The Eurovision Song Contest organization acknowledges that the flag policy at the door of the Malmö Arena was not working well this year, with people wrongly having to hand in their rainbow or other pride flags.
“Pride flags were not banned and were welcome alongside the flags of the participating countries,” the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) assured on Instagram.
“However, sometimes things do not go as planned during complex live events and we recognize that we could have done better. We regret that people were wrongly forced to hand in their flag or felt that this prevented them from being their authentic selves.”
The organization felt compelled to write something about its flag policy after a post appeared on Instagram earlier in the day to mark the start of Pride Month. Many followers called the post “hypocritical”, as Swiss winner Nemo claimed that they were not allowed to take the non-binary flag on stage. The artist had to “smuggle it in”.
The EBU emphasizes that it is “incredibly proud” of Nemo and all non-binary, trans and queer fans. “We are grateful to them for bringing this to our attention,” the EBU statement reads.
The European flag was also not allowed inside the music event. European Commissioner Margaritis Schinas subsequently asked the EBU for clarification. The broadcasting association then gave the “sensitive global political context” as an explanation. “It was never our intention to discredit the EU flag itself,” the EBU said. Source: nu.nl
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