it's in our own interest to drive higher and heavier vehicles.

The trend of increasing SUV purchases reflects this perceived notion of increased safety - larger vehicles are more liable to rollovers, unless the center of gravity is low enough to make it hard but not all larger vehicles have that design. These days mid-sized and small cars have identical, sometimes even better safety ratings than SUVs and other larger vehicles. They're also less likely to kill the other party(ies) in an accident.

Passenger safety systems have come a long, long way, even since the 90s. There's a video of a mid or late 90s corolla versus a 2017 model or something, and the difference is pretty eye opening. In a head on crash, the 90s corolla had the dashboard get shoved into the test dummies while in the 2017 model the cabin was unharmed as the engine bay crumpled and took most of the impact energy. I still want to drive my mid 90s camry because I love the bulletproof thing, but I'm also fully aware that if I get involved in a severe accident there's a lower chance of me making it out unscathed compared to a much more recent model camry.