Effin the ref

So, whilst I maintain my position that the discussion this weekend about the word "Paki" is far more interesting than this business about footballers' swearing, the British media either doesn't agree or had somewhere other to be on a Saturday night than on their sofas in front of the telly. Their loss...

So, a quick update on some of the media miles devoted to footballers' language. First link below is to an interesting piece in The Times, written by an ex-footballer, in which he argues quite cogently that this is an issue of what society wants technology to do, not what footballers should be held accountable for. This is all good stuff if, like my AS class, you're exploring the relationship between language and technology.

In the public spirited Sun, however, a campaign is under way to scrub out footballers' mouths with a bar of carbolic soap - and you too can take part. So get ringing the Sun's swearbox hotline to shop a player for swearing! And check out the Sun's soccer swearbox... Matches will be monitored, with a lip reader paid to judge any borderline cases, and then The good old Sun, those valiant upholders of the nation's moral scruples, will turn up at the ground ready to charge players and managers a fiver for every offending word. It's a curious world...

And as a slight aside, you just gotta love The Sun website, eh?! You find the article you want to read; you get the first two paragraphs; and then you get the message "For full story and pictures buy the Sun newspaper". I'm just surprised the phrase "you tight-wad" isn't on the end of that imperative!

Check 'em out...

Watershed approaches for the badly behaved

Stop effin the ref