Everybody says the 2010 World Cup is the best of the modern era, and come on, isn’t it?
Apart from the captivating matches themselves, there was a lot of excitement, culture, great
music, the Jabulani, and of course, the vuvuzelas, among other things.
Hate it or love it, those vuvuzelas gave that tournament a lot of character and individuality.
If a match is put on the screen right now and you hear that deafening sound drowning
the stadium, you just know it’s a game from the 2010 World Cup.
But that musical instrument, if we’re allowed to call it that, was not able to cross over
from that World Cup tournament in South Africa to mainstream football all around the world.
Why?
Because it was banned.
If you were ever in a stadium where vuvuzelas were blown, you’d be thankful that they
were banned.
But today, we want to go down memory lane a little and look at the history of the vuvuzela
and why it is banned in the world of sports today.
The vuvuzela, you could say, evolved from the traditional kudu horn which was used to
gather people around in villages in Cape Town and Johannesburg back in the day or call customers
to fish carts.
These horns were either made of aluminum or tin.
But at the turn of the millennium, someone had the brilliant idea to bring those horns
into use in football stadiums.
In 2001, a manufacturing company named Masincedane Sports got a contract to supply football stadiums
with horns, and the vuvuzela as we know it was pretty much born.
However, a very enthusiastic football fan from South Africa, Freddie Maake, came out
and claimed that he invented the instrument.
He narrated that the idea for the vuvuzela came to him when he was gifted a bike with
a horn by his brother on his 15th birthday back in 1970.
He removed the air pump, put his mouth to it, and blew.
It created a really vibrant sound which quickly became the soundtrack of street football games
in his village and its environs.
Fast forward to 1989, and the sound had spread like wildfire all around South Africa.
So, the father of one of Freddie’s friends offered to manufacture some horns in his plastic
factory which would make similar sounds to the tin and aluminum ones.
He did that and the boys went on to sell the horns for 4.50 pounds in front of stadium
gates during local derbies between Orlando Pirates and Kaizer Chiefs.
By the early 90s, this instrument had spread to the whole of South Africa, and was named
the vuvuzela in 1992.
Now, remember that South Africa was banned from international sporting tournaments at
this time because of apartheid.
It was not until the early 1990s when Nelson Mandela was freed that the ban was lifted.
So, by the mid 90s, the vuvuzela had crossed into other sports.
Rugby, a very popular sport in South Africa, now had fans blowing the vuvuzela during official
games.
So, when South Africa was to host the Rugby World Cup in 1995, the vuvuzela was manufactured
and distributed to fans by large corporations.
That tournament announced the vuvuzela to the world.
But of course, no sport in the world could give it as much fame as football would, so
many still didn’t know of it until 2010.
After it gained notoriety at the 2010 World Cup, it was labeled by many the most annoying
instrument in the world, and the reason is pretty obvious, isn’t it?
When pressed against your ear, the vuvuzela is 127 decibels at full volume.
For comparison, it is louder than a referee’s whistle, a drum, and even a chainsaw, all
at full volumes.
The Hear the World Foundation, which was created to raise awareness about hearing loss, warned
that too much exposure to sounds from the vuvuzela could lead to permanent deafness.
So, not only is the vuvuzela annoying, it is also potentially harmful.
That’s why fans were encouraged to use earplugs and earmuffs back at the 2010 World Cup.
Of course, fans heeded, and earplugs, which were called Vuvu-Stops, were sold out in no
time back at the tournament.
But the solution obviously was not earplugs, it was banning the instrument itself.
Back in 2009, former Spain international, Xabi Alonso, called for it to be banned in
stadiums, after first hearing the sounds of the vuvuzelas at the Confederations Cup.
The coach of the Netherlands team at the 2010 World Cup banned it from the training sessions,
and even Cristiano Ronaldo said that it was difficult for players to focus on the pitch
with those sounds blasting from the stands.
The thing is, not only is the vuvuzela really loud, it has no rhythm or melody.
Think of a mosquito singing in your ear but at 127 decibels.
Then think of having 20,000 of those mosquitoes singing in your ear simultaneously at 127
decibels each.
You would want to rip out your eardrums yourself.
Some fans who were watching from their homes said that they had to watch the World Cup
games on mute in order to escape the annoying sounds of the vuvuzelas.
Now, think about those who were live in the stadiums.
But despite all the moanings of players and managers, the vuvuzela was not banned at the
2010 World Cup.
In fact, the craze caught on with several fans from around the world who got themselves
some pieces of the plastic instrument and took it back to their countries.
These fans then tried to infuse the vuvuzela into the leagues in their countries, yes,
even the Premier League, but they were quickly stopped in their tracks.
Before the English top flight even kicked off after the summer in 2010, 8 clubs had
already placed bans on the vuvuzela.
And not just because it is annoying, but also because it is a health risk and could be used
as a weapon.
Spurs were the first Premier League club to announce a ban on the vuvuzelas, and then
other clubs followed suit.
So, thankfully, the instrument never successfully crossed over into English and European football.
An outright ban was placed on the vuvuzela for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.
And other sporting events, too, started to ban the instrument.
The UFC, Wimbledon, Rugby Union, and cricket events all placed bans on the vuvuzela, and
that was how the instrument became less and less popular.
But we sort of saw a little reemergence at the 2018 World Cup in Russia when fans of
Morocco and Iran were reported to have brought vuvuzelas into the stadiums.
Will the vuvuzela also make an appearance at the 2022 World Cup?
The instrument has been included in the list of banned items in Qatar, but who knows?
Some fans could be stubborn enough to smuggle them in.
What do you think?
Also, what do you think about the vuvuzela itself?
Are you of the opinion that it is not that bad or do you never want to see or hear a
vuvuzela again?
Air your opinions in the comments.
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