Not Dick of the Year – Jeremy Clarkson
This is not a nomination for our Dick of the Year award by Roddy Shippin. If you want to nominate someone (or un-nominate them) email 2-300 words to editors (at) brightgreenscotland (dot) org.
Many worthy candidates have already been put forward for this most prestigious of phallic-themed humiliations, but rather than nominate another I would like to recommend a name for dis-inclusion: Jeremy Clarkson.
Now, before I’m drowned in a sea of online rage, I want to make it clear that this is no plea for mercy. I’m aware of the racism, the misogyny, the general stream of outrageous, politically incorrect opinions which he has for money; these charming little foibles have, if anything, intensified over the past year. To sum up: Jeremy Clarkson is, in the immortal words of Elvis McGonagall, an arse. Therefore, aside from disqualification on strict anatomical grounds, he would seem like an ideal candidate, a frontrunner, the ’08 Obama of the ’11 Dick race…
But think about it: bestowing on Clarkson the title of “Dick of the year 2011” is exactly what They want you to do! Stewart Lee’s afore-linked skewering touches on an important point – Our Jez is, in essence, a pantomime villain. He performs a function similar to the American “Shock Jocks” (Limbaugh, Beck, Stern etc etc) – dispensers of poison, to a man, but not its manufacturers. Clarkson may, for example, make hilarious reference to the shooting of Public Sector strikers, but he’s not responsible for the vicious programme of cuts that prompted the strikes in the first place.
I don’t mean that Mr. C should be taken lightly – he may be a bogeyman, but still needs to be picked, rolled & flicked (though hopefully not licked…) at the first opportunity; I merely want to pay due respect to the gravity of this award. Clarkson, like an artist setting up his easel opposite your burning flat, is there to draw your fire. It’s the real arsonists that we should be focusing on.
He is not one of the manufacturers of the poison indeed – but figures such as him play a significant role in making a particularly damaging mindset look acceptable amongst large parts of the population.
He is A dick of the year, but not because of that “shoot them in front of their families” ridiculousness, which was just his unfunny attempt at making joke about BBC bias.
Out of context, at best it’s pantomime villainy, and at worst it’s incitement to murder, but in context, it was his rebuttal to his own previous statement, that the strikers made the streets clearer (or something…).
My point is he’s not a dick because of politics. It’s mostly just about how badly he carries denim.