Strike Clarkson dead!

Morning

So anyway, I saw this clip on youtube of Jeremy Clarkson - the laddish drivy man who amuses us all by driving somewhere stupid every Christmas and filming himself breaking down.  He's talking about Wednesday's public sector strikes.



Copyright BBC1.



Unbelievably, he appears to be calling for the execution of people who went on strike last Wednesday! On national television! Actually advocating murder! Unbelievable. This man is a monster, and should be fired. Or, better yet, killed. Yes, killed. In front of *his* family. That would show him. And them. And everyone who ever dares to...

Oh, hang on.

Turns out, if you do even the slightest bit of research into this whatsoever, that there's more to what he said. Turns out he didn't just rock up to the One Show, plonk himself down on a sofa and shout "Kill the strikers!" before bouncing up again and driving away in a reasonably priced car. Turns out it was part of a longer peice, where Clarkson both praised the strike and then, claiming that the BBC had to give balanced views, gave an exaggerated, jokey counterpoint.

Now, it's obvious from looking at what he said that he probably isn't a big fan of the strikers. The pro-strike jokes were about him being able to drive his car fast down empty streets, whereas the anti-strike joke was rather more enthusiastic. But they were still jokes, and they don't actually amount to anything. And, most importantly, he's allowed to have an opinion, and he's allowed to make a joke.

The huge amount of panic and anger in the face of Clarkson's joke makes me ashamed to be British / human / a biped. Unions are calling for his sacking, otherwise intelligent people are demonsing him... everywhere you look someone is pointing at that 15 second clip and going "OHMYGODTHATMANISA M O N S T E R!" But look, intelligent people, look...

1. You've just watched a 15 second clip. Out of context. And you are basing your opinion on that. Or, worse, you have watched it all and chosen to focus on that 15 seconds to make your point. And your point is "I don't like Clarkson." Which is a fair enough point on its own - he does seem to be a variety of stupid things - but it's not a political point, and there are better ways of making it.

2. Your anger at him is distracting you, me, and everyone from the place our real anger should be focused: the government. This strike was about a set of terrible decisions and ideologies that have been put in place by a bunch of millionaires. Millionaires who think that everyone will be fine as long as they are rich, and since everyone they know is rich, everyone will be fine. They are using a financial crisis to push through ruinous policies that will widen the gap between the super-rich and the poor to unbelievable proportions. They deserve our anger, and our condemnation, and we should not be wasting our time with Clarkson.

3. The people I have met at protests have been good humoured, intelligent and warmly compassionate. This kind of cold, snarky bleating misrepresents them completely. Stop it.

So there. I've defended Clarkson. Sort of. Sorry. I defended Bernard Manning for a bit, once. I'm sure I'll get over it.