Top Gear racist remark (again)

[LondonJohn]

If it had been, say, Stewart Lee instead of Jeremy Clarkson, nobody would have batted an eyelid.

Actually if it had been Stewart Lee, he would have stopped after the mumble, backed up and said it at full volume then made a ten minute routine out of rubbing our faces in racist-things-we-used-to-take-for-granted.

I contend that this is totally different. Firstly, the entire narrative arc of a Stewart Lee performance makes it abundantly clear to any observer (provided that the observer also has an IQ of 100+ and an open mind) where Lee-the-performer* stands on any given issue. Any (deliberately-injected) ambiguity is clearly resolved through further context and other areas of the performance. Clarkson has never employed any such art in his "routines".

Secondly, there's no ambiguity at all about what Lee-the-performer is: a stand-up comedian employing satire, sarcasm and contrarian arguments for effect. Conversely, even if Clarkson fancies himself as some sort of contrarian satirical comedian, it doesn't "say that on the tin". People have little choice but to take what he says at face value.

Thirdly, even Lee-the-performer would be extremely careful about introducing racist terminology into his act, owing to the huge sensitivity around the subject. And if he ever were to do so (off the top of my head, I can't recall him having done so before, but I might be wrong), I am confident that he would be extremely careful to bracket it heavily with material that explained clearly to the audience why he was using such language, and what comic ends he was seeking to achieve through its use.


Incidentally, one of the other things about Clarkson that indicates a fair amount to me is his (in his view) humorously-ironic inclusion of phrases such as "...and on that bombshell" at the end of each show. For those who might not know, this was the closer used by fictional (and satirical) chat-show host Alan Partridge (played by Steve Coogan) at the end of each "Knowing Me Knowing You" chat show (typically where the show had ended in chaos or some unsavoury revelation or other). Clarkson clearly thinks it's funny to appropriate this phrase in some sort of "reverse-irony". It's not funny, and it's not clever. But it is ironic - in that it unwittingly shows Clarkson to be just the sort of buffoon that Coogan was lampooning in the first place.


* I use that term ("Lee-the-performer") since there is another factor to bear in mind, which is that the "Stewart Lee" who performs stand-up is not the same as the real-world person off-stage. Just as I imagine (and hope....) that "Clarkson-the-Top-Gear-presenter" is a character who differs from the "real" Clarkson. But in both cases, the real people are entirely responsible for the views, conduct and language of their on-air/on-stage personas.

 

[MattusMaximus]

My husband had not ever heard "slope" as a term towards Asian people, but I have. So my question is (and poll to soon follow) have you heard the term "slope" used as a racial epithet towards East Asian people?

Yes.

 

[zooterkin]

I know I should get out of this thread and walk away, but one other point about risky humour, and I hope I can express it the way I mean it:

When someone makes a joke which depends on the audience understanding that the shock of the bad taste of the joke is the joke, then they need to be very sure they have a relationship with their audience where that is understood. When someone with views far to the political left or right does it, they need to know that people who already hate their views are not going to charitably assume they meant the joke they way they actually meant it.

When Kenny Everett went onstage at a Young Conservatives rally in the '80s and opened with a gleeful "Let's bomb Russia!" to wild laughter and cheering, there were plenty on the left who acted as if he was entirely serious.

Clarkson has probably just marched into the same trap. There are plenty of people who already despise his views on so many things that they need no persuading to accept that he may also be a racist. If the viewer is inclined to assume he's not a racist, then the bad taste gag works as intended and becomes a comment on the shock of remembering the rhyme we (the older ones anyway) learned to say as children, when we had no idea what it meant. If you don't give him the benefit of the doubt, then the gag becomes a vile piece of sneaky racism, sneaked into a TV show because he's a vile, sneaky racist who wants the sneakily rub our noses in his vile racism.

I'm sure he intended the former, but he'll now reap the whirlwind of the latter.

+1

 

[Filippo Lippi]

Thirdly, even Lee-the-performer would be extremely careful about introducing racist terminology into his act, owing to the huge sensitivity around the subject. And if he ever were to do so (off the top of my head, I can't recall him having done so before, but I might be wrong), I am confident that he would be extremely careful to bracket it heavily with material that explained clearly to the audience why he was using such language, and what comic ends he was seeking to achieve through its use.

Lee often quotes a Tory election leaflet from 40ish years ago that apparently stated, "if you want a ****** for a neighbour, vote Liberal or Labour," as a response to those, like Clarkson, who claim that "political correctness" has "gone mad."

Context: I enjoy the comedy stylings of both Stewart Lee and Jeremy Clarkson.

Edited by Locknar: 

Edited, breach of rule 10.

 

[bluesjnr]

In a totally unrelated observation, I find that I can usually divine quite a bit about any particular UK person's deeper ego (as opposed to the superficial character they would sometimes like to display) by whether or not they have a passion for Top Gear that goes beyond a sheer interest in cars.

When people start saying things like "Huh huh I really love it when they race a Ferrari 340 against a hang glider" or "Huh huh I loved that bit where they dropped a caravan from a crane 200ft high", or "Huh huh I love that Clarkson is so irreverent, and I love the witty banter between him, the Hamster and Captain Slow", that usually gives me a fair amount of information to work with....

 

[Reeco]

He may have said ****** now.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/may/01/jeremy-clarkson-not-use-n-word

Edited by zooterkin: 

Edited for Rule 10. Do not try to evade the autocensor.

I just want to say, I typed an 'n' and 5 astericks, and wasn't trying to evade anything. If there's a rule to not replace letters with astericks then fair enough, but I wonder how useful using just astericks is when trying to relay information.

*** **** * ****?

 

[bluesjnr]

I just want to say, I typed an 'n' and 5 astericks, and wasn't trying to evade anything. If there's a rule to not replace letters with astericks then fair enough, but I wonder how useful using just astericks is when trying to relay information.

*** **** * ****?

There is,

10. You will not swear in your posts. This includes using swear words in a disguised form, for example, by replacing certain letters in the word with another letter, character, or image.E6

You'd think they'd have a link to the rules to stop people with 9 years time in falling foul of them - eh?

 

[Reeco]

There is,

You'd think they'd have a link to the rules to stop people with 9 years time in falling foul of them - eh?

I know there is, I got the PM. Regardless, I wasn't trying to evade the auto-censor. I was intentionally masking an offensive word, in a thread discussing the use of offensive words. It's not like I used 5 letters and 1 asterick.

Anyway, /derail.

 

[malicus]

I'll see your and raise you a WTF?

 

[angrysoba]

I know I should get out of this thread and walk away, but one other point about risky humour, and I hope I can express it the way I mean it:

When someone makes a joke which depends on the audience understanding that the shock of the bad taste of the joke is the joke, then they need to be very sure they have a relationship with their audience where that is understood. When someone with views far to the political left or right does it, they need to know that people who already hate their views are not going to charitably assume they meant the joke they way they actually meant it.

When Kenny Everett went onstage at a Young Conservatives rally in the '80s and opened with a gleeful "Let's bomb Russia!" to wild laughter and cheering, there were plenty on the left who acted as if he was entirely serious.

Clarkson has probably just marched into the same trap. There are plenty of people who already despise his views on so many things that they need no persuading to accept that he may also be a racist. If the viewer is inclined to assume he's not a racist, then the bad taste gag works as intended and becomes a comment on the shock of remembering the rhyme we (the older ones anyway) learned to say as children, when we had no idea what it meant. If you don't give him the benefit of the doubt, then the gag becomes a vile piece of sneaky racism, sneaked into a TV show because he's a vile, sneaky racist who wants the sneakily rub our noses in his vile racism.

I'm sure he intended the former, but he'll now reap the whirlwind of the latter.

For whatever it is worth, I will make my own position clear.

I do not dislike Jeremy Clarkson. I don't want to see him sacked from Top Gear or from the column he writes in one of the newspapers.

All I would like to see right now is an acknowledgement that yes, he did use the n-word. I would like to see him acknowledge it (which he pretty much did acknowledge) and I would like to see the "sceptics" who deny he use it acknowledge that he actually did. If we cannot trust the indisputable evidence of our own senses and have to make up reasons why we may be mistaken or make up some even more convoluted reasons why it is different if he grew up in Doncaster in the 1960's or if Nigel Farage had said it, or if we can only know he said it from the context which makes it impossible that any other word could have been there, then I fear we are not really sceptics but rather the type of people who rationalize rather than reason when we really, really wish something other than the truth happened to be true.

+1

And a +1 to my response as well.

 

[bluesjnr]

It's clear to me that Clarkson thought he had done enough to obscure the offensive word, it's clear to me that he didn't. It's clear to me that Clarkson acknowledges that the word is offensive. It's clear to me that this 2 year old segment was never aired. It's clear to me that prior to this being unearthed nobody had made a complaint.

It's clear to me that a circus has hit town. Such pearls of wisdom as,

jeremy clarkson is a legend, racism is invented by people who divide the community. if i didn't like someone and they happened to be black and they called me racist they are the ones making it a race issue not me. therefore calling someone a racist makes you the real racist. 

And similar are appearing on social media sites as Vox Pop. We've even veered off into speculating about personality types based on reactions to Top Gear on this thread and one or two of our resident SJW are in situ to steer this thread the way of all such threads.

I can't get upset, outraged, miffed or even mildly perturbed about this issue.

 

[LondonJohn]

I'll see your and raise you a WTF?

So does this imply that you are a fan of Top Gear and the "comedy stylings" of Jeremy Clarkson then?

 

[lobosrul]

It's clear to me that Clarkson thought he had done enough to obscure the offensive word, it's clear to me that he didn't. It's clear to me that Clarkson acknowledges that the word is offensive. It's clear to me that this 2 year old segment was never aired. It's clear to me that prior to this being unearthed nobody had made a complaint.

It's clear to me that a circus has hit town. Such pearls of wisdom as,



And similar are appearing on social media sites as Vox Pop. We've even veered off into speculating about personality types based on reactions to Top Gear on this thread and one or two of our resident SJW are in situ to steer this tread the way of all such threads.

I can't get upset, outraged, miffed or even mildly perturbed about this issue.

+1. They tried out a "bit", then Clarkson decided: no lets not do that, it crosses the line. It was never aired. I think everyone who is outraged over this, was looking for a reason to be so.

 

[LondonJohn]

For whatever it is worth, I will make my own position clear.

I do not dislike Jeremy Clarkson. I don't want to see him sacked from Top Gear or from the column he writes in one of the newspapers.

All I would like to see right now is an acknowledgement that yes, he did use the n-word. I would like to see him acknowledge it (which he pretty much did acknowledge) and I would like to see the "sceptics" who deny he use it acknowledge that he actually did. If we cannot trust the indisputable evidence of our own senses and have to make up reasons why we may be mistaken or make up some even more convoluted reasons why it is different if he grew up in Doncaster in the 1960's or if Nigel Farage had said it, or if we can only know he said it from the context which makes it impossible that any other word could have been there, then I fear we are not really sceptics but rather the type of people who rationalize rather than reason when we really, really wish something other than the truth happened to be true.



And a +1 to my response as well.

My position is similar to yours on the whole "slope" and "n-word" issue. I differ in that I do dislike the persona that Jeremy Clarkson adopts for the purposes of presenting Top Gear (I have no idea whether he's like that in real life, but it's irrelevant anyhow in assessing his performance on Top Gear). I think that the Clarkson-in-Top-Gear persona is a rather unpleasant and infantile bully, who exhibits playground behaviours of "taunt and run" and "let's see just how much offence we can get away with, hur hur hur".

I am glad to see that the BBC has at least publicly announced that Clarkson is on a very short leash from now on, and that he's effectively been given a final warning about his behaviour. I hope that this might result in him curbing his boorish, adolescent behaviour - and, more to the point, I hope that it will curb him from using his powerful platform to toss casual insults at a variety of ethnic groups, professions, nationalities and other defined groups. I realise that he thinks it's all very big and clever, and that there's "no offence, honestly". But hopefully he now realises that his employer feels otherwise.

I'd actually go further, and say that as the host of a prime-time programme on a public service broadcaster, Clarkson truly has a responsibility to behave appropriately. It's absolutely wrong to argue along the lines of "Well the people seem to love what he does - the audience figures don't lie". After all, you could use the same "logic" to support public executions (frequently, tens of thousands of people would turn up to watch criminals being hanged (and often eviscerated into the bargain)).

I'm reminded (not for the first time) of what Lord Reith - the founding father and first Director General of the BBC - said in response to someone who asked him whether his new television service would be giving the people what they wanted. "Oh no", replied Reith, "we'll be giving them something a lot better than that".

 

[LondonJohn]

+1. They tried out a "bit", then Clarkson decided: no lets not do that, it crosses the line. It was never aired. I think everyone who is outraged over this, was looking for a reason to be so.

Why does the fact that the "n-word" take was not transmitted make a material difference in regard to whether or not it was acceptable?

By the same measure, do you think that the fact that the misogynistic "banter" of Richard Keys and Andy Gray in the Sky Sports studio - which, similarly, was never transmitted - was any sort of mitigation against the gravity of the language/attitudes? (You're aware, perhaps, that these remarks got the two the sack from Sky Sports, on grounds that were/are entirely compatible with UK employment law?).

Had Clarkson perhaps done this rhyme off the cuff in Take 1, and had totally innocently rattled off the n-word instinctively, and had then immediately realised what he'd done, apologised, and gone for a retake, then that would probably have been acceptable. Everyone is allowed to slip up in such a manner. But that's NOT what happened - by Clarkson's own admission.

Look, I agree with you that it's not the most heinous of "crimes" on Clarkson's part. However, it IS (in my view, and that of the BBC apparently) a significant piece of misjudgement and misconduct on Clarkson's part. What's more, it's part of a demonstrable pattern of behaviour. He needs to be left in no doubt that it's utterly unacceptable to engage in this sort of behaviour, and that the consequences for him if he continues to do so will be become far more serious.

 

[angrysoba]

+1. They tried out a "bit", then Clarkson decided: no lets not do that, it crosses the line. It was never aired. I think everyone who is outraged over this, was looking for a reason to be so.

Yeah, but did Clarkson use the word?

 

[lobosrul]

Why does the fact that the "n-word" take was not transmitted make a material difference in regard to whether or not it was acceptable?

Err, because they realized they made a mistake immediately after it was recorded and decided not to air it? Was it actually Clarkson that wrote that part of the show, or someone else? If a comedian on a sitcom said some lines, and then immediately afterwards said, after hearing them out loud, no that is inappropriate, should they get in trouble??

To me this is actually no where near as bad as this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...chard-Hammond-calls-Mexico-lazy-feckless.html

I like the show, I like their juvenile boyish humor. If I had a nickel for every time Clarkson made some idiotic insult about American's I'd... maybe have a couple of bucks. But I don't get offended because I know he's being a buffoon for entertainments sake.

By the same measure, do you think that the fact that the misogynistic "banter" of Richard Keys and Andy Gray in the Sky Sports studio - which, similarly, was never transmitted - was any sort of mitigation against the gravity of the language/attitudes? (You're aware, perhaps, that these remarks got the two the sack from Sky Sports, on grounds that were/are entirely compatible with UK employment law?).

I had to Google this one. Completely different from what Clarkson said. If say the cameraman had been black and he was repeatedly calling him "almost" the n-word but muttering and muffling it, then it would be analogous. And BTW under USA employment law, and what I know from working for 10 years or so in the corporate world, those two would be immediately fired.

ETA: the other difference, Clarkson said what he did as part of the show. These Sky Sports announcers were talking as themselves (when I assume they thought they were off camera). If there was footage of Clarkson sitting around between takes asking female staffers "to get their **** out" or spewing racist remarks, my opinion would be different.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Yeah, but did Clarkson use the word?

He recited the rhyme and deliberately mumbled the second line. The whole point was not to say the bad word. The mumbling he spontaneously came out with was meant to sound rather as if he was actually saying the words, but not quite. In one take his spontaneous attempt sounded too much like the real word so he made a point of insisting that take shouldn't be used. In the end the whole sequence was ditched.

I do not see why you think it's so critical to establish agreement on whether he was on one side or other of some imagined boundary between a mumble that sounds somewhat like a word and a mumble that actually is that word. It's not the boundary between his being or not being a racist, is it?

We all know what the word was that he was supposed to obscure. Would it actually change anything if he had actually said it? What if the "joke" had been that he would recite the rhyme in its original form and the word would be bleeped out for transmission? Would the fact that the viewers believed he had said it out loud instead of mumbling change the offence?

 

[angrysoba]

Here's an opinion that I pretty much agree with in that well-known SJW rag the Daily Telegraph:

Yesterday, Jeremy Clarkson, the famously straight talking presenter of BBC’s Top Gear, attempted to issue an apology after it was revealed he had used the word [“******”] whilst reciting the racist nursery rhyme “eenie meenie miney mo” on one of his programs. Strangely, on this occasion his capacity for straight talking suddenly deserted him. Indeed, his defence appeared to be he had totally lost control over his ability to use words at all.

Initially he had said “I did not use the N-word. Never use it”. But yesterday he explained that he had, in fact, tried to “mumble” the word. Then, to his horror, when reviewing copies of the unbroadcast footage, he found “it did appear I had actually used the word I was trying to obscure”. Or, to put it another way, the reason it appeared he’d used that word was because he had indeed used it.

Of course, Dan Hodges also alleges that the UKIP election posters are racist. I find that much harder to agree with than the idea that Clarkson used the n-word and then denied using it. But I'll bet that some who have expressed antipathy towards "SJW"s will somehow manage to argue that the reverse is true.

 

[angrysoba]

He recited the rhyme and deliberately mumbled the second line. The whole point was not to say the bad word. The mumbling he spontaneously came out with was meant to sound rather as if he was actually saying the words, but not quite. In one take his spontaneous attempt sounded too much like the real word so he made a point of insisting that take shouldn't be used. In the end the whole sequence was ditched.

I do not see why you think it's so critical to establish agreement on whether he was on one side or other of some imagined boundary between a mumble that sounds somewhat like a word and a mumble that actually is that word. It's not the boundary between his being or not being a racist, is it?

No, it isn't but that's never what I have said. I have said he used the word, just as the Mirror states he had. And furthermore that Clarkson's denials he used the words are unbelievable at best, in my opinion, and outright lies at worst, or as most people would call it, in reality.

We all know what the word was that he was supposed to obscure. Would it actually change anything if he had actually said it? What if the "joke" had been that he would recite the rhyme in its original form and the word would be bleeped out for transmission? Would the fact that the viewers believed he had said it out loud instead of mumbling change the offence?

Yes, we all know the word he was supposed to obscure and failed to do as even he realizes.

It would have changed nothing if he had simply admitted it.

What if...? Who knows? It's not important to me right now or of interest to me. I am only interested in why he and you are denying he used it.

As for the last question, I don't particularly care and think it is not related to what I am talking about.