult. You, the writer, know exactly what you are thinking when writing. The readers have no clue what you’re thinking. The readers can apply whatever spin to the words without knowing if the application is consistent with what the writer intended. I can see how the writer in this case could be completely neutral. I can also read what was written and see a jerk. I can also see a person who cares about others and also hopes his plans aren’t affected. Which one of the three is accurate? I have no real absolute idea. I will interpret the whole thing through whatever emotional lens I happen to be using at the time. To believe that my take is accurate is misguided at least and arrogant on my part. In a word, selfish, concerned with only me – not others – like many folks in our culture. Had this person only asked about the autocross, we wouldn’t have anything to comment about.
Look at all of these SJW’s attacking this unfortunate misunderstood Porsche owner ;)
Hope the hurricane drops an Aztec on his Porsche.
!KIDS! .
What’s the matter with kids these days ? .
=8-) .
-Nate
(cue the millennial jokes)
Wait till he arrives to find that the evacuees evacuated all over everywhere.
Kenmore – He could buy mud and snow tires.
Ewww…
And the bottoms of all those cones will need hosing off.
So, this isn’t the right way to ask about a cancelled event, but folks do travel from farther away for events sometimes, so I get the need to ask the question *somehow.* Shoot, I used to go 5 hours away for autocross because there wasn’t anything on my half of the state.
Clearly, he probably should’ve acknowledged that it’s good that AMP is taking in evacuees and that he understands the situation. There are way bigger problems than autocross scheduling woes happening right now! I’d have framed it as “Are we postponing the event?” instead.
Have you reached out to the dude to get his actual intent behind the comment? Goodness, knows, Facebook comments all too often get posted off the cuff and end up more awkward than they should be. It’s not the polished, edited publishing platform of say, TTAC or Jalopnik. Thus, I’m not sure the digs at the guy’s driving were merited, TBH. Granted, I’ve gotten a similar treatment lately about my own (admitted!) lack of autocross skill for daring to criticize the Miata and the unreasonable fanboy treatment it gets (the HORROR!), so I guess I know the feeling. It sucks, and it feels bad. To me, it’s too hard to tell if this guy’s priorities are autocross über alles based on one bad post.
(Full disclosure: I’m also a PCA member, albeit in the Hill Country region. And yeah, I’m kind of terrified for friends on the east coast who are riding this one out! Stay safe and out of the mess, y’all.)
I was going to reply to your comment, but Android autocorrected Miata to Mistake and Stef to Steve, so instead I’m going to ask if you know a legal way to stream Bathurst this weekend.
“Have you reached out to the dude to get his actual intent behind the comment?’
Nah.
This is way more fun.
Lou, are you also creeped-out by the egregious virtue/compassion signalling of this trend for substituting “reached out to” for “contacted”?
Maybe I’m alone in thinking it reeks of soggy smarminess.
@Kenmore – yes. 100% agree. The generation gap widens.
As a young man “reaching out” was what you did before your hand “contacted” her ass.
:-D
It’s a bit like saying “passed” instead of “died” or heaven forbid “dead”.
A bit, but your examples only show a universal fear response while the “reach out” crowd are out to instill social guilt permitting property confiscation in the service of politically manipulable dependents.
No question that there was a need to find out what is happening. This was just the most inconsiderate way imaginable to phrase it.
People get stuff wrong or are thoughtless and it doesn’t mean they’re evil. If he apologizes, no harm, no foul. But he should understand why people are bothered and apologize. If he doesn’t get that… then maybe he is evil.
Are these transients going to ruin our autocross? If I wanted to see homeless people, I wouldn’t have expensive hobbies. Is this real? Did someone really invite a bunch of campers to the facility we’re paying for?
Your casual hyperbole renders rational conversation moot.
I remember a football fan who was concerned that moving some Saints home games to the opponent’s stadium would affect the playoff race.
While this is quite despicable I’ve seen worse on the subject of Tesla, worse as in “its a good thing that people died in those auto pilot crashes, they deserve darwin awards for their deaths.”.
This guys just out of touch, too busy thinking about his stick shift.
Yeah, but those T***a comments didn’t begin with feigned concern before going French aristocrat.
Here in Gainesville (and also Baton Rouge) there are this guy’s equivalent in football fans that are upset about the UF-LSU game being postponed.
I am a Porsche owner and I don’t see an issue with the post. All he did was ask a question about the autocross. We can’t ask questions now?
iama – thank you for “contacting” us proles whom make false assumptions about Porsche owners. I’m sure there are a few that aren’t narcissistic.
you bemoan “millennials” but then spell it “backkk?”
Wow… Ok. Jamie here… I am the guy this article was about.
First of all to the author, sympathies for your father and being displaced by the hurricane. I also have family down in Florida and everyone here in Georgia is concerned with their safety during this time.
As for the post in question, this was posted to a local PCA board by me early in the morning about the plans for autocross this Sunday. The PCA board doesn’t get much action, but they do keep everyone up to date on the driving events such as autocross. I had not heard any updates on the event this Sunday due to the extra traffic at Atlanta Motor Speedway because of the hurricane evacuees. The post was merely for my own clarification along with the benefits of anyone else who might be going to the autocross.
I had just woken up that morning (my head still foggy from sleep) and I have to say the post was not worded very well – especially going back and reading it in retrospect.
Let me clarify my statement and my feelings on recreational driving events versus the safety and well being of those displaced by the hurricane. The safety and refuge of others in harm’s way is far more important than any autocross. I would GLADLY give up my weekend driving if it means people have a safe place of refuge from this storm.
Again, my sympathies to anyone effecting by this terrible storm and my apologies for my insensitive post yesterday morning.
It just hit me. Even Bark isn’t a big of enough of an arse to publicly shame someone for asking a freaking question.
Nice setup guys.
Porcupine humor?
Jaime ;
I hope you and yours make it through this weather madness O.K. .
BT, DT ~ it wasn’t any fun atall .
Thanx for chiming in .
-Nate
The worst human ever? Mao, Stalin, Hitler and a host of others through the ages all unavailable for comment.
Yeah, I think that kind of preschooler hyperbole is a good clue that iama is right about this being a setup.
I don’t think this belongs here for a variety of reasons.
I don’t think you Bark are particularly qualified to write an article like this either. I mean it’s not like you helped Syrian refugees with your 43 grand. Sure, you have the decency and thoughtfulness to not do this, but beyond that, what credentials do you have to judge others?
Is helping Syrian refugees now the standard by which we measure charity?
Can you explain why there is such a great need to resettle Syrian refugees in Europe and North America as opposed to other places in the world? How many refugees have been taken in by Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the Emirates? Turkey seems to just want to transship them to Europe and points west.
Fuck no. Those Syrians can keep invading Germany.
I am one of the displaced. Had to leave Jacksonville FL and am in Lagrange right outside ATL.
I’m planning on being at Disney World with my family next week. While also being concerned about the welfare of the people affected by the storm, it definitely crossed my mind of how my vacation would/could be impacted. Bad phrasing, but no malice intended, IMO.
I’m with you Quentin.
When I read the guys statement my reaction was “That’s it? That’s all people are freaking over?”.
Our society seems to have become bizarrely nit-picky (unless you are in a protected PC-favored group or position).
I have relatives in FL also. Very thankful they are OK.
All this guy did was juxtapose two very normal thoughts. He was glad people were getting to safety-this is compassion dim-wits-and hoped he could still get out and enjoy himself at the track.
These are not mutual exclusives. Not even close.
Lighten up people-get a life, or at least rent one.
This guy is not even close to, oh I don’t know, maybe a POTUS that can’t leave the golf course for any crisis, foreign or domestic.
Have a nice day.
Bunter
Wording was a little insensitive, yes.
Gross human rights violations, no.
Worst person in the world, no.
Hyperbolic accusation and click bait vibe, yes.
I think we can move on now.
“Hyperbolic accusation and click bait vibe, yes.”
Concise. +1