{"id":32987,"date":"2011-02-02T19:24:14","date_gmt":"2011-02-03T00:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=32987"},"modified":"2013-11-14T06:18:17","modified_gmt":"2013-11-14T11:18:17","slug":"stunningly-unapologetic-racism-on-the-bbc-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2011\/02\/02\/stunningly-unapologetic-racism-on-the-bbc-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Stunningly Unapologetic Racism on the BBC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/files\/2011\/02\/Capture2.jpg\" data-rel=\"lightbox-image-0\" data-rl_title=\"\" data-rl_caption=\"\" title=\"\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-32957  aligncenter\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/files\/2011\/02\/Capture2.jpg\" width=\"481\" height=\"100\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>On January 30th a video was uploaded to youtube featuring among the most blatantly racist banter I have ever heard on or off screen. \u00a0 The conversation occurred among the hosts of a BBC program called <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/topgear\/\" target=\"_blank\">Top Gear<\/a>: Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May. \u00a0They discuss a new sports car made in Mexico and the racist &#8220;hilarity&#8221; ensues. \u00a0It is pretty damn horrible&#8230; and it goes on and on&#8230; so, trigger warning.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/SW0x_M_xrm0\" height=\"390\" width=\"480\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s a full transcript after the jump, but here are some high points:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>They say the car is like the Mexican people: &#8220;lazy, feckless, flatulent, [indecipherable] leaning against a fence asleep&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>They call Mexican food &#8220;sick with cheese on it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Hammond says, &#8220;Just imagine waking up and remembering that you&#8217;re Mexican.&#8221; Everyone laughs. Clarkson replies, &#8220;It&#8217;d be brilliant because you could just go back to sleep again.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Hammond is the ring leader in this example, but Clarkson appears to make a habit of racist commentary. Here&#8217;s just a sampling from Wikipedia:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>In October 1998 Hyundai complained to the BBC about what they described as &#8220;bigoted and racist&#8221; comments he made at the Birmingham Motor Show, where he was reported as saying that the people working on the Hyundai stand had &#8220;eaten a dog&#8221; and that the designer of the Hyundai XG had probably eaten a spaniel for his lunch&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>In April 2007 he was criticised in the Malaysian parliament for having described one of their cars, the Perodua Kelisa, as the worst in the world, built &#8220;in jungles by people who wear leaves for shoes&#8221;&#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>This clip reminds us that there are still people out there who will make race-based attacks and plenty of people, note the audience, who will laugh. \u00a0Many white people truly do oppose racism and they want people of color to trust them; they want the benefit of the doubt. \u00a0But\u00a0occasional\u00a0exposure to people like this, even if just on television, and the ongoing daily experience of prejudice, some mild, some severe, plus the hundreds of things that happen every week that may have been racism or may have been somebody having a bad day, add up. \u00a0This makes it very scary to trust white people. \u00a0Every &#8220;benefit of the doubt&#8221; has the potential to backfire.<\/p>\n<p>Given the daily experience of race that most people of color must endure, blind trust is too much to ask for.<\/p>\n<p>(Transcript after the jump, borrowed from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.racialicious.com\/2011\/02\/02\/top-gear-goes-from-zero-to-racist-in-under-two-minutes\/\" target=\"_blank\">Racialicious<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>James May:<\/strong> Have you ever wanted a Mexican sports car?<br \/>\n<strong>Jeremy Clarkson:<\/strong> Yes, I have!<br \/>\n<strong>JM:<\/strong> It\u2019s good news, because there is one, and here it is [points to display] and it\u2019s called the Tortilla.<br \/>\n<strong>JC:<\/strong> It is not \u2013 it is not called the Tortilla! What is it?<br \/>\n<strong>JM:<\/strong> I can\u2019t remember, it\u2019s something a bit \u2026<br \/>\n<strong>JC:<\/strong> So you just made up the name, then, there you go.<br \/>\n<strong>JM:<\/strong> I\u2019d forgotten, sorry<br \/>\n<strong>Richard Hammond:<\/strong> Why would you want a Mexican car? \u2018Cause cars reflect national characteristics. So German cars are sort of very\u00a0<em>[unintelligible]<\/em> and Italian cars, a bit flamboyant and quick. Mexican cars just gonna be lazy, feckless, flatulent, overweight, leaning against a fence asleep looking at a cactus with a blanket with a hole in the middle on as a coat.<br \/>\n<strong>JM:<\/strong> It is interesting because, they can\u2019t do food, the Mexicans, can they? \u2018Cause it\u2019s all like sick with cheese on it.<br \/>\n<strong>RH:<\/strong> Refried sick!<br \/>\n<strong>JM:<\/strong> Yeah, refried sick.<br \/>\n<strong>JC:<\/strong> How much is this Mexican sports car?<br \/>\n<strong>JH:<\/strong> The refried Mexican sports car is 33 thousand pounds.<br \/>\n<strong>JC:<\/strong> That isn\u2019t enough. It isn\u2019t enough because somebody\u2019s paid for that to be developed and it\u2019s gotta be shipped. That\u2019s 800 quid to the car right there.<br \/>\n<strong>JM:<\/strong> You say that, though, but they do say in their blurb it\u2019s got rack-and-pinion steering.<br \/>\n<strong>RH:<\/strong> Wow, it\u2019s got steering!<br \/>\n<strong>RH:<\/strong> I\u2019m sorry, but just imagine waking up and remembering you\u2019re Mexican.<br \/>\n<strong>JC:<\/strong> It\u2019d be brilliant! It\u2019d be brilliant \u2019cause you could just go straight back to sleep again.<br \/>\n<strong>RH:<\/strong> \u2018That\u2019s all I\u2019m gonna do all day.\u2019<br \/>\n<strong>JC:<\/strong> That\u2019s why we\u2019re not gonna get any complaints about this \u2013 \u2019cause the Mexican embassy, the ambassador\u2019s gonna be sitting there with a remote control like this. [Clarkson slumps in his seat and starts &#8220;snoring.&#8221;] They won\u2019t complain. It\u2019s fine!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<span class=\"ft_signature\"><em><a href=\"http:\/\/lisa-wade.com\/\">Lisa Wade, PhD<\/a> is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/American-Hookup-New-Culture-Campus\/dp\/039328509X?ie=UTF8&amp;*Version*=1&amp;*entries*=0\">American Hookup<\/a><em>, a book about college sexual culture; a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Gender-Interactions-Institutions-Lisa-Wade\/dp\/0393931072?ie=UTF8&amp;*Version*=1&amp;*entries*=0\">textbook about gender<\/a>; and a forthcoming introductory text: <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/lisa-wade.com\/intro\/\">Terrible Magnificent Sociology<\/a><em>.\u00a0You can follow her on <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/lisawade\">Twitter<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/lisawadephd\/\">Instagram<\/a>.<\/em><\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On January 30th a video was uploaded to youtube featuring among the most blatantly racist banter I have ever heard on or off screen. \u00a0 The conversation occurred among the hosts of a BBC program called Top Gear: Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May. \u00a0They discuss a new sports car made in Mexico and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1824,283,221,285,1754,1757],"class_list":["post-32987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-nation-mexico","tag-prejudicediscrimination","tag-cars","tag-raceethnicity","tag-raceethnicity-latinos","tag-raceethnicity-whiteseuropeans"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32987"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59145,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32987\/revisions\/59145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}