I don’t want to say that the controversy over the vuvuzela at South African football games can be reduced merely to race. But the calls for the banning of the ubiquitous horns from next year’s World Cup shows a remarkable sense of cultural blinders. The latest demand that South Africans yield their own sporting quirk comes from the Japanese, but they are only the latest in a line that will continue through next year’s tournament.
Look, it seems quite clear that we are willing to put up with English fans (and others) singing songs from the terraces which, if you are not a fan of the team is probably pretty annoying. The Wave, the Tomahawk Chop, marching bands, cheerleaders, chants, cowbells, thunderstix, booking bass drums, whistles — these things are all annoying to the outsider and, perhaps most to the point, to the visiting fan. College football in the US alone produces as many annoying traditions as there are teams (“Rocky Top” played incessantly in Nehlan Stadium, anyone?) but no one calls for banning these traditions.
The vuvuzela is a longstanding tradition in South African football circles. The world needs to deal with it. But hopefully all of the non-African teams and their fans are annoyed as hell by them. After all, if this is going to be Africa’s World Cup, let’s hope all of the teams benefit from the intolerance of the many.
