Readers of a regional daily have taken it to task over an editorial praising the merits of the controversial vuvuzela horn.

The trumpet-like instruments have thus far provided the soundtrack for this year’s World Cup in South Africa, with many armchair fans driven to distraction by their incessant drone.

Amid mounting calls to have them banned, Worcester News editor Kevin Ward penned an editorial championing the horns as an integral part of South African football culture.

His readers, however, disagreed, with 70pc saying they “loathed” the instruments in an online poll compared to just 12pc who said they “loved” them.

Wrote Kevin: “This World Cup has an utterly different atmosphere to previous finals because it is the first to be held in Africa and, yes, partly because of the vuvuzela.

“It is differences like this that we should embrace rather than reject. Too many of us, particularly in Western countries, lead insular lives.

“To call for a ban on a nation displaying a part of its culture to the rest of the world displays an utterly blinkered approach to life.

“Play on, vuvuzelas, play on. And if TV viewers do not like it they can always press the mute button.”

Commenting on the editorial on the paper’s website, reader Maggie Would, said: “We have tried watching the footie with the volume turned down, but have had to turn the sound off completely. Watching football with no sound is just not the same, so we have been hitting the ‘off’ button.”

Another poster calling herself Feline, from Upton-on-Severn, likened it to listening to a golf tournament from St. Andrews “with continuous and incessant bagpipes under the commentary.”

Comments

Roger Jones (18/06/2010 11:36:30)
It’s good when an editorial gets a response, whatever the subject. That’s what it’s all about.
Regarding Maggie’s problem, is it not possible to watch TV with the sound turn off and listen to a radio commentary, Radio 5 Live perhaps? Just a thought, I don’t follow footie.

Ex-Ed (18/06/2010 12:00:42)
How many readers bothered to vote in this fascinating poll?I think we should be told!

Chris Youett (18/06/2010 15:42:57)
Who says that the vuvuzelas are part of the South African culture? Some middle class suit with a guilty conscience about his/her posh upbringing – and is only saying this because it will make him/her look “in” at the next dinner party!
Before we have any more silly remarks, could editors and sports hacks do some traditional checking of facts? Look at major sporting occassions over the past 30 years involving the Springboks & see how few vuvus there are.
These horns are only being sold to make money – and the British media has been conned into giving the manufacturers acres of free publicity.