Agreed, his PQ17 Arctic Convoy Disaster programme (written and presented by JC) was one of the best ww2 documentaries in a long time.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03n3297
[video:http://youtu.be/w-c4VopIj0Y]
The Guardian article makes him look more liberal than so called liberals. Many do think the BBC has a distinct left wing bias. The corridors being full of empty champagne bottles after Blair’s first win is one clue.
I am a huge fan of Top Gear USA and Top Gear BBC. Both are excellent shows in my opinion. That said, there certainly are many times when I’ve either cringed or just shut off the television when watching with my 10 year old. Particularly in the BBC version there are topics and humor involved that I personally feel are inappropriate for a lets say an under 15 audience. I realize opinions vary in that regard and I also understand the cultural difference between the UK and the US. In the short clip that was posted of “Richard Hammond being racist to Mexicans” I can’t argue that it is at least stereotyping and possibly racist. However, knowing the nature of the show I do not truly believe it was intended to be offensive but simple comedy if possibly in poor taste. I have a very close friend who is Mexican and I am mostly Polish and he and I can make jokes about “lazy Mexicans” and “dumb Polaks” between ourselves but we are very close friends for over 25 years and we know what would be offensive between us. We understand each other’s sense of humor and neither of us would take offense to such comments coming from either direction but what is acceptable in private conversation between old friends is not necessarily acceptable when speaking to a large audience. If you are speaking to an audience that is, thanks to technology, a “global audience” I don’t see a problem with trying to reign in the ethnic jokes. I am not a big fan of “political correctness” in general but thinking before you speak is quite reasonable in my opinion. I did not watch that episode so I can not offer my take on what happened there and many things can be taken out of context and deemed offensive if you quote a small portion of a conversation. I can say that I truly hope the show survives. That’s my two bits…
Awesome! I would only follow the UK presenterswhich means I have to switch over to amazon. Aaaand I don’t know how to do that 
I’m totally ignorant about the subtilities of british politics, i’m in general not politicized and see partisanship as a great danger to intelligence, all i know is i watched 3 episodes of top gear, the third was in india i remember it it as being a succession of racist innuendos from begining to end, then i researched a bit a came to the conclusion that it was not just poor taste but genuine racism from Clarkson whom wit and comedic talent i admire otherwise.
this is the UK Prime Video site:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Prime-Instant-Video/b/?node=3280626031&ref=atv_surl_piv
Your local Amazon should have a simi version (Of course it's bound to be on "other sources" as well after broadcast on Amazon).
I wonder… if the Amazon version of their show will have more liberal use of expletives and racial insults, since it isn’t airing on national TV? :zipper_mouth_face:
Seriously, despite Clarkson’s brilliance of humor and sarcasm, he’s a dolt. I mean, there is just no good reason for him to hurl racial insults the way he does. Leave them out and everything would be A-OK, everything still very funny and engaging. If he could roll the tape back and not say those things, don’t you think he’d do it? If so, then it’s clear — these were terrible gaffes. But perhaps he just can’t help himself, because he’s doing everything in his power NOT to say those things on TV as perhaps he says them all the time off camera.
A show like Top Gear is not just the presenters but all the production staff, especially the writers, directors, and producers. They didn’t go it completely alone. I have a feeling that outside of the BBC, they won’t be as talented.
It’s a performance and as all performers know what you see does not often equal who they are off-screen. And on-screen you do what succeeds best, that’s what you’re paid to do. I have some understanding of the British way, humor and all, so I wasn’t offended by the show. It had more depth through innuendo than most Americans understood; something like Monty Python where there’s the obvious humor and much, much more behind it if you truly understand what they intend. And one must also understand British journalism where absolute truth may be denied in order to produce a compelling enough story. Any celeb over there is going to have their slightest things blown out of proportion and headlined as if nobody else is like that. Clarkson may be a crass twit or not. He made mistakes in judgement but who doesn’t? What he did do is help create a great show of a genre which was new even if it simply comprised of successful approaches already proven to work single. It was how they combined it all that brought the greatness, and that greatness cannot be denied.
But nothing and nearly nobody goes on forever on one show or even with one format. In that, Clarkson had his run at it and few could have equaled him. Now it’s time for other things and other people- such is the way of life. Top Gear is a classic and that will long outlive those who made it.
Phil
Then we must disagree. TG is about mockery. They often refer to Clarkson as an orang utang, and on occasion have spent several minutes insulting him while he sits, arms folded, waiting for them to finish, and then he carries on.
I saw the India episode and saw no racism. I did see them making themselves look completely stupid, and making foreigners think that we know nothing about food. If anything it made Indians look good, and the TG team look bad i.e. like a bunch of idiots. However, some parts were very funny. It is hit and miss in my view. Some parts are dull, some are hilarious. Of course you are free to cite the bits that you consider ‘genuine racism’.
Exactly, it is a performance. Clarkson plays the buffoon on purpose. It is completely over the top, and sometimes staged, such as the hover-van soaking some people on the river bank. I thought it was dead a few years ago, then it bounced back. We will see if it sinks or swims on (in the) Amazon.
God forbid any one is ever offended :zipper_mouth_face:
I think the vast majority of UK TG viewers find offensive remarks funny, that is the beauty of the English humour. We can laugh at ourselves, everyone can be a minority in some aspect of life and humour can almost certainly be obtained from that.
Things like the slope remark regarding Asians eye shape, no Englishman would take exception to being called a similar name for being round eyed in comparison. The same with skin, the pale English complexion is often mocked.
I’ve seen some American shows do similar, take the cartoon Southpark, it pokes fun at everyone, regardless, no one is immune, this makes it funny.
Long live free speech and the ability to offend someone without cries of repression or hatred from left wing softies.
A very funny example of top gear making harmless fun of a stereotype…
Top Gear - French Peugeot Breakfast - Let’s make terrible cars! from Ad Hoc on Vimeo.
Striking a coworker is a sack-able offence in any workplace, let alone just because there was only cold food available after the kitchen closed, and that was what he was fired for, his abilities and/or character had nothing to do with it, any employer has a duty to provide a safe work environment for ALL employees!
I’ll bet most here would change their minds about him if it was them that was punched for a trivial reson.
Cheers David
Good riddance to J Clarkson. Pompous twit!
The show was written by Clarkson, Hammond and May and the senior production team (led by Andy Wilman) have defected to the new show with them.
Its more likely that the BBC show, now written, presented and produced by Chris Evans (he who cannot drive and talk and gets car sick as a high speed passenger at present) is going to struggle to be more than a mundane show about cars.
This example is very interesting because it’s very funny and actually not harmless, these jokes about the quality/reliability of french cars are common place in british media to the point that the common men considers french cars unreliable, the word is french cars are cool but you have to live with them, yet reliabilityindex.org wich is the best effort yet to gather satisticaly relevant data about car reliability rates french cars the second most reliable in the world behind Japanese ones.
They rate every single french car brand statisticaly more reliable that every single German car Brand, yet the stereotypes jokes (this is another top gear favorite) are perpetuated shaping people’s opinions to be the oposite of reality.
My point is, some stereotyping/racists jokes have consequences in the real world (some are completly harmless i recon), stereotypes become common wisdom and people act on it, in this particular example, the efforts of french manufacturers and workers to build reliable cars are not rewarded to their merit in britain because people are trying to be funny.
Let’s see how Clarkson’s detractors would respond after 16 hours working, from before sunrise, to after sunset and an imbeciles main job is to secure a decent hot meal and comfortable place to sleep once again fails to do so.
Let’s stop and take into consideration that he is far from a spring chicken, so his needs are more likely primarily backed by medical dictations.
TL DR, you work 16 hours and cop a cold sandwich as your main meal and see how you react, particularly as someone’s paid decent money to ensure that doesn’t happen!
Oh and this demonstrates a serious problem in today’s society.
I agree on this! And I love that video. I can’t even tell gender biased or racial biased jokes to some of my juniors without some of them getting the hurt in their butts. As for me I do not care if you did those to me even though we have only just met, provided it was all on good terms. I do that all the time. I normally get positive reactions but I rarely receive negative repossession. But when I do, they’re normally overly sensitive or downright pussies who were pampered by their mums and we’re not exposed to the harsh reality of our world.
I wasn’t an avid watcher of Top Gear - I simply didn’t always have the time - when I did watch it, I generally enjoyed it. Most of the presenters over the years have had their pluses and minuses. Jeremy Clarkson is entertaining, of that there is little doubt. Some of what he says is near the knuckle - the rest is well past the knuckle. My view is that if people are offended by something/someone - don’t watch, nobody forces a TV programme upon anyone (well, I’m getting forced by the wee’n to watch an awful lot of back-to-back Peppa Pig at present)
In my line of work, I regularly have to deal with conflict, whether it is grown-ups acting like kids, “threats” over Facebook, people punching ten bells out of each other or, over the years, the occasional murder. I find a saddening and sometime fruitless amount of time is spent trying to persuade people who should really know better to be a little less brittle and to accept that sometimes human beings don’t get on very well with one another. Should that happen, maybe they should just steer clear of each other instead of always seeking someone to blame, someone to be punished, someone to be a “victim”…….
Jeremy Clarkson may or may not regret punching that guy. The punched guy may well regret the fact it was, let’s face it, blown out of all proportion. The BBC certainly regret the fact they’ve been backed into a corner and have had to lose a moneyspinner.
I wonder if Jeremy Clarkson was ordered to simply give a proper, grovelling apology and accept a good, solid, hard-as-you-possibly-can punch in the face back from the guy, things may have been different?
Anyway, I don’t have Amazon Prime so I won’t be watching Top Gear on there, though I’m sure sooner or later it’ll be available to view elsewhere. Once Peppa Pig is finished.
I won’t miss the show at all. I first liked it when it was mostly about cars (or at least I thought so), but when it turned into fictional scripted TV show that only featured cars it went downhill.