Gary Lineker has thankfully been put in the clear after he was said to have ‘racially abused’ Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger during an episode of Match of the Day (MOTD).
Just before he signed off Lineker waved his arms around in the air before saying ’Au revoir’ in a mock French accent.
Following the broadcast Lineker was criticised on twitter, but today Ofcom announced no action will be taken.
As an Arsenal fan and having witnessed the incident first hand I can’t see what the problem is, I found it quite funny and to call it racial abuse (as some have) is grossly misguided.
For those who found the incident offensive, what was so bad about it that you felt Ofcom needed to intervene?
What were those who wrote to Ofcom saying?
How dare he exaggerate the traits of someone’s personality for comic effect, who does he think he is.
If they had such a problem with that then I can only imagine what they must think of Rory Bremner, Alistair McGowan, Ronni Ancona, Jon Culshaw, Debra Stephenson etc
The only person who had the right to be offended by this was Arsene Wenger and he hasn’t complained about it.
Unfortunately incidents like this seem to springing up more and more, where people feel compelled to become offended on someone else’s behalf.
Often if complaints are received about a TV or radio programme, it usually accounts for less than 1% of the total audience.
Why should those people in the 1% take precedent over the 99% who didn’t complain?
It needs to stop, broadcasting companies and regulators should think before panicking about complaints and making knee-jerk decisions based on a handful of opinions.
I think we should congratulate Ofcom and celebrate this decision as a victory for common sense.
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