Ford pokes fun at EV haters, cops a bit of backlash

Ford Motor Company’s character arc has been an interesting one to plot over the last few years, as it’s gone from the V8 Mustang and Ranger ute company to a company aiming to position itself at the forefront of electric vehicles. 

The firm has even started making fun of electric vehicle critics on its own social media channels, with seemingly mixed success. 

Overnight it posted what the young people term a ‘meme’, showing ‘doge’ in buff tough-guy form representing EVs, and doge in banal, dopey form as a representation of EV critics. We won’t explain it any further, you can just use your own peepers and check it out above.

At the time of writing the post had attracted almost 5000 comments. That’s not the only meme the firm posted, either. Over on Twitter it went loco, spamming nine of the things in a row. Here’s a few highlights below:

While these memes were mostly well received on Twitter, the Facebook post was another story altogether. It’s received plenty of critique from blue oval fans, many of whom clearly aren’t huge electric vehicle fans. 

“I love it when a manufacturer makes fun of their customer base!” said one poster. “Make fun of potential and lifelong customers. Bold move,” said another. 

“If the product was any good, you wouldn’t have to insult your customers and leverage a name with a half-century of goodwill and brand recognition attached to it to get them to pay attention,” added another commenter, with many more all chiming in with pictures of lithium mines and the like. 

It wasn’t all bad, though, with a few people sticking up for Ford’s sudden desire to crack a few jokes on the internet. 

“I went from a hybrid plug-in EV to a truck and I can say this: I hate filling up my truck at a gas station. It takes up too much time,” said one commenter. 

“Time that I could be out fishing or doing other more productive things. People claim it takes a long time to charge an EV at charging stations that are not at home. I want to know how they can afford that many vacations in one year because that is what they are for. Takes me 1 second to plug into a charger at home to get a full charge for next time I drive an EV.” 

To its credit or its fault, depending on your position, Ford has done plenty for electric cars in 2021. It launched the F-150 Lightning, pledged to spend billions on EV facilities, and signed an agreement to phase out internal combustion engine vehicles by 2040.