Am I on the only one

Don't get me started. Cars are not toys or penis extensions, they are lethal weapons, as well as being useful for getting around.

Ten years working on a head injury unit means I have a complete sense of humour failure when it comes to this sort of nonsense.

Road casualties in this country are very low and, I think, still falling. Idiots are idiots and for a young driver to follow what they see on Top Gear is very unlikely. To begin with the presenters are all, let us say, mature, and to a young man, older men like that playing silly blighters with cars is like Dad Dancing, something you look and laugh at but do not copy. In fact I doubt many young men watch it, however carefully the production company selects their studio audience. Most viewers are older men pretending to live past glories.

When I was 22 I saw my land lady killed in a road accident, my sister died of head injuries following a road accident and my DD has a permanent disability as a result of a road accident. I do not take this subject lightly, but in each case the accident wasn't caused by stupid drivers, speed or drink, but by ordinary drivers failing to note one element in a complicated road/traffic situation.

The fact remains that young men are disproportionately represented in serious road accident statistics.

I don't see how any TV programme is to blame. Accidents happen when people are being careful and when they're being daft.

The fact is young men are disproportionately represented in death statistics of all kinds. Young men are risk-takers and poor judges of risk; always have been, probably always will be. They swim in dangerous waters, jump in lakes with out testing the depth or looking for rocks and participate in all sorts of high adrenalin activities. They go where angels fear to tread.

This does not make this acceptable, certainly not to their parents, who lose a son or others losing family members as a result of their behaviour, but it is unlikely that watching a tv show hosted by three middle aged men whose development was arrested when they reached the age of about 14 will have any effect on their behaviour; either way.

I have never watched more than five minutes of it and it always seems like boys and their toys. I thought it was watched in significant numbers by men and women of all ages who like cars. Several of my golf ladies love it and fast cars and most of the men excepting my own DH who thinks its ludicrous to invest excitement into as someone else has said lethal and fantastically expensive machines.

My four DGSs can't stand Chris Evans so I doubt if they'll bother with the new series. They outgrew the old Top Gear just as boys outgrow comics.

The two eldest passed their tests first time, saved up and bought their own cars and as far as I know are sensible drivers. Watching Top Gear didn't do them any harm

We live in 'boy racer' country.....Lots of open roads and no high hedges to block views. Funnily enough, very few fatal accidents are caused by young men driving too fast. It's usually drivers pulling out at junctions without looking.

Perhaps it is just my dislike then, of grown men doing ridiculous things with vehicles which can kill that makes me think the programme is a dangerous influence on young people some of whom, are not as road-wise as we should like them to be.

So agree, boys and toys sooo boring, cars are just a set of wheels that get you from A to B after all one programme I never watch - life is too short!!!!

My driving instructor (Roger Bone, King's Lynn) told me always to remember I had a lethal weapon in my hands.......

Jeremy Clarkson is a clever man who is not just a petrol head. His writing is clever and witty. As for the others and for the 'Top Gear' format:- it is dangerous, sexist and promotes waste and self indulgence.

Always hated the programme, sexist, boring and with nothing to commend it.

Girls grow into women,boys grow into bigger boys !!! Not always of course.

I think that most men who watch Top Gear would not dream of driving in a reckless manner themselves.The brainless ones who do would most likely do it without the programme.
I have never quite seen the point of watching such over rated ,over paid buffoons.

While I can't help but agree with some of the comments above, nevertheless there is a part of me that does not want to live in a world where every single thing is safe, unadventurous, hygienic, and tedious.
Rightly or wrongly, I just love Top Gear very much and shall continue to watch and enjoy the new one with Chris Evans and (my secret passion) Matt Le Blanc, and also the other one with the marvellous Jeremy, Richard and James on Amazon.
(controversial chaps, but so entertaining!)
In spite of watching Top Gear for many years I am still a safe driver, I think,
having been driving since 1974 with never an accident of any sort.
Much in life is dangerous, but we live with it. Let us not get so safe that we all die of utter boredom.

Well said, monica.

Young men will always feature more highly in road accidents because young men take more risks than other people. That is not going to change. It's in their genetic code because, in evolutionary terms, it is more beneficial than not.

If you don't like the programme, don't watch it. While ever millions of people do watch it around the world, the BBC will carry on making new series. I bet global road accident rates have not gone up because of it.

I don't watch the programme, saw it once, I think, and now only see the trailers which make we cringe. Like henetha I do not want to live in a world which is totally safe and sanitised, we all need a little bit of 'dare' in us, but the motor car is a lethal weapon, as already been said, and programmes promoting safe driving would be far more beneficial.

i don't watch the programme as i've never liked it and certainly won't now that chris evans is fronting it [can't stand him!].
i know young lads in their late teens and twenties are classed as boy racers but i know that after a few years they all calm down and are very careful with their girlfriends, wives and families.
it's the older "boy racers" who annoy me - the maturer guy in his sixties who has been successful in his job and has the money for a low-slung "posh" car - sometimes a convertible. here in the dorset/hampshire area they seem to be multiplying and you can see them smugly passing you doing over the speed limit. is it something about men and toys that women just don't understand? or is it that people simply want to get to their destination as fast as possible however you get there?

My DS was a huge fan of the 'old' Top Gear, but loathes Chris Evans so is not bothering to watch the new series.
DS passed his test first time just three weeks after his 17th birthday, his instructor (a woman) said he's a born driver!
He drove a heap for the first few years and saved every penny he could spare towards buying what he really wanted.
He finally got there in September 2012 and bought himself a brand new very powerful sports car!
He drives very sensibly, is a courteous and law abiding driver and sticks within the speed limits. Occasionally he goes off to 'Race Days' and drives at high speed around a track, safely as they're fully organised events!
Of course, now that he and DDIL have a baby due in August, the car's going to have to go, in favour of a more child friendly model, but he's had his time of his car being his pride and joy!
He's not giving in completely though, he's ordered his new car, and it has a 2.8i V6 engine......how he affords the insurance and fuel is beyond me!
henetha I used to love Matt le Blanc, but after the Cenotaph stunt, I went right off him!

Programmes such as Top Gear, made by a bunch of arrested adolescents, only appeal to :
a. Fellow arrested adolescents... a relatively small number of people when compared with the total, adult driving population.
b. Real adolescents, who probably aren't quite old enough to drive anyway.
On that basis, I don't think they have any significant impact on RTA rates.

The trouble with all youngsters they lack experience and imagination. DD had an accident soon after getting her first car as she did not read the other driver's body language and so they collided when he went across her front. He also was young and tried to do something when he should have waited for her to pass.
Top Gear got sillier that even motor heads got fed up. Don't think new one will be better. Frankly a waste of licence payers money.

Personally I think that blokes who are going to drive like idiots will do it whatever they do or don't see on TV.

PS - I am reminded of some Don't Drink and Drive! leaflets that appeared in my local library around Christmas a few years ago. On the lines of, 'Instead of drinking and driving, why not try one of these delicious non alcoholic cocktails?' Followed by a couple of recipes.

It was obviously well meant by the local council, but I did wonder what planet they were on, if they thought that the sort of person likely to drink and drive was going to change their behaviour because of a leaflet in the library! (Of all places!)
'Ooh, I hadn't thought of that! I'll make myself a nice Tropical Fantasy instead of 4 pints at the pub.'
In their dreams, I should think.

Programmes promoting safe driving may well be beneficial but I doubt if anyone would watch them.