An Open Letter to All the People Who Claim They Don’t Care About Eurovision But Persist In Telling Me Their Opinions About It

Hello, good people. I hope you all had lovely weekends shivering outside a pub or going on a bracing walk or watching the “footie” (did I use that term correctly?)

I spent the weekend watching disjointed 30-second snippets of Eurovision rehearsals. 90 percent of that time involved me yelling, “SLAY” and “YASSS QUEEN” and “STEP ON MY NECK SIS” at a computer screen.

But the other 10 percent of time? Oof. That other bit was spent going, “Oh shit, here are the 15 unfunny and unfair jokes that are going to show up on my Twitter feed once this goes out to the world.”

So in that spirit, here’s my plea to you, People Who Don’t Care About Eurovision:

1. If you don’t care about Eurovision, you can continue not caring about it silently, in the privacy of your own home! Social media tools allow you to mute certain hashtags. The BBC will be broadcasting other content on various channels – and I bet you have Netflix as well! You can just, you know, ignore it the same way you do the rest of the year!

2. Oh, you’re still here. I guess that means that you don’t care about Eurovision so much that you need to tell everyone your opinions about it! I mean, I don’t know why you’re bothering. It’s not like I come onto your social media after every post you make about an American football team and point out the high rates of brain injury, domestic violence, and general hypocrisy associated with that League, do I? No! And if I did, you would be so completely whiny about it. So why are you doing this with someone else’s hobby? 

3. Oh, you’re doing it because you think you’re funny, do you? You like to punch up with your comedy to target *checks list* one man with Tourette’s Syndrome, two teenagers, a pregnant woman, two refugees, three body-positive feminists, two acts hounded from within their own countries by nationalist trolls, and multiple entries who have experienced racist abuse? Not to mention Natalia Gordienko, who is currently being held captive by Philipp Kirkorov? Wow. It takes a real comedian to take down the people in power who are doing the life-threatening work of singing a three minute pop song. 

4. But you’re different because you’ve got something original to say about the Eurovison Song Contest? Really? Like what?
   1. Britain won’t win because Europe hates us due to Brexit/The Iraq War/Hadrian’s Wall/Meghan Markle (I’d only believe the last one)
   2. Eastern European countries engage in bloc voting, which – kudos to you –  is a strong argument coming from someone who can’t name any Eastern European countries!
   3. There’s no “real music” in the competition (Buddy, if you’re going to try this line, let me introduce you to my friend Salvador Sobral who wanted to make this point so hard he won Eurovision so he could say it in front of a billion people)

We’ve heard all of these tropes before, pal, and if you deploy them you will be buried under an onslaught of data and charts and music videos disproving every single one of your examples, so I hope you like having some facts served alongside your opinions!  

5. You know what? If you are such a real music fan, why are you sitting here watching Eurovision in the first place? Glastonbury is happening tonight too. Go watch fucking Coldplay and leave us in peace. 

Warmest regards, 

Dude