this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2023
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How can you brag about being able to drive a manual car? It's a basic life skill that almost everyone has (at least here in Europe). It would be like bragging you're able to tie your shoe laces. My 70 year old mom drives a manual.
It used to be the other way around: since manual is the norm here, the only people who drove an automatic were those with some kind of physical or mental disability. If you drove an automatic people would assume something was wrong with you. Nowadays this stigma no longer exists and manual transmissions are becoming more accepted, but still uncommon outside of EVs.
Is that even allowed? Here you either do your driving test in a manual, in which case you already know how to drive one, or you do your test in an automatic and you aren't allowed to drive a manual. You'd have to take lessons (with a licensed instructor) and do a new driving exam.
Driving an automatic when you're not used to it can also be quite scary as half the controls you need to operate the car are missing. Took me a while to get over the feeling of not being able to stop the car, it feels super weird to just keep the brake pressed until it stops without it stalling.
In the USA licenses are not contingent upon manual vs. automatic. No one checks what car you drive. So you would have to learn somewhere - someone around you has to own a manual car in order for you to learn how to drive one, and here simply no one does. No one in my entire extended family, none of my friends, none of my coworkers I'm friendly with, none of the 50+ cars I have any tangential access to are manual. So even if I wanted to learn, what are my options? Buy an entire car just to learn? Services like Turo won't let you rent one unless you can drive one already.
We have Driver's Education in high school but it involves no actual driving - there are separate paid/private courses you can take that might involve defensive driving or learning stick. I did one on controlling skids on wet or snowy pavement and demonstrating e.g. turning under braking with and without ABS. But nothing about manual.
I would expect the driving school to have a manual. That's how it works here. It doesn't matter what car your family or friends own, you can't take driving lessons in an unmodified car anyway. You need a car with dual controls and a licensed instructor.