188 complaints about top gear!
honestly.. where has the use of comedy gone:
eremy Clarkson has sparked fresh BBC controversy by joking about murdering prostitutes.
http://news.sky.com/sky-news/content...1/15141545.jpg Clarkson made the joke on BBC's Top Gear programme
The Top Gear presenter, 48, made the quip about lorry drivers killing sex workers on Sunday night's BBC2 show.
As he completed a lorry-driving task, he said: "This is a hard job and I'm not just saying that to win favour with lorry drivers, it's a hard job.
"Change gear, change gear, change gear, check mirror, murder a prostitute, change gear, change gear, murder. That's a lot of effort in a day."
His comments come after serial killer Steve Wright was convicted in February of murdering five prostitutes in Ipswich.
Wright was a former lorry driver, as well as pub landlord and forklift truck driver.
Clarkson's joke, made before the watershed, sparked 188 complaints to the BBC, out of what the corporation said was seven million viewers.
A BBC spokeswoman said: "The vast majority of Top Gear viewers have clear expectations of Jeremy Clarkson's long-established and frequently provocative on-screen persona.
"This particular reference was used to comically exaggerate and make ridiculous an unfair urban myth about the world of lorry driving, and was not intended to cause offence."
Broadcasting watchdog Ofcom said it had also been contacted by viewers angry at the remarks.
The Iceni Project, a charity which had helped some of the murdered prostitutes in Ipswich, criticised Clarkson.
The group's director Brian Tobin said: "I just think it was highly distasteful and insensitive.
"It is around the time of the anniversary of the girls' (Ipswich prostitutes) deaths and it's a very delicate time. I saw it on Top Gear. It made me cringe."
http://news.sky.com/sky-news/content...4/15130479.jpg Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand
The remarks come after a prank carried out by Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand on Brand's Radio 2 show led to the controller of the station, Lesley Douglas, resigning.
Ross has been suspended for three months without pay and Brand also resigned over the incident, in which the pair left a message on Fawlty Towers star Andrew Sachs' answer machine claiming Brand had slept with his grand-daughter.
The new Clarkson controversy comes amid a call from ITV chairman Michael Grade for less bad language in broadcasting.
The former BBC chairman said there was a "pattern" in the prevalence of bad language and use of the "f-word" was "a little unrestrained".
He stopped short of pushing for a ban, but said: "Clearly not enough consideration is given to a very large section of the audience who perhaps don't want to hear that word or such words.
"You therefore have to know why you're using it and give it a little bit of extra consideration. It seems to me rather indiscriminate now."
He was speaking at a meeting of the Broadcasting Press Guild in London, where he also praised the BBC for its handling of the Ross-Brand scandal.
