Unless you were sleeping under a rock, the obnoxiousness of the Vuvuzela could not be missed throughout the World Cup. The "horns from hell" infuriated players, and partnered with the much maligned Adidas ball "Jabulani" to make the African tourney the lowest scoring World Cup in history. This fallout has sparked countless requests to ban the African inspired/Chinese manufactured menace from all North American sporting events. Sounds reasonable to me.
But if we are going to eliminate objectionable imports from public places, why stop at Vuvuzela? Forget Crocs or Nickelback, I think next in line should be Simon Cowell, the unctuous American idol judge who just so happens to share a thing or two with this, the more annoying of the two Horns of Africa.
I cannot adequately put into words my distaste for this poorly coiffed buffoon. His fellow Englishman Andrew Sullivan does it superbly in his recent Times article "Rude Britannia: the limeys breaking US taboos,"
"Last week saw the final American Idol featuring Simon Cowell as a judge. Cowell is better known in America than, say, the Supreme Court’s chief justice or three-quarters of Barack Obama’s cabinet. At some point in a distant Wildean past, a British musical judge might be expected to be wittier than his peers. Cowell is witless, inexpert, inarticulate and touchy. He just possesses a series of ugly prejudices and crude hunches and the ability to tell someone to their face that they’re rubbish. In Britain, who really cares? In America he’s a legend."
In many ways both Cowell and the Vuvuzela are from Nero's "bread and circuses" school of entertainment. Unsophisticated, crass and unsubtle -- both pander to our inner 8-year-old -- the kind that seeks to annoy and cause a stir just for the hell of it.
On the bright side, it's a good thing Cowell can't be mass produced!
