Jeremy Clarkson accused of 'racism' during Top Gear series finale in Thailand

[tingtongfarang]

I've experienced racism as a white westerner in Asia. In the supermarket Bangkok a till woman shouted FARANG! at me, followed by a stream of Thai, because I was queueing a few inches from what she deemed to be the correct queueing point. It wasn't very nice. Ipso facto, it's probably more not nice when ethnic minorities in the West are, oh I don't know, discriminated against in the classroom by their teacher, physically detained by the police when they haven't committed a crime, apprehended on suspicion of shoplifting when they've legitimately paid for their items, or beaten to death in police custody.

But do you know what has been by FAR the most common experience I've had as a Westerner in Asia? Adorable kids running up to me on the street so they can say hello to me. But then I don't have decades of bile and ignorance etched into my flabby sunburned face.

Better to be called Farang than her turning round and saying "Hey Knobhead, you're in the wrong queue"

All the kids in the village where I live call me farang, it's not derogatory at all, the lads in work call me a "Porridge <deleted>" .. water off a ducks Back too, as it's done in humour.

Clarkson is an a-hole, but he's a funny a-hole, and the fact he hates Peirs Morgan with a passion makes him alright in my book.

Pepper Me.. I was down in the Falkands during the "Stills and Bennies" , that made me chuckle when you reminded me of that time.

When the lady in the shop calls me a farang i call her a banana ..i feel ok with it.

[pbeieio]

The term "slope" is not a term used in England.

I first heard it used in Australia and even then I had to ask a local what the hell they were on about.

[Jeremy50]

Out and about in Udon, I pick up about 10 racial slurs on a daily basis. Farang! Paksida! Gluee! Heean! usually preceded by adjectives: old, ugly, crazy, mad, scary etc, and mostly shouted by youngish Thais from the back of motorbikes [cowardly], the mouths just seem to open , and this s@it just comes out. They are all complete strangers to me of course.Only in Korea did I come across more open and unreserved racism.

So Clarkson says the word 'slope' when referring to a bridge in Thailand which may well have been sloping and everyone starts slagging him off. 'Slope' is hardly known by most people,but I always thought it referred to the sloping foreheads of some Vietnamese people. Surely he would have said 'Look, the bridge has a dink in it!' if he wanted to be racially offensive.

Anyway, I love Top Gear and Clarkson's humor. So keep up the good work.

Edited March 18, 2014 by Jeremy50

[laobali]

"Sticks and stones may break your bones but words can get your arse sued off."

Lucky the weather was warm and there wasn't a nip in the air or goodness only knows what he might have said.....

The way I heard it at least 40 years ago was that the 'nip in the air' must be an overflying Japanese satellite.

[exalll]

What a lot of BS and curried mangoes. Never heard of that experession in my life. 555

Right, but OTHER people have read books and are culturally aware, so... who really cares what you've heard of and haven't heard of?

I see you have just arrived on this forum. Everyone is entitled to comment and have an opinion here and to answer your question I care and I am interested as to what ThaiMouse and others say. Don't have to agree but I am still interested.

My meaning was not that the author didn't have the right to make a point, but that their point was totally redundant. Disputing the veracity of facts because you 'haven't heard of' them should not be acceptable behaviour in any discussion between adults.

Hurling inane and gratuitous insults around as freely as you do is certainly not acceptable behaviour in a discussion among adults.

[SABloke]

These people complaining must be part of the small percentage in England that don't use the word 'Paki' when refering to southern Asians. I guess Paki is a term of endearment, not racistm. Or maybe they suffer from selective indignation.v

Sent from my GT-S7270 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

Calling someone a Paki because they come from Pakistan is no different than calling a person from Australia and Aussie. Paki, Aussie, Thai or Kiwi.

If you come from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, India or Bangladesh you're called a Paki. It's not the same mate.

Sent from my GT-S7270 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[allan michaud]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

Having lived and worked in Asia for 13 years, I now realise I have led a sheltered life.

I have never heard the "slope" expression used before and if some sensationalists hadn't written this drivel, I would still have been happily ignorant of it's meaning.

Me too and I am still completely ignorant of how 'slope' is meant to be remotely racist.

Heading off on a slight tangent here, I would just like to say that having traveled pretty widely (25 countries so far) I find Thailand by far the most racist nation I have ever been to.

[marko kok prong]

Here's a Hollywood trivia question for you. Which 14 yr old actor uttered the words "shut up slope" manning the 44s on the PTB street gang? For a clue look at my avatar.

Sent from my GT-N5100 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

if your talking about apocalyse now,i was sure it was PBR streetgang,as in patrol boat river,i presume,and i thought Lance was on the 44,maybe you are referring to the actor Laurence Fishburne,who was also in the matrix,not 100 % sure but i think he was on an m60 gpmg,when the blasted the boat,he was born in 61,so would have been older than 14,17 or so i think,have i won todays trivia question?

[laobali]

What did you really expect from those conceited dimwits on Top Gear? They are supposed to be entertainers and they think of themselves clever, but really they are just bums.

It's got humour, but not really funny, Just old school kids playing toy games. Mostly fast cars racing round to see who has the fastest, or promotion for expensive models.

Upper class prigs show, Looking for brownie points and ratings. Never appealed to me, although I did watch it hoping someday they would show more down to earth car models, rather than GT types. The show is named Top Gear aimed at the upper class audience.----BBC ought to promote Bottom Gear and give the not so well off people some tips on how to save on maintenance --insurance--economy --buying second hand etc.

Absolute rubbish. The studio audience is typically ordinary middle-class Brits who enjoy driving all sorts of vehicles; many of those promoted or used are not expensive, including the basic hatch used for guest drivers on the track.

[keemapoot]

Here's a Hollywood trivia question for you. Which 14 yr old actor uttered the words "shut up slope" manning the 44s on the PTB street gang? For a clue look at my avatar.

Sent from my GT-N5100 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

if your talking about apocalyse now,i was sure it was PBR streetgang,as in patrol boat river,i presume,and i thought Lance was on the 44,maybe you are referring to the actor Laurence Fishburne,who was also in the matrix,not 100 % sure but i think he was on an m60 gpmg,when the blasted the boat,he was born in 61,so would have been older than 14,17 or so i think,have i won todays trivia question?

Yeah, PBR is right, brain cramp. BUT, regarding Fishburne, and Fisburne is correct, but the reason he was only 14 is the movie was shot years before it actually got produced and hit the theaters. Come to think of it, I think you are also right about Lance being on the 44. If I recall there were several "slope" reference in that film.

[johnh101]

Some people need to get a life.

[fasteddie]

Not being of the Vietnam era, I had to google "slope". Many definitions, one of which claimed it is an acronym for "Silly Little Opium Peddling Easterner".

Slope is mild really, compared to other Clarkson insults.

Not so, it was a derogatory term, "slope heads", used by the yanks in 'nam describing the chaps who kicked their butts!

[Jim walker]

Racism in Thailand I don’t believe it Thais believe in calling a spade a spade or a falang falang I am sure most gooks won’t be watching Top Gear when there are such a fine intellectual stimulating choice of Thai soaps to watch and if they have a TV then I am sure they will also have a remote with an On Off button.

Top Gear used to be a programme all about cars but not anymore it’s all about three blokes trying to spent their BBC budget as quickly as possibly by arseing about in Africa Asia America and having a bit of lads fun and trying to entertain themselves not a TV audience time the BBC dropped this expensive crap and took back a motoring programme to replace it for or us normal people who don’t drive a Zonda or Bugatti for an everyday car in Bangkok

[PepperMe]

I've experienced racism as a white westerner in Asia. In the supermarket Bangkok a till woman shouted FARANG! at me, followed by a stream of Thai, because I was queueing a few inches from what she deemed to be the correct queueing point. It wasn't very nice. Ipso facto, it's probably more not nice when ethnic minorities in the West are, oh I don't know, discriminated against in the classroom by their teacher, physically detained by the police when they haven't committed a crime, apprehended on suspicion of shoplifting when they've legitimately paid for their items, or beaten to death in police custody.

But do you know what has been by FAR the most common experience I've had as a Westerner in Asia? Adorable kids running up to me on the street so they can say hello to me. But then I don't have decades of bile and ignorance etched into my flabby sunburned face.

Better to be called Farang than her turning round and saying "Hey Knobhead, you're in the wrong queue"

All the kids in the village where I live call me farang, it's not derogatory at all, the lads in work call me a "Porridge &lt;deleted&gt;" .. water off a ducks Back too, as it's done in humour.

Clarkson is an a-hole, but he's a funny a-hole, and the fact he hates Peirs Morgan with a passion makes him alright in my book.

Pepper Me.. I was down in the Falkands during the "Stills and Bennies" , that made me chuckle when you reminded me of that time.

Yeah, but WHY isn't it derogatory to you? It's not because it's done it humour, but because YOU'RE in the position of power. White western men are the most privileged and least oppressed people on the planet. There is no reservoir of atrocity and oppression under the surface to which the terms refer. Unlike other racial slurs against peoples who have suffered terrible atrocities, slurs like slope and gook and the n word and all its variants.

And if any of the soldiers you served with (I'm assuming you were serving in the Falklands) had, say, a brother or sister or close relative with some form of learning difficulties (as, and I think this is correct but feel free to check, roughly 20% of people in the UK do or will at some point) then you might not be so quick to chuckle at those terms.

I can take it on the chin when leveled at me, so I feel justified in giving it out also.

When things are clearly meant in humour, then in my book. It is totally fine.

With your reference to 'white men' that could also be seen as a racial slur.

Also your 20% with learning difficulties in the UK is laughable.... But then again, I didn't go through the Scottish education system so I can't really comment. But in England, in our school of 1000 there were about 20 kids in the special class.

So maybe it is something to do with being north of the border where that may represent 20% But in my school it was 2%.

[worgeordie]

Having lived and worked in Asia for 13 years, I now realise I have led a sheltered life.

I have never heard the "slope" expression used before and if some sensationalists hadn't written this drivel, I would still have been happily ignorant of it's meaning.

same, never heard of it and I doubt very much that Clarkson has either, I watched the show and didn't think of anything weird because the bridge they built did have a slope on it and the guy on the bridge looks like one of the crew

Maybe he should have said there is a lean on it.

Then the THIN people would be up in arms, you cannot string a sentence together today without offending

somebody, regards Worgeordie

[simon43]

I guess lotsa people currently in Thailand led a sheltered-life or are too young to remember back to the late '60s or early '70s.

No, it's because we are British. We did not take part in the Vietnam war. We never adopted the word 'slope' as a racist term. Growing up in the 60's and 70's in the UK, I never, ever heard this word, other than referring to something not level or even 'sloped off' ==> walked away.

Now if Mr Clarkson was American, he would certainly not use that word....

The name was changed to Myanmar by the military junta who seized the country. Hence Burma is seen as the correct name by most Burmese, as I understand it. I've only ever met Burmese who refer to the country as Burma.

Stange, because that is not my experience - having worked in Myanmar in 2011 -2013. I found that only the Burmans (main ethnic group) occasionally used the word, because 'Burma' means land of the Burmans. That excludes all the other minority ethnic groups (Shan, Kayin, Kachin etc).

The word 'Myanmar' was seen to be a more inclusive word to refer to all ethnic groups of the country. II was encouraged by all my work colleagues never to use the word 'Burma' or 'Burmese', because it was considered a divisive word.

Anyway, this is going off-topic....

Simon

[ginjag]

What did you really expect from those conceited dimwits on Top Gear? They are supposed to be entertainers and they think of themselves clever, but really they are just bums.

It's got humour, but not really funny, Just old school kids playing toy games. Mostly fast cars racing round to see who has the fastest, or promotion for expensive models.

Upper class prigs show, Looking for brownie points and ratings. Never appealed to me, although I did watch it hoping someday they would show more down to earth car models, rather than GT types. The show is named Top Gear aimed at the upper class audience.----BBC ought to promote Bottom Gear and give the not so well off people some tips on how to save on maintenance --insurance--economy --buying second hand etc.

Absolute rubbish. The studio audience is typically ordinary middle-class Brits who enjoy driving all sorts of vehicles; many of those promoted or used are not expensive, including the basic hatch used for guest drivers on the track.

Absolute rubbish sounds to me like the MIDDLE CLASS remark---- B/S is normally used.

Nothing to do with what you enjoy driving--most of his programs are based on speed laps---Bentley's and the like.

Choose from all his programs how many concentrate on the old car, the man in the street. The term you used "on the track" no wonder there are boy racers, with their GTs flying around thinking they are from the Clarkson lot.

The studio Audience---you speak about. you mean the ones that get freebies to go let their daft out with Big J.

I am talking about the TV viewers, and what THEY would like to see more of than YOUR studio Middle class snobs.

[waighty]

Yes Clarkson once again proving what a complete and utter buffoon he is. Yes I know the word "slope" as a derogatory term for Asians.

[Bluespunk]

Did anyone just happen to look at the walkway from the main span. it does have a slight uphill slope to the walkway. So he was correct in his statement, and it was not racism.

Unless those who think so want it to be, and that would make them a racist. Might be a good idea to get over it drop this bullshit.

It was an attempt to be clever and use a racist term for humour [failed attempt]. OK, not as vicious as those racists who have nothing but hatred in their hearts, but none the less it was a racist comment.

[cornishcarlos]

Geez, people see racism where they want to see it !!

Clearly he was referring to the angle of the structure..

[Fat Haggis]

I've experienced racism as a white westerner in Asia. In the supermarket Bangkok a till woman shouted FARANG! at me, followed by a stream of Thai, because I was queueing a few inches from what she deemed to be the correct queueing point. It wasn't very nice. Ipso facto, it's probably more not nice when ethnic minorities in the West are, oh I don't know, discriminated against in the classroom by their teacher, physically detained by the police when they haven't committed a crime, apprehended on suspicion of shoplifting when they've legitimately paid for their items, or beaten to death in police custody.

But do you know what has been by FAR the most common experience I've had as a Westerner in Asia? Adorable kids running up to me on the street so they can say hello to me. But then I don't have decades of bile and ignorance etched into my flabby sunburned face.

Better to be called Farang than her turning round and saying "Hey Knobhead, you're in the wrong queue"

All the kids in the village where I live call me farang, it's not derogatory at all, the lads in work call me a "Porridge &lt;deleted&gt;" .. water off a ducks Back too, as it's done in humour.

Clarkson is an a-hole, but he's a funny a-hole, and the fact he hates Peirs Morgan with a passion makes him alright in my book.

Pepper Me.. I was down in the Falkands during the "Stills and Bennies" , that made me chuckle when you reminded me of that time.

Yeah, but WHY isn't it derogatory to you? It's not because it's done it humour, but because YOU'RE in the position of power. White western men are the most privileged and least oppressed people on the planet. There is no reservoir of atrocity and oppression under the surface to which the terms refer. Unlike other racial slurs against peoples who have suffered terrible atrocities, slurs like slope and gook and the n word and all its variants.

And if any of the soldiers you served with (I'm assuming you were serving in the Falklands) had, say, a brother or sister or close relative with some form of learning difficulties (as, and I think this is correct but feel free to check, roughly 20% of people in the UK do or will at some point) then you might not be so quick to chuckle at those terms.

It's not derogatory to me due to the tone and the context they have been using it, and it's NOTHING to do with power or position, that's an extremely ignorant way in which to look at it, if you don't like being called a Farang, why on earth did you come to Thailand?

Your own comments about White males reeks of racism, and elitism, I'm no power hungry WASP, I'm very humbled by the way people in the village have endeared themselves to me, you need to look at facial expressions, body language and the context of how they're addressing you, like I said, I don't find being called Farang at home offensive in any way whatsoever.

Plenty of squaddies I served with had siblings with learning difficulties, and some of them ripped the piss out of their own, if you've never been a squaddie, then you'll never understand their humour in a month of Sundays..never!! Squaddies can get away with saying a lot of things to their mates, about wives, mothers, girlfriends, brother sisters that a civvy would get his lamps punched out for.

You might want to go and see a local proctologist and see if he can remove that giant self important bug that you seem to have in your ass !!

Try developing a sense of humour, and if you can't laugh at yourself, then stay indoors and let the local kids rip the piss out of you for being a recluse!!

[zydeco]

You've got to love the irony..JC in a racial row in one of the most racist countries in the world.

Pretty sure that none of the complaints are coming from Thailand, the UK has to have the most PC people on earth. Most of them probably unaware that we are referred to (quite openly) as FARANG.

Keep it up Jezza.

It was only a year and a half or so ago that ESPN in the US fired some sports editor because of what he said about Chinese American basketball player Jeremy Lin. After Lin turned the ball over 10 times, the editor wrote that his turnovers was a "chink in his armor." But then again the US is the same place the term "Black Magic" is considered racist by many. I don't know anything about this guy, but the situation certainly looks ambiguous enough. I don't know how you can even use language if people are going to misinterpret what you say intentionally. Soon, nobody will say anything, other than, "have a nice day."

[Bluespunk]

Some people need to realise that "racism" is a "white" invention...it is tool for suppression that became common place in the l18th and 19th centuries to justify such things as slavery and genocide of indigenous peoples.

trying to sideline it by using sound bites like "PC" and "sensitive" are just not part of a reasoned response.

A common argument amongst racists is to cite incidents of what THEY regard as racism by other "RACES", often as some kind of justification of racist behaviour by themselves.

This actually only seems plausible or logical if you are racist yourself. irt is in reality just an admission of racism by the person promulgating this idea

Racism is not the problem of just one ethnic group. Anyone who discriminates against another person based upon their ethnicity is a racist.

Edited March 18, 2014 by Bluespunk

[rockdoc]

Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority, and promoted by mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a piece of shit by the clean end.

[laobali]

In Southern Africa - where we have some choice racist words that are flung around and listed in some country's legal ordinances and by-laws of racial terms that are officially outlawed and whose use is punishable by a fine - we are used to the word "slope" - but there it refers to a white Afrikaner - or a "boer". This term of endearment comes from the fact that white Anglo-Saxons born and brought up there think the Afrikaner to be a person of reduced intelligence and bit of a genetic throw back to someone like an early caveman - the big bumbly guy with the long hairy arms (knuckles dragging on the floor) and the sloping forehead (hence the connection).

So one mans VC in SE Asia is, I suppose, another mans favourite rugby player in Africa.

I was about to mention this. In the 60s and 70s Rhodesian Army guys referred to their South African (mainly Afrikaner) counterparts as 'slopes' or 'slope-heads'; more derogatory was 'rock spiders'. Terrorists were called 'flops' or 'floppies'. It had two meanings: the hats they wore and the way they flopped to the ground when shot. Admittedly black humour but common at the time.

[zydeco]

I've experienced racism as a white westerner in Asia. In the supermarket Bangkok a till woman shouted FARANG! at me, followed by a stream of Thai, because I was queueing a few inches from what she deemed to be the correct queueing point. It wasn't very nice. Ipso facto, it's probably more not nice when ethnic minorities in the West are, oh I don't know, discriminated against in the classroom by their teacher, physically detained by the police when they haven't committed a crime, apprehended on suspicion of shoplifting when they've legitimately paid for their items, or beaten to death in police custody.

But do you know what has been by FAR the most common experience I've had as a Westerner in Asia? Adorable kids running up to me on the street so they can say hello to me. But then I don't have decades of bile and ignorance etched into my flabby sunburned face.

Better to be called Farang than her turning round and saying "Hey Knobhead, you're in the wrong queue"

All the kids in the village where I live call me farang, it's not derogatory at all, the lads in work call me a "Porridge &lt;deleted&gt;" .. water off a ducks Back too, as it's done in humour.

Clarkson is an a-hole, but he's a funny a-hole, and the fact he hates Peirs Morgan with a passion makes him alright in my book.

Pepper Me.. I was down in the Falkands during the "Stills and Bennies" , that made me chuckle when you reminded me of that time.

Yeah, but WHY isn't it derogatory to you? It's not because it's done it humour, but because YOU'RE in the position of power. White western men are the most privileged and least oppressed people on the planet. There is no reservoir of atrocity and oppression under the surface to which the terms refer. Unlike other racial slurs against peoples who have suffered terrible atrocities, slurs like slope and gook and the n word and all its variants.

And if any of the soldiers you served with (I'm assuming you were serving in the Falklands) had, say, a brother or sister or close relative with some form of learning difficulties (as, and I think this is correct but feel free to check, roughly 20% of people in the UK do or will at some point) then you might not be so quick to chuckle at those terms.

It's not derogatory to me due to the tone and the context they have been using it, and it's NOTHING to do with power or position, that's an extremely ignorant way in which to look at it, if you don't like being called a Farang, why on earth did you come to Thailand?

Your own comments about White males reeks of racism, and elitism, I'm no power hungry WASP, I'm very humbled by the way people in the village have endeared themselves to me, you need to look at facial expressions, body language and the context of how they're addressing you, like I said, I don't find being called Farang at home offensive in any way whatsoever.

Plenty of squaddies I served with had siblings with learning difficulties, and some of them ripped the piss out of their own, if you've never been a squaddie, then you'll never understand their humour in a month of Sundays..never!! Squaddies can get away with saying a lot of things to their mates, about wives, mothers, girlfriends, brother sisters that a civvy would get his lamps punched out for.

You might want to go and see a local proctologist and see if he can remove that giant self important bug that you seem to have in your ass !!

Try developing a sense of humour, and if you can't laugh at yourself, then stay indoors and let the local kids rip the piss out of you for being a recluse!!

There must be snowmen in the Fiji islands. I find myself agreeing with Fat Haggis.

[jpeg]

I guess lotsa people currently in Thailand led a sheltered-life or are too young to remember back to the late '60s or early '70s.

No, it's because we are British. We did not take part in the Vietnam war. We never adopted the word 'slope' as a racist term. Growing up in the 60's and 70's in the UK, I never, ever heard this word, other than referring to something not level or even 'sloped off' ==> walked away.

Now if Mr Clarkson was American, he would certainly not use that word....

The name was changed to Myanmar by the military junta who seized the country. Hence Burma is seen as the correct name by most Burmese, as I understand it. I've only ever met Burmese who refer to the country as Burma.

Stange, because that is not my experience - having worked in Myanmar in 2011 -2013. I found that only the Burmans (main ethnic group) occasionally used the word, because 'Burma' means land of the Burmans. That excludes all the other minority ethnic groups (Shan, Kayin, Kachin etc).

The word 'Myanmar' was seen to be a more inclusive word to refer to all ethnic groups of the country. II was encouraged by all my work colleagues never to use the word 'Burma' or 'Burmese', because it was considered a divisive word.

Anyway, this is going off-topic....

Simon

If memory serves, you didn't seem to have spent much time in Burma, couple of months (?) before you were back slinging up yet another shanty 'resort' up by the Phuket airport.

I, on the other hand, spent time in Burma long before it was being touted as The Next Beautiful SE Asia Country To Wreck, (so that didn't appear to work out for you, amongst others, fortunately for the Burmese).

It was always referred to as BURMA and all my Burmese friends/workers call it BURMA. I've yet to meet a Burman/Burmese call their country Myanmar.

BTW, I'd never heard the slang 'slope' until I hit Thailand so gather it's US originated along with 'gook' and 'geek'.

Edited March 18, 2014 by jpeg

[boisian]

he could have said, "That bridge is slanted, or is that my eyes?

[laobali]

Having lived and worked in Asia for 13 years, I now realise I have led a sheltered life.

I have never heard the "slope" expression used before and if some sensationalists hadn't written this drivel, I would still have been happily ignorant of it's meaning.

I vaguely remember having learned in school that the correct term is &lt;deleted&gt; as in Worthy Oriental Gentleman

"western" I believe

"Westernized" was as I understood it.

[wilcopops]

In summary - Definition of racist - someone who thinks use of the word "slope"in this context isn't racist