http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/m ... d-top-gear

It's hard to imagine what else he'd be saying (what's suggested was certainly the version I heard growing up), but the audio's rubbish.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/m ... d-top-gear

It's time to fire him anyway, though the Beeb have been far too lenient when it comes to Top Gear relative to other broadcasts and broadcasters.

Yes, let's sack someone for what we imagine he said, rather than on, you know, pesky things like evidence.

It's because to sells to 174 countries and is one of the biggest revenue earners for the BBC.
Though as the footage was from an unaired piece and he mumbled the word it's more of a bad choice word usage. Also it seems someone at tg decided that that footage needed to be given though probably sold to a newspaper.

I watch the video on the Mirror’s site, and they’ve upped the volume at the salient points, just to be sure. However, that aside, I would find it harder to hear the “n word” if I had not been primed that that is what is being said. I certainly can’t hear the hard “g” sound in what he’s saying. I’m inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt because the word is so indistinct.

Thing is, it’s very hard to self-censor speech at times. I remember that poem, “n-word” and all, from a very young age - late 1960s early 1970s - certainly in the playground, along with it’s cousins “ip dip dog [LIFTED]”. I tend not to use either rhyme incase, for some reason, I revert to my childhood.

The realistic thing is that Jezza's contract with the BBC for Top Gear is almost certainly quite long and very expensive (although allegedly quite a bit less expensive than it was). If the Beeb terminated the contract due to something as, well, flimsy as this he'd be able to afford a very good lawyer to rip them to shreds. It would probably cost the BBC millions to dump Jeremy Clarkson over this.

And then the same papers who have been running this story would be running a story about the BBC wasting public money paying it's stars to go away.

I think Richard Littlejohn said in the Guardian, Clarkson was trying to remember the rhyme but then stifled the n-word bit, which means he was actively suppressing it. People of Clarkson's era may well have learnt the rhyme including the n-word. As an example, I learnt it but using the word "fish". It made no sense to me at the time because fish don't have feet but even know if I wanted to recite the rhyme, I'd use the word "fish".

I learnt it in the school playground as a kid, it was only years later that I found out what it meant.

I don't think I had a particularly sheltered childhood, but I learnt the words to that rhyme long before I knew what the N word was referring to - and until that point, I honestly imagined it was some kind of frog. It was even longer before I learnt that it was meant as a slur, and not just a label.

I see this as another version of the Robertson's Jam issue. It may well be that it was a racist slur, and perhaps it was actually intentional (I'm talking about the golliwog logo), but I believe it was viewed by most people, especially children, quite innocently. Just as the rhyme was learnt and recited innocently. I rather liked the little golliwog logo as a child, and I owned a golliwog teddy. I distinctly remember being rather fond of it too.

My mum used to make biscuits which see called "Nig Nogs" in the cookery book.

Exactly, I think I was well into my teens when the Gollywog 'scandal' broke. That shattered my childhood. Until then I thought they were just Gollywogs, like moomins are moomins and Tellytubbies are Tellytubbies etc.

Seriously? Richard Littlejohn is writing in The Guardian now? There's a sentence I never expected to read.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/richard-littlejohn

You'll need to explain to me the nuances of your surprise.