I suppose others have a more highly refined sense of aesthetics, but I just can't get behind the debate over the old vs. new Scion xB, the funky five-seat space wagon sold by Toyota's Gen Y-oriented brand. Aren't they both ugly?

Really. If you're serving, say, wart hog for dinner -- juicy, succulent, fall-off-the-tusk wart hog -- do you fret the relative pulchritude of wart hog A compared to wart hog xB? So it hardly matters if the redesigned car is more or less visually appealing than the original (model years 2004 to 2006). They both make babies cry.

Scion debuted in 2003 as Toyota's bid for the hoodies-and-Vans set. From the beginning it was clear Scion's brand mandarins had taken a big screwdriver to the collective heads of Gen Y, a demographic so savagely targeted from the moment of birth as to make it intensely allergic to anything like conventional advertising. Scion -- as successfully as any car company since Ferrari, I'd say -- generated its own owner culture, with Scion concerts, ring tones, car shows, clothing, sponsored exhibitions, Second Life environments and other insidious bits of affinity marketing. If Scion could get away with brand-marketed Ecstasy, it probably would.

To help deepen a sense of ownership, Scion sells its cars monospec, which is to say, with almost no factory options. Buyers can customize their rides with dealer-installed accessories (I'm partial to LED-lighted foot wells and cup holders, myself), sound systems and performance mods, such as lowering springs, sway bars and cold-air intakes. Not custom enough? There are vast warehouses of Scion-specific aftermarket chintziness available. To avoid freaking out inexperienced car buyers, Scion dealerships practice "pure pricing," which is basically no-haggle pricing, except it's pronounced, "Don't, like, haggle me, bro."