Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Mail

Not a pair of publications you'd expect to be carrying the same columnist really is it?

I really don't see what the fuss is about this.

He clearly didn't say the word. It sounded maybe like he mumbled it.

But even if he did... So what?

The word is not racist. A person using the word is not racist. Only the person can be racist.

I doubt very much that JC is racist. He's a bit of a knob from time to time but that's about it.

Like has been said before. It's a nursery rhyme that he probably learned as a child.

Big fuss over nothing IMHO.

In our school ground it was 'catch a baby by its toe'. I think I was in my 20's before I heard anything different.

The film The Dambusters was re dubbed. The dig was renamed "Trigger". The last screening of it I saw, the original soundtrack was restored, and the dog's proper name was used. It is also worth noting that the word was also in the film in the form of Morse code.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigger_(dog)

As far as gollywogs are concerned, it was a no-no in my house. It was explained what they were and what they meant at an early age, I and my sister knew what the origins were. However, gollywogs were acceptable. I am seeing them start to return, with little complaint.

Let's also not forget that even in the 1970s, the BBC was transmitting the Black and a White Minstrel Show, which was apparently acceptable up until it's final series in 1978.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_and_ ... strel_Show

My point? I grew up with racism. It was the in my early childhood - part of society. It was certainly present in schools, and in the media. That stuff sticks with you, and the chances of it leaking out is always there.

See I grew up with robertsons jam which had the golliwog figure as a logo. Despite being a child of the 80s, I had no idea that it had racist connotations until around the time i went to university at which point there was news of it being withdrawn as a logo.

The DVD I have still says N.....
However I heard that Stephen Fry (script writer) has renamed him Digger for the remake that Peter Jackson is supposed to be getting round to making.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/m ... -bbc-ofcom

In that instance Clarkson shouldn't be the only one to go. There's been far too many instances like it already and it's a scripted show!

Oh FPS. If you polled 1000 people in the UK I'd be surprised if more than 10 of them thought the word 'slope' was a racial insult. And it's a perfectly reasonable word to use in the circumstances.

Feck off with your tabloid hyped hysterical nonsense. Really. (Not you Ernie, the people complaining).

I had never heard of that word having that meaning before.

I would like to thank Mr Clarkson for inadvertently educating me. See, I DID learn something from Top Gear after all!

The only place I've heard slope used as a slur was in a Karate Kid film. The first one I think.

IRL, I don't think I've ever heard it used in that context. If I have, it completely passed me by, just like it did on Top Gear.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/a ... son-gaffes

I'll laugh if they do sack him in the end. He can take Hammond with him too. I used to love TG but the arrogance was only tolerable when it was a genuinely good show. Then they started to rely on controversy to mask how crippled the Beeb had left it.

Not as much as he will. He can afford good enough lawyers to tear the BBC a new one if they sack him over a complaint as idiotic as this one. Then he can just go off and do the same show for ITV or Channel 4, given they own the rights to the show not the BBC.

So basically the BBC can sack him, lose millions of pounds in legal damages, more millions of pounds in revenue and lose one of it's most popular shows to a rival. Or not. Which do you think they are going to go with? 'Final warning' my arse. He holds all the cards, he knows it and they know it.

Jon

I'm under no illusions about why he's still in the job, but even the Beeb will cede once the Mail smells blood in the water and starts reporting outraged Twitter users as usual. They both know it becomes self-fulfilling at that point. The Beeb and the TG team have used up most of their excuses already.

The beeb are utterly powerless. That's the point. And it shows just how poorly the press understand the situation.

The beeb cannot sack Clarkson because Clarkson does not work for the beeb. He works for an independent production company that makes TG for the beeb. The only thing the beeb can actually do is say "we're not going to commission any more TG if you have Clarkson in it." At which point the production company can reply "Oh, fair enough then, I'm sure somebody else will be happy to take your place." And the audience will happily follow, they don't actually care what channel TG is on as long as it remains TG.

There is no 'tipping point' here, there is no 'final straw'. If the beeb want TG they have to put up with Clarkson and his idiocy,
It's that simple. And they certainly do want TG. They simply don't have the ability to boot Clarkson or the ability to force the production company to do so (especially given IIRC he's also a director of the company). Yes, they may be cowards in the face of the likes of the Guardian but the bare fact is the Guardian can scream all they like, the beeb can't actually give them what they want.

Sacking off TG because Clarkson used a word that offended literally two people in millions would be arguably the stupidest management decision in the history of the BBC. I'm not saying they're not capable of that but in this case I think they're much more aware of the reality of the situation than the press seem to be.