Jeremy Clarkson's latest gaff

[Loosehead]

Anyone see this at the time?

http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30000-13479356,00.html

Is it a strom in a tea cup or was he out of order? I didn't see it myself so I'm wondering how serious it was in real time or is this the tabloids getting hysterical again?

[spaced]

Its true, I watched it. I knew he would get a ticking off for it!

[OBonio]

Yay. Another victory for those against freedom of speech. This is why Rowan Atkinson went to court over the religious hatred bill I thought.

Sounds quite funny to me.

[flip-flop]

Completely innocuous. Clarkson has said in the past that he could sum up the Germans in one word: Humourless.

Strikes me that he's been proven right.

Personally, I think he's a great writer - very very readable: his column in the Sunday Times is well worth the price of the paper on its own.

He's not scared to say things that are, perhaps, unfashionable (such as speed cameras have absolutely nothing to do with safety, but are merely another way to raise revenue), which is why the Guardian reading monkeys tend not to like him and why they will make grist out of this utter non-event.

[JudgeJ]

I didn’t see it myself, but it sounds like what used to be called lighthearted humour. Of course, under the current regime, all forms of offence, (whether deliberate or accidental, malicious or benign, serious or humorous, real or imagined) are viewed as more serious crimes than mugging old ladies for their pension, and have to be stamped out.

We are thus in a situation where only people such as Jeremy speak without fear of retribution. It therefore comes as a shock when things are said by people like him which, only a few years ago, would have passed with a chuckle from those who found it amusing and without comment from those that did not.

It is well known that Jeremy will offend somebody or other during the course of a thirty-minute programme – the Germans are not alone in being on the wrong end of his humour. This, in my view, makes him that bit more entertaining than the politically correct clones which the BBC – aka the British Government Propaganda Corporation - otherwise employs. So those of a delicate disposition should simply not watch.

[KebabMeister]

Well it appears he is just playing for easy laughs. Britain have been baby fed jokes about Germany since both world wars when in fact many people don't know a thing about Germany.

I find some of the stuff pretty amusing but I cringe when he does stuff like a Nazi salute because that is incredibly offensive, and illegal (arrestable), in Germany (or to German people in the UK). It just comes down to another country being an easy target and therefore an easy joke (instead of being original).

Anyway, I am British but I do live/work in Germany and I think they're the nicest, most polite people I have ever met... and some do have a good sense of humour, very similar to our own!! :) It actually makes me envious that Germany can be clean, tidy, safe, cheaper, very little vandalism, no violence (in Bavaria anyway), good public transport and I wonder where Britain went wrong?! So, I have a laugh to myself when I hear Clarkson, or others, saying stuff like that because the joke is on him.

[KebabMeister]

Of course I read his 'The World According to Clarkson' and yeah, it's funny, but it doesn't mean that I have to agree with all his views. He's a funny journalist who knows exactly what makes his viewers laugh. If he just said the truth all the time then it would be rather depressing rather than witty humour! :)

[v64paul]

as in most cases, you get what it says on the tin. if you are easily offended, tune out. it's a long time since top gear was the programme to watch if you wanted to learn how the latest austin maxi drove and quite right too! i'm sure some of kebabmeisters neighbours would have laughed out loud had they watched it. probably.

[Coobeastie]

It went without comment on airing its only because the authorities are being overly cautious with the football coming up.

[Tim B]

Is this any different from the Farty Owls 'The Germans are Coming.' episode? I think not.

[snapdarlich]

If everyone took every word he said seriously, we'd all be running about in high performance cars and blowing up caravans. Vauxhall would be finished completely etc etc - It's a bit of fun - What about al Murray on the big fact hunt and the scottish team - He would only speak to them in a scottish accent or when Donny Osmond was on BBC scotland and would only speak in a scottish accent for the entire interview... Everybody gets grief - it was perhaps a bit tactless but that's all. I thought it was quite funny btw!

[gary baldy]

I think i'm a lone voice here but clarkson is not only not funny or clever but disgracefully racist.
The germans are pretty humourless when it comes to nazi references and so they should be.
Clarkson is an idiot for only relating Germany with the Nazis.
Why is it alright to make naive (and racist) remarks about the germans - where as if he was to say something about Blacks or jews he would be sacked immediately. The germans are very sensitive about their past and if you ask me dont kick off enough about ignorant brits dragging it up.
Clarkson represents Jim Davidson and Stan Boardman and if making nazi salutes whilst talking about a German designed car makes him a 'funny journalist' - then god help both our humour and our journalism.

[Oneeyedvic]

gary baldy - I suppose John Clease is rubbish too.....

As with most things, 90 percent of people find it funny, there are a few people who don't.

As previously said, you know what you are getting when you tune in to Clarkson, so it is fairly simple - don't tune in.

On a personal note, I can't stand Jordan - so guess what - if she is on tv, I turn over and I don't read newspaper articles about her. Pretty Simple stuff really.

What really makes me laugh about all of this is that it is covered by The Mail - the most pro nazi paper!

[tuv]

i think as a nation we are being told to lose our sence of humour, what was funny 20 years ago we heve to "tut tut" to

[KebabMeister]

Well, I don't find a Nazi salute offensive, but I have some German colleagues who would laugh at it and others who would take offense, especially if they worked for BMW and they interpretted his Nazi salute as meaning that all that work for BMW are Nazis. You see there are different ways of interpretting this illegal gesture in Germany. It may indeed be very funny for British people but if I saw something similar on German TV making an illegal British subject then I may not see the funny side of it (say burning a British flag whilst they all laughed).

What would be more amusing is watching him do that in Germany and then see him being arrested, fined, and taken to jail for two weeks!! :)

Incidently, it isn't just Germany that Nazi issues are illegal.

[Markandshez]

Its all nonsense. The trouble is that only white English people can be racist !!. Have a look at this from the Sikh Times this week

http://www.thesikh-times.co.uk/

Note the headline of a black person being made a "victim of racism". Then have another look at the top of the page - Is this not disgraceful racism?

How can the paper get away with it? - because they are not white. The worlds gone mad

[Loosehead]

Surle abusing the French is allowed ?!

[gary baldy]

Oneeyedvic- If you have ever heard John Cleese talk about Fawlty you would know Cleese used him as an example of the ridiculous pompous gits who use the war as a reference point for everything they think they know about Germany and the Germans and Cleese himself is far too clever (unlike Clarkson) to actually think such things are funny.

[wochi83]

As a future German teacher studying English next to History I can just say this issue is very contraproductive to Anglo-German relations. I watched "Don`t mention the war" and it�s definitely funny and I also like if Brits make fun on the German th or their pronunciation in general as it is awful indeed. What annoys me is the fact that Britain just refer to Germany as the Third Reich and doesn`t see the complete change on the Continent. In most British school classes history education stops after 1945. This lack of knowledge of current Germany combined with the omnipresent comments about Germans as Nazis is actually the reason why most Germans react in such an emotional way. If TheSun were so friendly to refer to Germany as a modern, democratic constitutional state just one single time, the whole debate would be seen in a different way.

[KebabMeister]

I guess calling them Nazis is no different to Britain being labelled a nation of hooligans, or a nation of people with crooked/rotten teeth, or oppressive murderers, or an empire that invaded and robbed countries of their resources.... whether it's current or history I take it none of you are offended by the above comments??

They're just a few comments I've heard people describe British people.