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February 12, 2023

A Tesla Will Hit a Child-Sized Mannequin in a Super Bowl Ad This Year

To showcase the supposed flaws of the company’s self-driving technology an activist will air a video showing the purported failures of Tesla’s auto-pilot.

A crashed Tesla from an accident in 2018.KTVU via AP

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Ah, the Super Bowl is upon us. Like most American news organizations, we are obligated to offer some predictions today, and the time of the game, for easy web traffic. The game is on at 6:30 p.m. Eastern Time. I think the Philadelphia Eagles linebackers will try to target Kansas City Chief’s go-to tight end Travis Kelce unsuccessfully. I think the Chief’s defensive line will attempt to contain Eagles’ prolific rushing quarterback Jalen Hurts unsuccessfully. And I think an ad from Dan O’Dowd about Tesla’s self-driving cars is going to try to cause a mild shitstorm (successfully).

O’Dowd is a safety activist and California tech entrepreneur. He has spearheaded a campaign, spending millions, to get Tesla’s fully self-driving cars off the road. In his pursuit, this year O’Dowd bought a Super Bowl commercial attacking Elon Musk’s car company’s technology that will air in Washington, DC, and several other state capitals, including Albany, Atlanta, Austin, Tallahassee, and Sacramento, according to the Washington Post.

The ad by his advocacy group—which calls itself the Dawn Project—shows a Telsa with its “Full Self-Driving” mode turned on hitting a child-size mannequin. It shows a Tesla hitting a stroller. It shows a Tesla driving on the wrong side of the road. It shows a Tesla blowing through areas marked with “do not enter” signs and blazing past stationary school buses with their flashing  “STOP” sign out.

The purpose of the ad, and the Dawn Project, is to try to get Congress to regulate Tesla’s self-driving cars. The Dawn Project’s broader mission is demanding technology  “computers that are safe for humanity” and “software that never fails and can’t be hacked” across a range of areas. 

The group’s footage is only one of many videos that highlight Tesla’s relatively consistent safety failures. In January, the Intercept reported on a video showing a Tesla using driving assistance features abruptly stopping on the Bay Bridge, resulting in an eight-car crash that injured nine people. 

As the Post reports:

Last year, Tesla issued a cease-and-desist letter after O’Dowd’s group, the Dawn Project, published footage of the cars repeatedly striking child-size mannequins. A test run by a prominent Musk supporter included a real child to show the car recognizing them and stopping. O’Dowd has offered to run the test with Musk or any of his other critics in-person, to prove the car is making the mistakes without any tampering.

Since 2016, The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has investigated 35 crashes in which Tesla’s autopilot or Full Self-Driving mode was being used. According to the agency’s own data those features were involved in at least 273 Tesla crashes between July 2021 and June 2022. 

In the meantime, my colleague Abigail Weinberg wrote about one of the safest alternatives to auto-pilot that already exists for those who don’t want to drive: public transportation.

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

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