Friday, July 17, 2009

FIFA fails to follow Austria's lead



Kudos to Austria for taking initiative in what will surely be the biggest head-to-head in next year's World Cup, the battle of vuvuzela v. sanity for all the marbles. It's a shame, however, that FIFA won't take such overwhelmingly brilliant action, ignoring all calls for a ban of the tinny, 10-cent trumpets from the tournament.

I feel bad for my remote control, as it's going to be a long summer for my poor, poor mute button.

FIFA's Director of Communications Hans Klaus told reporters the following earlier today: " "That would mean one would have to take away the cow bells from Swiss fans and ban English fans from singing. We approach this in a relaxed manner. I am convinced the vuvuzelas will be a hit at the World Cup. It will be a World Cup with African sound."To be (gasp) fair to FIFA for a minute, he's absolutely right. As frustrating and irritating as the vuvuzela can be, we have no right to march into South Africa and pluck their proud cultural artifact from their hands in order to have a nice, clean, non-threatening tournament, though the temptation is tough to resist.

Still, FIFA got their analogies wrong. It wouldn't be like banning the English from singing, but banning them from getting rip-roariously drunk in a foreign country and destroying everything in sight.

10 comments:

Raatzie said...

Proud cultural artifact? They're plastic, for God's sake. And they only started using them 4-5 years ago.

And the Swiss and English are reactive to the course of play. The damn vuvuzelas just go all game regardless.

They're annoying enough to boycott the WC over. I'm serious.

Great job, Sepsis.

Jim Hendry said...

I think it was meant somewhat sarcastically

BackBergtt said...

I like them, I think it adds atmosphere.

Though I look forward to it being the excuse for the English going out on penalties again.

Sarah said...

I grew to tolerate the sound, and now I don't even notice them. They drove my family crazy though, and they didn't even watch the games.

Raatzie said...

Like the English need an excuse.

"It was Thursday" is available.

BackBergtt said...

They never could get the hang of Thursdays ...

jjf3 said...

I think I saw this in "Blogging for Dummies":

1) Find a consistent audience that enjoys your content.

2) Threaten them with bodily harm.

3) Profit!

BackBergtt said...

Sounds like a nice Summer evening we've got planned.

Teeknuts said...

Well now I really wish I could be in Baltimore

Love The Smell Of Burning Vuvuzela said...

I like setting vuvuzelas on fire.