Does V.A.R suggest the future of super technology isn’t so black-and-white?

As the tournament hurtles towards its conclusion, the stakes have grown. So too has the suspicion. Against a backdrop of wider geopolitical tensions – from Donald Trump’s intervention over Folarin Balogun’s rescinded red card, to visa disputes surrounding the competition itself – the atmosphere surrounding V.A.R. has arguably reached fever pitch.

Technology, often sold as a neutral solution, has become entangled in exactly the kinds of political and institutional questions it was supposed to rise above.

Every marginal offside is treated with the forensic precision of a criminal trial. Stephan Uersfeld put it most succinctly when he observed that while V.A.R. ‘brings some fairness to the game, it has become a bureaucrat’s dream.’

That’s the central contradiction of modern sport. The more precise the technology becomes, the less satisfying the spectacle feels. Football has always thrived on emotion and imperfection. V.A.R. replaces much of that with procedure. And in high-stakes matches like those at the World Cup, the consequences of a V.A.R ruling can be devastating.

Jay Caspian Kang captured the theatrical absurdity of the process in The New Yorker. ‘The most unfair part,’ he wrote, ‘is that when the V.A.R. officials call down a missed penalty decision or draw their little pictures showing that a fraction of a big toe is offside, they beckon the head referee to a TV monitor to pronounce a final decision.’

‘The referee then has to stand in front of the monitor, hands on hips, and go through a charade of free will. In reality, the refs just do the bidding of the cowards behind the curtain.’

This identifies something audiences instinctively understand. We are invited to believe a human remains in charge even as the real authority appears to sit in a room filled with screens.

V.A.R.’s promise of microscopic precision often undermines the spirit it claims to protect. The technology can apparently determine whether a player’s shoulder or toenail has strayed beyond an invisible line, yet still leaves room for bewildering inconsistencies elsewhere.

There is, as Kang notes, ‘rage at the machines for turning what should be a spiritual game into the strictest and most tedious rule-following exercise possible.’

But there is also a second, arguably more important anger. People do not believe this supposedly objective system is applied equally. If technology can be influenced by institutions, politics, or selective interpretation, then its claim to impartiality will always collapse.

For the past two years, we have been told that artificial intelligence will transform everything from medicine to education and law. These machines are more consistent and reliable, they tell us. Less vulnerable to human error.

But the first question when faced with the latest advancement in super tech is almost always the same: who built the system? And who controls it?

Enjoyed this? Click here for more Gen Z related tech stories.