Complaints after Top Gear Stig shooting

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It's entirely possible to be sure a gun is not loaded. If I pick up a gun, remove the magasine, clear the breech and can visually see no round in the gun, it is not loaded.

However, it's a matter of principle. I agree Clarkson shouldn't have done it. I don't think people will copy Clarkson, but I still don't like it. It's a bad thing to do, and I wouldn't do it myself. What I have shot the most is two barrel shotguns. With a two barrel shot gun, it's so easy to establish wether or not it's loaded a child could do so. I still wouldn't do it.
 
...or that time they violated restricted airport airspace in a carablimpvan. I'm sure their fine was huge.
Absolutely! What if somebody decides to build a caravan airship like the one in the video and collides with an airliner? After all, they saw it on the telly!
 
Absolutely! What if somebody decides to build a caravan airship like the one in the video and collides with an airliner? After all, they saw it on the telly!

I must rescind my apology to you from before. These things are so completely unrelated, the idea that a comparison is possible is beyond ludicrous. This thread has become perverted into being a platform for those who have not been exposed to/have little to no understanding about guns touting their false ideas and/or beliefs about them. With their subtle digs, members are simply chiding me into posting more about why carelessness with firearms, even on television, is stupid and wrong.

The fact of the matter is this: The gun lobbies in the UK and Australia have succeeded in getting firearms banned, giving many limited exposure to guns. The ideology of firearms safety should never take a back seat, for any reason. Top Gear is not an action/adventure program, and as it isn't such it has no need to have its presenters pointing guns at themselves, nor does it need to have graphic depictions of suicide. The gun Clarkson used was not a prop, and did not have its firing pin disabled. The fact that he was at a closed shooting range only worsens the issue, as people watching this may someday have the opportunity to visit a closed shooting range. Finally, people do copy what they see on TV, to the point that I and many others have seen people do entirely stupid things with guns because they "saw it on tv." Clarkson and May have effectively promoted unsafe firearms practices on air.
 
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the Matrix should be banned for promoting unsafe firearms practices, all that dancing about in the air and doing karate while firing guns, someone might try and copy them. someone might get hurt!

think_of_the_children_186.jpg
 
The gun used was a Sig Sauer P226, well worn. It was marked for the shooting range, and it was the same gun that Clarkson later fired.

Edit: Thinking about this, it may have been a number of other P22#. That really doesn't matter though.

Got it paused right now. Looks like an early P229 (non-rail, old style takedown lever.)

It could sorta matter because those guns have no manual safety.
 
Again with the chiding... The Matrix is an action/adventure movie with an R rating, not an 8pm weekly television program. The gun used in the scene was a Sig Sauer that had been marked by the range. Clarkson went on to shoot this same gun. You can actually see this if you watch carefully. Absolutely NO safety instructor should allow a person they are supervising to point a weapon at their head for any reason. One would hope that the instructor turned immediately to reprimand Clarkson, and that the footage from that was left out.
 
Sig P-series use magazines, not clips. ;-)

Most guns use magazines, yet people, including myself, incorrectly say "clip."

Edit: If the gun used has no manual safety, I would have to retract what I said about the model being irrelevant.
 
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I must rescind my apology to you from before. These things are so completely unrelated, the idea that a comparison is possible is beyond ludicrous. This thread has become perverted into being a platform for those who have not been exposed to/have little to no understanding about guns touting their false ideas and/or beliefs about them. With their subtle digs, members are simply chiding me into posting more about why carelessness with firearms, even on television, is stupid and wrong.

The fact of the matter is this: The gun lobbies in the UK and Australia have succeeded in getting firearms banned, giving many limited exposure to guns. The ideology of firearms safety should never take a back seat, for any reason. Top Gear is not an action/adventure program, and as isn't such it has no need to have its presenters pointing guns at themselves, nor does it need to have graphic depictions of suicide. The gun Clarkson used was not a prop, and did not have its firing pin disabled. The fact that he was at a closed shooting range only worsens the issue, as people watching this may someday have the opportunity to visit a closed shooting range. Finally, people do copy what they see on TV, to the point that I and many others have seen people do entirely stupid things with guns because they "saw it on tv." Clarkson and May have effectively promoted unsafe firearms practices on air.


As somebody who have been in the one year in military training like most of the finnish men and as a military police i had fair amount of weapon training from handguns to light bazooka at the time so i get what you are saying about safety here, but imo Top Gear here got such a small influence compared to how movies portray guns everyday and how to use them with all the cool one hand sideway type of stuff (in a military service the gun would be taken away from you the sec you would start doing something like that with just blanks in).

I have to agree with some here that Top Gears promotion of speed is much more serious in a bigger picture than Top Gear crew not handling guns properly in couple of episodes.
 
Just watched the firearms scene again with much use of the pause button.

In the order of the show, they insert the mags before Clarkson points the gun at himself.

Yet there is a shot of Clarkson with his arm outstretched where there is clearly no mag in that P229, after the mag insertion but before the self-pointing. I've got a 1920x1080 screen capture of it right here. (He's also got his finger nowhere near the trigger, which is good.)

So I am going to assume that the mag-insertion was put in the show out of order, and that there was no mag in the gun Clarkson pointed at himself.

Doesn't make it right by any means, but at least he wasn't doing it with a loaded piece that had no manual safety :shudder:
 
^You have the order of events correct, and your last sentence gets exactly what I've been trying to say all along. Pointing a gun at your head is never okay.
 
So I am going to assume that the mag-insertion was put in the show out of order, and that there was no mag in the gun Clarkson pointed at himself.

Doesn't make it right by any means, but at least he wasn't doing it with a loaded piece that had no manual safety :shudder:

Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking too, the scenes were out of order. With whatever safety precautions, shit always happens (Hammond's crash?), so if it would've been loaded, ugh...

I won't dwell on the issue too much, but suffice to say they've managed to do exactly what the show sets out to... push the envelope... And we've been talking about it for 4 pages now. Whatever my take is, I'm impressed that the topic stirred up so many passionate opinions. :thumbup:
 
I must rescind my apology to you from before.
I was trying to inject some humour into this thread. Terribly sorry if I offended you so deeply.

And yes, I was indeed happy that what was being discussed was an actual issue (fooling around with a gun) and not the bogus one (shooting a cardboard man in a costume). However, I still remain to be convinced that Jeremy was fooling around with an actual firearm. Hence I don't see the drama.
 
I wasn't really paying attention to Clarkson's handling of gun, so I can't comment on it. James May looking down the barrel of a shot gun in the Polar special, however was incredible stupid. .

And the reaction of the other guys on the show was priceless. And showed just what they thought of it. Hell, I still flinch when I see it.

Theres also a behind the scenes clip of Jeremy and James where they talk about how to make sure a gun is clear, and Jeremy is giving him hell about looking in the barrel of a gun.

Dont look down the gun!
 
Again with the chiding... The Matrix is an action/adventure movie with an R rating, not an 8pm weekly television program. The gun used in the scene was a Sig Sauer that had been marked by the range. Clarkson went on to shoot this same gun. You can actually see this if you watch carefully. Absolutely NO safety instructor should allow a person they are supervising to point a weapon at their head for any reason. One would hope that the instructor turned immediately to reprimand Clarkson, and that the footage from that was left out.

You are making differences where there are none, when it is boiled down;

The Matrix is a silly movie, not to be taken seriously in any way.
Top Gear is a silly tv show, not to be taken seriously in any way.

You are blurring the line and taking something that is not to be taken seriously, seriously. When you do so you are inventing problems where there are none.
 
You are making differences where there are none, when it is boiled down;

The Matrix is a silly movie, not to be taken seriously in any way.
Top Gear is a silly tv show, not to be taken seriously in any way.

You are blurring the line and taking something that is not to be taken seriously, seriously. When you do so you are inventing problems where there are none.

R rating is the same as 18 rating UK. You're basically saying that Top Gear should be able to do the same things as a movie with an 18 rating while still being aired at 8pm.
 
R rating is the same as 18 rating UK. You're basically saying that Top Gear should be able to do the same things as a movie with an 18 rating while still being aired at 8pm.

Actually, R has no equivalent in the UK.
 
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