VOTE!!! for or against the Vuvuzela!

[Tony]

Do you Love it or hate it?

[Murphmaester]

[QUOTE]Whining at the cup
by Andrew Bolt

DO not adjust your TV set. That mad buzzing is the sound of morons and con men ruining the World Cup.

Is there a more brainless noise than that mad monotone of soccer fans blaring thousands of plastic trumpets?

No rhythm, no tune, no dynamics - just one sustained B flat from those damned vuvuzelas that blots out all that’s musical or even human.

There have been complaints, of course. Almost every broadcaster has had furious viewers protesting that the Cup sounds like it’s staged in a beehive.

French captain Patrice Evra says the players can’t hear each other, while Portugal star Cristiano Ronaldo says he can’t concentrate.

But worse is that the sheer volume of hordes of fools blowing their lungs into these metre-long, 127-decibel trumpets blots out every other audible sign of culture in the crowd.

Every match has the same soundtrack. Close your eyes, and you cannot tell from the crowd which teams are playing.

The vuvuzelas drown out any singing from the English, any samba from the Brazilians, any chanting from the Dutch. You hear only the industrial whine of plastic Globo-trash.

And here’s the final insult.

Broadcasters, players and coaches knew from last years’s Confederations Cup, also held in South Africa, that these vuvuzelas were trouble, and asked FIFA, the world soccer body, to ban them. But FIFA boss Sepp Blatter refused on (get this) cultural grounds.

“We should not try to Europeanise an African World Cup,” he said. The vuvuzela was the sound of South Africa.

Actually, this is two insults in one.

First, FIFA insults South Africans. Mondli Makhanya, former editor in chief of the Sunday Times, says song, not a plastic trumpet’s long whine of waaaaaah, has long been the “trademark of South African football”.

Indeed, choral singing is one of the country’s cultural glories. Think Ladysmith Black Mambazo.

South Africa’s World Cup organising chief, Danny Jordaan, also wishes he could hear the crowds sing instead.

“It has always been a great generator of a wonderful atmosphere in the stadiums ... In the days of the struggle (against apartheid) we were singing - we did not blow anything, we were marching and singing.”

And the second insult? Blatter and the rest of us have been conned.

I know, vuvuzelas have been made almost immune from criticism from the West by being sold as a tribal artefact.

What smart marketing by Neil van Schalkwyk, whose Masincedane Sport has mass produced the plastic version from 2001. As the International Marketing Council of South Africa now sells it: “The ancestor of the vuvuzela is said to be the kudu horn ... blown to summon African villages to meetings.”

And only a racist would want such a traditional instrument banned - even the $2 knock-off made in China.

Yet these pests reached plague proportions just a decade ago, and are as South African as the plastic they’re made of. Trumpets like them have long been played at grounds in Mexico, and boogieblast.co.za, a Johannesburg manufacturer, doesn’t even pretend any link to kudu horns or Zulus.

“The first prototype was from America,” it concedes. “We have researched the history of the vuvuzela, and follows (sic) a trail back to a woman’s Chinese basketball team.”

So, no, that endless blare you hear is not the sound of some authentic culture. It’s instead the destruction of it, and please, shut it up. [/QUOTE]

..

[59progolfer]

Do you Love it or hate it?

Gary Coleman fakes death to attend World Cup

[Tony]

Why so many people hate vuvuzela?

[nickkaka]

Why so many people hate vuvuzela?

Because its f'n annoying

[TeeOhDoubleDee]

Gary Coleman fakes death to attend World Cup

Gold!!

(Who can blame see his missus)?

[renzo]

Whining at the cup
by Andrew Bolt / stopped reading here!

[Murphmaester]

Whining at the cup
by Andrew Bolt / stopped reading here!

Yeah, You probably are not alone. Most Bolt haters are on the very left side of the fence and therefore just a headline is enough to re-inforce their rose tinted opinion of the world. Facts? Who needs them?

[thret]

I like Bolt, even if I think he's an idiot when he has strong opinions on things he doesn't understand. My mother believes he is the Messiah and everything he says is the truth. But he makes for decent debate sometimes, and as this is the whole point of an opinion piece I think he serves his purpose rather well.

In this case I agree with him.

[renzo]

Yeah, You probably are not alone. Most Bolt haters are on the very left side of the fence and therefore just a headline is enough to re-inforce their rose tinted opinion of the world. Facts? Who needs them?

Fact: The guy doesn't even believe half of the dribble he writes. I have had the "pleasure" of sitting at the same dinner table as Andrew. He basically admitted to stirring the sensationalist pot as often as possible to sell papers. Left or right if you don't have the convictions to stand by your words you are a doosh!

Herald Sun readers lol