As presidents Trump and Putin square up to Europe over Ukraine, it’s to be hoped their analysts are not factoring Eurovision into their assessments of continental unity.
“Couldn’t organise a sing-song in an Irish pub” might be a fair conclusion, as the venerable annual song contest is already a shemozzle.
Ireland’s entry is a song written and performed by a Norwegian artist, sung in English, celebrating an emblem of Soviet space conquest with an elegy to 1950s rocket capsule dog Laika.
Estonia’s entry is a rap remorselessly mocking Italians – for their accents, coffee drinking, pasta-eating, luxury-loving and mafiosi – leaving Italians wondering what they ever did to Estonians.
When Israel launches its entry, even if it’s an ode to adopting stray kittens and volunteering in rest homes, there’ll be further intra-country disgruntlement.
Trivial and silly as this might seem, Eurovision – devised to promote the European Broadcasting Union, which includes Israel – has become a mass-market annual event across the continent. Few of its songs achieve commercial success; the lavishly staged camp extravaganza’s appeal lies in pageantry, drama and shock.
Last year’s content was so risqué and horror-show scary, host Graham Norton issued an unscripted “not for children” warning.
Were US Vice President JD Vance to have Eurovision drawn to his attention, he would forget about childless cat ladies and focus his sanctimony on the apparent prevalence of devil-worshipping, belligerent nudity and glorified violence in Europe.
Trump and Putin would seize on the disunity suggested by Eurovision entrants disrespecting one another’s boundaries and languages, having constant biffo over Israel and now even glorifying the old Soviet Union.
Given Trump’s reframing of geopolitics, Eurovision could offer the only evidence he needs that this hopelessly disorganised and decadent group of nations is crying out for the new world order he and Putin advocate.
Is a Eurovision foreign policy template any sillier than, for instance, the proposed new world order on tariffs? The US now contends that world trade is fuelled, not by people buying what they need at the best possible price, but by anti-American spite. Apparently, consumers have said, “While I really fancy that Chrysler Man-Spreader, I’ll grab a cheaper, more efficient Japanese import – just to annoy Uncle Sam.”
Evidently, world consumers never particularly liked our lamb and butter, or Lorde, or Hobbit movies, or Flight of the Conchords. They only sell because they’re not American.
Are Eurovision border skirmishes any dafter than the new Gaza vision – as in, forgetting all about being an ancient religious homeland and pivoting to beach parties and golf resorts and moving party-pooping Palestinians into neighbouring countries to global choruses of Kumbaya, My Lord?
Is Eurovision reality any less improbable than America’s new Ukraine vision: that the country has fooled the entire world into believing it’s a plucky new democracy, willingly battling for sovereignty, when all the time it has been crushed into submission by a despised dictator who personally invited Russia to invade it, just for macho kicks?
There’s a diplomatic solution to Eurovision’s geopolitical risk: a special guest invitation, as is often extended to Australia. Who would be a better US contestant than Trump’s Rasputin-in-chief, Elon Musk, whose avant-garde performances include literally wearing his youngest son, X Æ A-12, to top-level meetings as an accessory?
X, aged 4, already speaks fluent Eurovision, having picked his nose in public and, albeit in disputed reports, told Trump to “STFU”(stop talking).
Naturally, Musk and X would wipe the floor with the other Euro attention-junkies. And on recent form, this victory would lead Trump to conclude America was now part of, and more or less leader of, Europe – and hopefully turn his attention elsewhere.
