Until around a decade back, most of us either watched the Eurovision Song Contest because it was extremely camp, or for what passed for the ‘politics’ – Greece and Turkey not voting for each other over Cyprus, and that exquisitely rebuking nul points the UK invariably got from Germany and France, for being an uppity little island nation which was still celebrating winning Second World War.  

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The campness is still there, but it now sits uncomfortably with real politics – that of the culture wars. ‘Trans’ and Israel are the flashpoints, with the supporters of the first and the opponents of the latter overlapping in a vicious Venn diagram. This was summed up in 2024’s Irish entrant, one Bambie Thug, who offered ‘I’m queer!’ in lieu of being able to sing, and who said that she cried when she heard that Israel (represented by Eden Golan, who was enthusiastically booed by Hamas groupies, the strict anti-music Islamists who would happily string Eurovision fans up from the nearest lamp-post) had made it to the final. The poor diddums was probably cross that Israel was first with the whole trans thing when Dana International won the 1998 Eurovision with ‘Diva’.  

The rise of ‘queerness’ – gayness without style or humour – has had a dreadful effect on Eurovision. Gayness never thought........

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