society

Do the Ayatollah

Sometimes you read stories in the press like the whole Austrian incest story that broke last week that make you lose a little more faith in human nature. However, after last night’s London Election results, I have very little faith in people left. The one by-product of a fully global media is that we are unable to live blissfully unaware of tragedies, perversities and vagaries that occur around the World. Now since it’s a bank holiday, I don’t want to dwell on the negative, let’s look to the positive and let me share with you a story about, Ayatollah Khomeini, an obscure Welsh punk band and tens of thousands of Welsh people rabidly slapping their own heads like a Right Said Fred appreciation society.

It’s very rare that we write anything about sport on the site and even rarer that we write anything about Ayatollah Khomeini but I just had to share this cultural phenomenon so it gets the recognition it deserves!

For those not in the know, Cardiff City are a the biggest football team in Wales although I think they’ll be the first to admit that they’re no 1970s Brazil in terms of quality. This year the mighty Bluebirds have reached the FA Cup Final which is basically the equivalent of Art Brut headlining Glastonbury.

I had the pleasure of getting a free ticket to the Cardiff vs Barnsley semi-final at Wembley a couple of weeks ago and had to say it was a good laugh – not because of the football or the burgers costing approx £213 but watching 40,000 Welsh people do this:

I had to get to the bottom of this strange occurrence which led me down a road of causality that even Columbo would have struggled to link together. Welsh folklore has it that welsh-language punk band, U Thant of the late 80s were a little political. Their name is derived from the third Secretary General of the UN, called er, U Thant.
Part of the policio-punk rarebits’ live show was a gesture that they had captured from mourners at Ayatollah Khomeini’s funeral. The action, gesturing in a slapping motion towards the top of the end with both hands at the same time, was used to represent the the sorrow and grief of the events. The followers of U Thant quickly integrated the motion into their crowd antics and next thing was, it turned up on the terraces of Cardiff City.

The motion has been completely bastardised into a complete polar opposite emotion; from the streets of Tehran and it’s meaning of sadness to the streets of Cardiff and it’s euphoric meaning. I find this very satisfying, it is a beautifully simple visualisation of the power of globalisation and the media.

Now join me in doing the Ayatollah for which ever meaning is most appropriate for you on this day when London changed over to nasty right wing control.

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