The Eurovision Music Contest has lifted restrictions that barred spectators from waving Palestinian flags and different banners of non-competing international locations or entities — however the up to date flag coverage additionally states performers can solely wave the flag of the nation they’re representing, successfully banning Delight flags for artists.
The up to date coverage, shared with CBC Information, specifies that each one flags and banners are permitted for viewers members on the upcoming occasion this Could in Basel, Switzerland, so long as they don’t pose security dangers or break Swiss regulation.
However the identical is not true for performers after they’re in “official areas.”
Below the coverage, just one nationwide flag might be displayed by performers and their delegations when they’re in areas together with the stage, Inexperienced Room, Eurovision Village stage and Turquoise Carpet on the opening ceremony.
Through the flag parade, just one official flag offered by the Swiss Broadcasting Company (SRG SSR), the host broadcaster, is allowed to be displayed by performers.
Which means demonstrations just like the one which occurred when Italy’s Marco Mengoni carried each the Italian and Delight flags through the flag parade in 2023 will not be permitted.
It additionally means performers will not be capable to show one other nation or territory’s flag in solidarity, such because the Palestinian flag or Ukraine’s flag, which many performers displayed in 2022 within the wake of Russia’s invasion.
A spokesperson for the Eurovision Music Contest mentioned the coverage was developed by SRG SSR with enter from the Eurovision Broadcasting Union (EBU).
“Outdoors of those official areas, the flag coverage for delegations is similar as for audiences, the place all flags permitted beneath Swiss regulation can be utilized, together with Delight flags, and supplies loads of alternatives for the expression of everybody’s identities,” the spokesperson mentioned.
Delegations and performers could face “additional penalties” in the event that they violate the coverage, but it surely’s not clear what these penalties are.
Ban on Delight flags criticized
The up to date coverage for artists is an abrupt change to a long-standing custom by which the rainbow Delight flag was an exception to the rule that required solely the flags of competing international locations to be flown.
In 2022, a number of artists carried Delight flags through the flag parade, with S10, a singer-rapper from the Netherlands, and Australia’s Sheldon Riley each carrying rainbow flags, and Iceland’s Systur band carrying a transgender flag.
Switzerland’s Nemo, who scored first place in final 12 months’s Eurovision Music Contest for the music The Code, about their journey of self-acceptance, mentioned they needed to smuggle within the non-binary flag that they displayed onstage after Eurovision apparently advised them it wasn’t permitted.
Already, the information that no Delight flags will likely be allowed to be flown by performers and their delegations onstage is sparking backlash on social media and past, with many mentioning that the campy, glitzy occasion has lengthy positioned itself as an occasion that celebrates 2SLGBTQ+ individuals and allies.
“There’s simply one thing actually darkish about eurovision which claims to honour its swathes of LGBTQ+ followers deciding to outlaw contestants exhibiting satisfaction flags,” wrote X person @_Aviera_.
One other person wrote, “How can the @Eurovision go from being one of many very massive allies for the LGBTQIA+ group to now banning satisfaction flags- conceal ourselves once more! Final 12 months, Nemo (a Non-Binary Individual) gained in 2024. How does this make sense! Time for this present to finish.”
Dutch broadcaster AvroTros will likely be interesting the choice of the EBU to ban Delight flags in “official areas,” after assembly with LGBTQ+ rights group COC Nederland, based on local media stories.
Calls to boycott Eurovision proceed
The coverage change is simply the newest controversy to face the embattled pan-continental pop competitors.
Final 12 months’s instalment in Malmö, Sweden, was overshadowed by large pro-Palestinian protests calling for Israel to be barred from competing attributable to its navy marketing campaign within the Gaza Strip. Israel’s offensive has killed greater than 51,000 individuals and broken or destroyed most residential buildings, based on Gaza officers and the United Nations.
Eurovision briefly barred Israel from performing in 2024 over issues that its music alternative broke guidelines on political neutrality. The music, initially titled October Rain, appeared to include references to the Hamas-led assault on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, that killed some 1,200 individuals and led to about 250 being taken hostage, based on Israeli tallies. Israel was in the end cleared to compete after adjustments had been made to the lyrics and the title.
However the controversy hasn’t let up. Three nationwide broadcasters from collaborating nations — Slovenia, Spain and Iceland — have known as Israel’s continued involvement within the occasion into query this 12 months.
Contest organizers have maintained that Eurovision is a non-political occasion, however these opposing Israel’s inclusion have identified that Russia was banned from collaborating in Eurovision in 2022 following its invasion of Ukraine and has not participated since.
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