Have you heard all the buzz (pardon the pun) about the vuvuzelas at the World Cup in South Africa?  It's quite the controversial issue in the news these days.  A lot of the fans at the World Cup matches have these long plastic horns / noise-makers, and they use them pretty much throughout the entire game -- and a lot of international viewers (and players) don't like them at all.  They say they're loud and annoying.  They interfere with the game, distracting the players, and they bother people viewing the games at home because there's this constant base-level buzz throughout the broadcast.

Personally, I also find the vuvuzelas pretty annoying.  I pretty much avoid the problem by turning down the volume on the television when watching World Cup matches.  But actually, I was glad when I heard this week that FIFA, the sport's organizing body, decided to reject pleas to ban the vuvuzelas from the crowds (like they ever could have succeeded in doing that anyway!).  Seriously, it's just a part of South African sports culture!  And it's relatively easy to deal with the "problem," on an individual level.  I think it would be unspeakably mean for the rich Europeans and Americans to take away the vuvuzelas of the poor South Africans because they don't like the way that it sounds on their high-definition surround-sound home entertainment systems.  And besides, it gives us something to laugh about and to remember about this year's World Cup.

I've stumbled across a couple of especially funny commentaries about the vuvuzelas in the blogosphere that I thought might be fun to share here in this space as well.  First is this "Vuvuzela Instruction Manual," which came to me from Hilko Blok:

And second, Abraham Piper recently reminded us that as annoying as the vuvuzelas might be, they're not anywhere near to being the most annoying noise on earth.  That distinction, of course, is outlined perfectly in this classic film clip:

So yes, I say "Long live the vuvuzela -- even if it means having to turn down my television set's volume while I'm watching the games!"