Top Gear host Jeremy Clarkson was slammed today by TV regulators for making a homophobic remark on the hit BBC2 show.
In a January edition of the weekly motoring magazine, Clarkson, 44, referred to a car as “a bit ginger beer”, which is thought to be rhyming slang for "queer”, a pejorative term for homosexuals.
OFCOM, the regulatory body responsible for British television, launched an inquiry after receiving five complaints from viewers about the remark. It is not known whether the complainants were actually pillow-biters themselves but “it seems pretty likely”, according to our secret TV source.
After the seven-week investigation was concluded, OFCOM ruled that Clarkson had brought television into disrepute and caused great offence to gays everywhere, pathetic and unattractive women who desperately crave the attention of gays, the car (which is resolutely hetero), the car’s family and friends, ginger beer drinkers, ginger-haired people, ginger nut biscuits and communists.
This is not the first time the plain-speaking TV host and journalist has courted controversy with his no-nonsense remarks. In August 1998 he was reprimanded by his BBC paymasters for saying that the French need to “just fuck off” and he offended many animal-rights activists in November 2003 saying they “should all die like rats”.
Clarkson was unrepentant last night at his luxury home in the Isle of Man. He said he would reluctantly apologise for the remark but not in the way the complainants would be expecting:
“I am sorry…..I suppose. Now I wish I hadn’t gone with the ginger beer reference. I think I ought to have said something more oblique. Like saying the car was ‘a tad lemonade’.”
When questioned as to the relevance of ‘lemonade’ Jezza boomed:
In a January edition of the weekly motoring magazine, Clarkson, 44, referred to a car as “a bit ginger beer”, which is thought to be rhyming slang for "queer”, a pejorative term for homosexuals.
OFCOM, the regulatory body responsible for British television, launched an inquiry after receiving five complaints from viewers about the remark. It is not known whether the complainants were actually pillow-biters themselves but “it seems pretty likely”, according to our secret TV source.
After the seven-week investigation was concluded, OFCOM ruled that Clarkson had brought television into disrepute and caused great offence to gays everywhere, pathetic and unattractive women who desperately crave the attention of gays, the car (which is resolutely hetero), the car’s family and friends, ginger beer drinkers, ginger-haired people, ginger nut biscuits and communists.
This is not the first time the plain-speaking TV host and journalist has courted controversy with his no-nonsense remarks. In August 1998 he was reprimanded by his BBC paymasters for saying that the French need to “just fuck off” and he offended many animal-rights activists in November 2003 saying they “should all die like rats”.
Clarkson was unrepentant last night at his luxury home in the Isle of Man. He said he would reluctantly apologise for the remark but not in the way the complainants would be expecting:
“I am sorry…..I suppose. Now I wish I hadn’t gone with the ginger beer reference. I think I ought to have said something more oblique. Like saying the car was ‘a tad lemonade’.”
When questioned as to the relevance of ‘lemonade’ Jezza boomed:
“Come on! The gays love sticking lemons up each other’s arses. And they’ve all got Aids!”