... and the sad thing is, some responses to this thread will prove the point.

It is clear that (as is quite typical) the majority of commentators haven't actually read what Clarkson said, but choose to summon up the Lynch mob anyway. As a result, the BBC had so far had over 20,000 complaints, there are calls for Clarkson's sacking etc. All from people who either do not know what Clarkson said or, if they do know what he said, do not actually get it.

The BBC have now published his actual words. He said"I think they (the strikes) have been fantastic. Absolutely. London today has just been empty. Everybody stayed at home, you can whizz about, restaurants are empty,"

"It's also like being back in the 70s. It makes me feel at home somehow," '"

Not helped by Unison digging a massive PR hole and diving in head first. Bloody idiots.

I know.

"The union said it was considering reporting the Top Gear presenter to the police over comments on The One Show."

Breathtaking.

Or helped by the fact that it's Clarkson and a) he's not remotely funny, and b) the "balance because its the BBC" comment wasn't amusing, regardless of what he went on to say. He should leave jokes to the professionals and stick to tossing himself off over cars.

There is a massive over-reaction to this, but its certainly pulled some s out of the woodwork, on both "sides".

The whole incident was absolutely perfect for the news on Radio 1. I've moaned on here about how they dumb things down to the lowest common denominator these days many times. I cannot listen to it, it makes me want to smash the radio up.

The reaction to the Clarkson comments is ridiculous. As ever it's lead by the press in this country, but even if he had said those things as his actual opinion, would you actually complain about it? 20,000 people there who need to get a life.

The backlash to his comments was even more vomit inducing. Those selfish, greedy public sector workers put the country at risk then they play the stunned victim of a horrible crime. All because a TV presentor whose major MO is being controversial and crass has a joke about it.

Thread drift, but which ones would these be? Or are you joking too? Hard to tell from plain text

Care to find some reasoning for this remark from the same show?

[i"I do sometimes use the train to come to London but it always stops in Reading. It’s always because somebody has jumped in front of it and somebody has burst.

‘You just think, why have we stopped because we’ve hit somebody? What’s the point of stopping? It won’t make them better.”[/i

He's dug his own hole over the years, built a coffin, laid down in it and now he's hammered in the first nail. There are other high profile TV people who have simply vanished from TV over the years for much less.

I don't think people are dumb for complaining, they just don't like the guy.

Is it wrong for me to think that if a train ran him over it would stop, reverse and then do it again, just to make sure?

That said, and much as I think he's a complete and utter c0ck, the unions have handled this badly. The correct response was surely "Clarkson? He's a public school educated, faux 'lad' who likes to make controversial remarks. Who gives a flying what he thinks?"

He's Damo on a bigger stage. You have to wonder how, after all this time, he still gets such a massive rise out of people.

There was actually a union rep on Breakfast this morning who said there had been shootings of workers in Guatamala in front of people all because they belonged to a Trade Union. So it seems Clarkson really wasn't joking, it really could happen. The Union guy asked for Clarkson to dig into his pocket and donate some money to the Guatamlan victims to help their families who are now struggling ......... lets see.

IMO it was a joke but it was just another crass comment that I heard about my husband because he chose to excersise his right to strike.

The distinction between being an apologist on the one hand, and complaining about people either deliberately or through being dumb failing to comprehend something which was very clear, on the other, is pretty obvious and I don't believe you fail to understand it.

It makes no difference to me at all that it was Clarkson, and as an individual he gets on my nerves as much or more than he amuses (though I enjoy Top Gear when I watch it, which is not avidly).

My post is entirely about dumbed-down Britain, and I am in no way, not even 1%, being "an apologist" for Clarkson. Clarkson is almost irrelevant to my point. (What relevance his identity has to the point is only that those who know what he's like have even less excuse for pretending he was actually expressing personal views.) But my point would be true whoever had said it. I would be surprised if you don't get that.

I have no need to comment on the other random remark you bizarrely quote, gross though it was, as it has nothing at all to do with my point. But it is clearly a typical Clarkson attempt at humour by parody as opposed to "this is my actual opinion". It is to me more gross than amusing, but then I didn't say I found his "shoot them" parody funny either. The most amusing part of those remarks was its taking the pis.s out of the BBC's laughable claims to always be even-handed at all times on all subjects.

If only there were more people with the balls to speak their mind.

He spoke his mind?, I was under the impression it was a joke. Or did it just get classified as a joke after the fuss kicked off.

For someone who claims to be so anti PC and "says what everyone else is thinking" etc etc you'd think he'd have the courage to stick to his convictions rather than back down at the 1st sign of people disagreeing with him. Ah well, all mouth and no trousers, unsuprising really.