A while back Jeremy Clarkson was sacked from Top Gear by the BBC for assaulting a producer. All three decided to move on and were quickly snapped up by amazon. The new hosts for Top Gear did a terrible job and The Grand tour seems to be as good as ever. Should the BBC have fired him or should they have just overlooked the incident in favor of keeping their money makers?
Physical assaults are at that level of transgression they cannot be ignored if made public. Sometimes even talented people are more trouble to have around than they are worth from an institutional perspective. Time for everyone to move on.
The BBC is a government entity, so while it’s always lovely to save/make money for the taxpayers (or license payers) by having a big money-maker like Top Gear to anchor the channel, it is kind of gauche to have a loud-mouthed racist nutter like Clarkson as a public face of your government.
(Except in America where we all (except most of us) voted to have a loud-mouth nutter be THE public face of our government)
Yes, they should have fired him, whether or not the BBC is a government entity. But I enjoyed Top Gear with the three hosts and am sorry it’s gone.
I’ve been watching Amazon’s Grand Tour with Jeremy, James and Richard. While the production value remains very high and the chemistry between the presenter is as good as ever, I find the show format sucks.
The new test track looks terrible and the fat jackass that has replaced Stig is just unwatchable. Finally, the stupid gag where the guest star meets a “tragic” death before getting to the studio gets more annoying with every new episode.
ETA: I don’t think BBC had much of a choice in the matter. Clarkson behaved stchupidly.
Fired him? They should have had him arrested for assault. There’s no excuse for what he did.
It’s also worth considering the context: at the time the BBC was still reeling from the fallout of revelations of another “money maker” whose criminal assaults had been “overlooked” for decades by the BBC (and the government, and the NHS, and…). While Clarkson’s crime pales into insignificance compared to the crimes of that other person, there’s no way in hell the BBC could have just ignored this. Not again.
To keep him would have set a dangerous precedent (“we tolerate violence in the workplace”), and would have encouraged future incidents of physical violence - whether between those two or between other BBC employees.
Two things: 1)the BBC is a public body, definitely not a “government entity” and 2) no one in their right mind has ever seen Clarkson - or any of the other people on the BBC - as “a public face of your government”.
Having said that, the BBC (not the government) probably had no choice but to fire him. He had had various warning before and hitting someone is definitely over the line - very difficult for any employer to ignore. From what I heard afterwards it was probably a relief for both sides. Clarkson and the others (including their producer Andy Wilman who moved with them to Amazon) had not been happy with the way BBC senior management were handling the show for some time. Possibly part of the reason for the bad behavior - he really did not want to be there.
Yes, they should have fired him. He crossed a line, a line that should have been glaringly obvious to anyone.
A place I worked once fired a very talented person who became upset over a business decision and screamed “FUCK YOU!” a few times while walking down the hall away from the decision-maker. In many places that might not have been a fireable offense, but this was a professional office environment, and it was a very public display. Action had to be taken.
Of course they had to fire him, the only regret is they couldn’t fire him out of a cannon.
btw, he didn’t just punch a fellow employee he called him ‘an Irish cunt’, which in the modern world is racist abuse.
So do you think that Amazon shouldn’t have hired him?
Gawd…I got the vapors just reading that…
Jeezus…thank the stars he didn’t say " I find your selection of the solution to the problem sub optimum and am mildly upset about the problem".
I always thought Top Gear was little more than the hooray henry version of Last of the Summer Wine, so real-life nastiness (as opposed to the ho-ho pseudo-teasing “banter” version) wouldn’t fit.
Anyway, one of the essential points about the BBC and the principle of public service broadcasting is that ratings aren’t the only important thing, and that nobody, but nobody, is indispensable. Amazon makes their own decisions based on their own interests.
None of my business.
I don’t think so. How would your other employees feel if you started hiring known violent, unstable people, no matter how talented?
:rolleyes:
I just looked in your general direction unpleasantly…maybe I should be banned…
No, no, no.
A huge misconception. The BBC is a million miles from a government entity. It has no political affiliation at all.
God help any government that tries to interfere.
I enjoyed watching Top Gear, though it’s my wife who was the big fan of the show, and who avidly watches The Grand Tour, now. But, I say that with the caveat that I find Clarkson to be a tool in his in-show persona, and I suspect that he’s very likely just as big a tool in real life.
He has a well-documented history of asshole-ish behavior and crass comments, and had been reprimanded repeatedly by the BBC. Punching a co-worker would have been grounds for immediate dismissal at every company where I’ve ever worked, even without a history of disciplinary issues.
Had the BBC not fired him, it would have been clear that they were giving Clarkson a free pass to continue to be an asshole, simply because he hosted a very popular show.
Just to replace him with Chris Evans - who was subsequently removed due to a history of flashing his genitals at the women around the office.
Of the two, I’d rather work with Clarkson than Evans. I’m far more willing to believe that the producer that Clarkson punched deserved a punching than that any woman that Evans waved his ding-a-ling to, deserved that.
Yes he should have been fired. If it hadn’t been for his celebrity status he would have been prosecuted.