Jeremy Clarkson, the former host of the super popular show “Top Gear,” is blasting climate activist Greta Thunberg for killing the car show.
“Everyone I know under 25 isn’t the slightest bit interested in cars — Greta Thunberg has killed the car show,” Clarkson told The Sun. “They’re taught at school, before they say ‘Mummy and Daddy,’ that cars are evil, and it’s in their heads.”
Longterm sidekick Richard Hammond, 49, agreed, saying: “I hate to say it, but I think Jeremy is right.”
“Young people don’t care about cars. How many kids now are growing up with posters of cars on their bedroom wall?” Hammond said.
Clarkson, Hammond, and co-host James May starred on the long-running BBC show “Top Gear,” which featured the three getting into hilarious situations and talking about cars. The popular Clarkson was fired in 2015 after BBC executives concluded that he had verbally attacked a member of the car show’s production staff.
The three now host a popular Amazon Prime show called “Grand Tour,” which maintains the spirit of “Top Gear.”
The 59-year-old Clarkson has a history of saying controversial things, the Washington Post reported.
• In 2008, while driving a truck on “Top Gear,” Clarkson made a joke implying that “murder[ing] a prostitute” is a common pastime for professional truck drivers. The joke prompted at least one elected official to call for his firing.
• In 2009, Clarkson apologized after calling then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown a “one-eyed Scottish idiot.” Brown is blind in his left eye.
• In 2011, the BBC received more than 20,000 complaints from viewers after Clarkson responded to a question on “The One Show” by making a joke about “executing” striking workers in front of their families.
In a piece penned by Clarkson this month, he did it again.
“Thanks to that Swedish Thunberg girl, every child in the western world is now absolutely terrified that by this time next year, they will have died in a suffocating firestorm. So, this morning, let’s have a little story to cheer them all up again,” he wrote.
In the piece, headlined “Everyone says climate change is terrible… but what if it’s GOOD for mankind?” Clarkson writes: “That’s the thing about climate change. We keep being told the next shift will be a disaster for mankind. But who knows? You might wake up one morning to find your garden full of unicorns and mermaids and big chests full of jewels and money.”
On the other hand, Clarkson also said climate change is real. In a post on Instagram, he wrote: “For the first time ever, we’ve had global warming rammed down our throats — and we’ve not been idiotic, it’s very definitely a thing. You can change your mind. Only an idiot doesn’t change their mind when faced with irrefutable evidence. The question is, what to do about it? That’s a more interesting debate than what is happening.”
But he also jabbed Greta again, saying, “She’s an idiot. Going round saying we’re all going to die, that’s not going to solve anything, my dear.”
And in October, Clarkson blasted Great’s speech at the United Nations Climate Action Summit as a “full-on adolescent meltdown.”
“Shut up and be a good girl,” he said then.