It arguably is racist. Hmmmm. And this is where the real problem lies in my opinion. To relabel banter as racism is a terrible thing. What next? Football fans being banned for ribbing the rival fans? Being unable to talk in a southern accent lest a northerner finds it offensive? Prison sentences for farting because women find it offensive? I'm all for individuals being protected from abuse, vitriol, assault, persecution etc, but once we start preventing free speech then I'm afraid we are in a very dark place.
I don't disagree with you. Though obviously your point gets dangerously close to being a "slippery slope" fallacy. I'm comfortable with "Pom bashing" as banter. But it's clear, to me, that the line to draw is not far more than that, with a grey area covering that sort of "banter" so that people are conscious of when it's appropriate. But you've definitely got to live a little and enjoy it!
Well, you actually seem to be in agreement. Your saying you don't know whether he meant it to be heard by black people. I'm saying I don't think he did. In that instance I don't classify him as deliberately trying to offend black people.
Put it this way, if no black person heard about it, then no offense to them would have been caused. If Clarkson knew they would, I don't believe he would deliberately say it to cause them offence.
No, I'm not. I know he didn't mean it to be heard by black people. I'm saying I'm pretty certain he knew it might be heard by black people. Let me out it simply for you - if intentionally offending black people were a crime, then Clarkson would be almost certainly guilty of it. Albeit recklessly (which isn't as bad as oblique intention or direct intention). He is almost certainly guilty because he almost certainly knew that black people might hear him say it and he also knew black people were likely to be offended by it. That's as simple as it gets. So your assertion that he did not intend to offend black people just does not stand up to proper scrutiny. He did, because he was reckless.
On that particular matter, I think his sole intention was to play to his audience, his audience being predominantly white men. And many of those people will have found what he did amusing. It's supply and demand. Whether any of us as individuals like or don't like what he did is an entirely personal opinion. Whether using potentially offensive language in a passive way constitutes racism, I very much doubt, but happy to be corrected by the lawyers.
Reckless is not deliberate. Deliberate is the important point here. You don't know he almost certainly knew black people might hear. He may have been saying this stuff for years with nobody posting it on youtube.
I'm sorry, it is. Reckless intention is the phrase used, but it's the same thing. It's a level of deliberateness. You can be directly deliberate, obliquely deliberate, or reckless deliberate. That's the point I've repeated several times. The mens rea. I appreciate it's tedious legal terminology that doesn't suit you, but it is as I've said it - look at the case about the boy pushed in the river posted by SN earlier. I've already accepted I don't know that he knew black people might hear. However, I think we can be almost certain because: (a) he was videoed; and (b) listen to the video and how he says it - it's pretty clear he's conscious that it might not be wise to say it on camera! Honestly Carrabuh, you're just going to have to accept you're wrong on this one because we have now gone right back to the beginning.
Let me know if I'm allowed to be offended too. My family are mainly white Caucasian but I do have a Bob Marley album.
