Eurovision 2023 post-mortem

Georgia’s 2009 Eurovision entry “We Don’t Wanna Put In” was meant as a dig at Vladimir Putin after Russia had invaded Georgia the previous year. The song was rejected by the EBU for being political and Georgia dropped out of that year’s competition.

Oh how times have changed! This year we had several songs directly inspired by the war in Ukraine, Croatia’s entry not the least of them, appearing to refer to Putin repeatedly as a “little psychopath.” The line for political content seems to have shifted based on Russia’s actions, though it was reinforced when Ukraine’s President Zelensky asked to appear in the contest. This, the EBU tells us, would be political (as opposed to calling Russia’s President a psychopath and appearances from the controversial King and Queen of the United Kingdom).

This year, of course, the UK was hosting on behalf of Ukraine, something many Brits felt entitled to, as there seemed to be an impression that Ukraine only won in 2022 because of the war. Ukraine’s long history of incredible success and the quality of the song itself had little to do with the win, and we’re all certain that if points hadn’t gone to Ukraine, they wouldn’t have gone to any of the other televote top 5. Despite the fact that experts reckon Ukraine would have won either way, we would like to assure you that no, the UK is the bestest, as they did, after all, invent Peppa Pig.

But the Brits didn’t let any of this get in the way of their love and care for Ukraine. In fact, they made sure we knew just how much they loved and cared for Ukraine, their dear, dear friends. They even provided subsidised Eurovision tickets to displaced Ukrainians.

In the meantime, the UK has made it clear that refugees are not welcome in their country, with new plans to ship them home or to other countries such as Rwanda, despite the fact that opponents have argued that “Rwanda is not a safe destination for asylum seekers and that the scheme breaks human rights laws.” To discourage migrants from crossing the channel, they’ve also decided to start housing them in disused military bases and barges, an act which has been described by human rights advocates as “cruel.”

But that’s not the UK we will remember from Eurovision 2023. This week we saw a much kinder, benevolent UK, hand in hand with Ukraine and refugees, “United by Music,” or so the slogan said…

Unfortunately not everyone was able to afford being united by music this year 😢. The ongoing cost-of-living crisis in the country has sadly meant that many people could not afford to pay up to £380 for a ticket (a much higher price than previous Eurovisions).

On top of that, three Eastern European countries had to drop out of Eurovision this year because the cost of competing was also too high, since the EBU raised the participation fees. A mere 37 countries competed this year.

Despite the unfortunate exclusions, we have found ourselves looking at a very different image of the UK. Their cynical attitude towards Eurovision has changed somewhat in the last year due to Sam Ryder’s success in 2022 and the excitement of hosting in Liverpool. However, would it really be a UK Eurovision without some traditional conspiratorial thinking and dismissiveness towards other European countries?

As we all know, hosts must be impartial and respectful towards all participants, but it seems the UK is perhaps…out of practice? The BBC posted an official ranking of all the songs with their prediction of the results, because they somehow decided that was appropriate for a host to do! They mocked the Slovenian entry and the band responded in a tweet: “Thanks hosts! 😂 Can’t wait to meet you too hahahaha”.

Graham Norton, the usual UK commentator, doubled as an on stage host this weekend, but couldn’t resist getting in a dig or two at the contestants. For example, after hearing Germany’s entry, he said in the commentary booth, “Isn’t he old enough to know better? [...] I just hope they don’t win [...] I just don’t want to hear that again.” Haha, it’s all in good fun. It’s just good fun, okay? Why doesn’t anyone APPRECIATE THE UK’S GOOD WHOLSEOME FUN~?!?!?!?!

In the end, the UK’s attitude towards Eurovision doesn’t seem to have been significantly influenced by their hosting. The BBC have already published a self victimising theory about how the UK act flopped this year because its “post-modern, meta-textual lyrics failed to find an audience” among Europeans who couldn’t understand English well enough (indeed, English is such a small, humble language on the global stage). Forgetting of course that the song was popular all around Europe (we heard it on Slovenian radio just hours before the final), and perhaps downplaying just how awful Muller’s vocals actually were on the night.

The UK has also portrayed itself as “gloriously diverse”, with interval acts featuring drag queens telling us to “Be Who You Wanna Be” and a song about overcoming your problems featuring dancers with disabilities.

Coincidentally just this week, the UN expressed serious concerns about the state of LGBT rights in the UK, bringing special attention to the abusive rhetoric against minorities in the UK media (we’ve covered BBC’s own transphobia on the channel before). The UN has also determined that the UK isn't upholding even the basic rights of disabled people, and the UK's own Department for Work found that the UK government's decisions have led to the deaths of thousands of disabled people.

But that’s not the impression Europe will take away from Eurovision 2023!

Phew! What a week! Meanwhile, in gayer news…

Sweden’s victory this year means that three out of the four most recent Eurovision winners have been bisexual! (In addition to Loreen, Duncan Laurence and half of Måneskin are also openly bi [link contains NSFW photoshoot].)

However, Loreen won thanks to the jury votes and not the televote which heavily favoured Finland (Loreen came in 2nd for televote). The social media response to Swedish victory has consequently been pretty sour with numerous calls to reform or abolish the juries. The EBU already seems to be leaning in the direction of lessening the juries’ power - this year the semi finals were determined exclusively by televote - and it’s going to be interesting to see whether this trend continues.

When an artist competes in Eurovision, the performance is only partially for Europe - equally important is the performance for the audience back at home. Italy’s Marco Mengoni hasn’t made any statements about why he carried the rainbow flag during the flag parade, but we know that Italy’s government is currently reversing LGBT rights, retroactively deleting same-sex parents from legal documents, stripping them of parental recognition. In this light, it seems like Mengoni was perhaps sending a message primarily to his home country.

Of course, the same could be said for the BBC. After all, the BBC department in charge of Eurovision was not the same department publishing the transphobic opinion pieces. The Eurovision team could earnestly be advocating for equality for refugees, LGBT people and disabled people. Eurovision is a complex mechanism with many stakeholders, each with their own agenda: the EBU, the broadcasters, the artists, the record companies, the commentators, the sponsors (including those coming from public funds) all have their own, often conflicting agendas, and their agendas will be interpreted in different ways by different people. However, even the best of intentions don’t change the fact that millions of people all across Europe (and many other parts of the world) saw a version of the UK this week which doesn’t reflect the reality.

For better or for worse, that is the power of the Eurovision Song Contest.

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In case you missed any of our Eurovision content:

The [Queer] Politics of Eurovision

Performing Bisexuality - Patreon Video

The Bisexual Eurovision Playlist