Just a day after being sacked by the BBC, Jeremy Clarkson was spotted riding his bike near his home. A mob of reporters stopped him to ask if he was worried about going to jail. Clarkson instead said people should leave Oisin Tymon, the producer he assaulted, alone. And he's right.
Clarkson may have been incredibly immature when he verbally and physically assaulted his producer over the lack of a good meal after a day of filming, but his reaction to it has been far more mature.
He reported the incident himself to the BBC and attempted to apologize to Tymon multiple times. Of course, none of that was ever going to change that hitting a subordinate is a terrible, awful thing that you should never do, but it was at least an attempt to make amends.
Now, people have come out on Twitter and probably every other social media outlet to proclaim that Tymon should have done his job better and Clarkson didn't deserve this sort of punishment for being a jackass.
Thankfully, Clarkson realizes that those people are totally wrong. The blame lies solely with him, not Tymon. Tymon didn't even report the incident to the BBC, Clarkson took his fate into his own hands.
So, if you think the BBC should have disciplined the man that got struck, well, you're just wrong. Clarkson's actions are what caused this, not the lack of a nice warm meal.
Hat Tip to Road & Track
Contact the author at travis@jalopnik.com.