> Step 1 is to stop buying things (or not) because you care how it will make you look to other people who don’t actually care

Car OEMs invest millions in branding on the basis of/to promote the opposite of what you're saying: the brand is an expression or an extension of the buyers identity.

That’s what marketing is, but as individuals we should seek to understand the goal of marketing so we don’t blindly fall for it. It’s not real.

As the old saying goes… we spend money we don’t have, on things we don’t need, to impress people we don’t care about.

We can choose to not do that, and the marketing department can go to hell.

Personally, I stopped fighting this particular battle. I've come to the realization that intangibles matter - some of those might be incidental, some pure personal preferences, some result of me being manipulated by marketing.

But separating which is which is not always easy, and I'd rather spend my time on other things. As a result I take "intangibles" as a rational factor in buying decisions even if the intangibles themselves might not necessarily be rational.

Regardless of how true your point is, millions of 20-something year old men exist in the market that haven't yet, or never will, reach your state of capitalism nirvana.

So your assumption justifies judging Tesla owners? Doesn't seem very enlightened of you either

Did you mean to reply to me? I didn't claim it was or wasn't okay, or that I was enlightened. I am merely pointing out that one person's journey to separating themselves from being concerned with vanity and status of their vehicle doesn't remove the large population of people predisposed to behave otherwise.