Bad music can achieve more than bad politics

The Eurovision Song Contest is the most successful example of European cooperation, writes author Oscar van den Boogard in the daily De Standaard, noting that more can be achieved with "bad music" than with bad policies: "The ban on the homosexual demonstration last Saturday in Moscow shows that gays are still having to rebel strongly against a regime that does not accept them. Their sweet revenge was the song contest itself. One couldn't have conceived an event with more gay counter-culture and a greater audience. The Norwegian winner Alexander Rybak put it like this: 'Let's just say that the timing of the parade was not ideal. But this evening we had the greatest gay parade in the world here.' Can the song contest move voters to go to the ballot for the European elections in early June? Televoting is easy, but going to the election office is 'sooo difficult'. What exactly do the politicians mean when they talk about Europe? Only a boy with a violin who sings about a fairytale [Rybak with his song Fairytale] can really fire our imaginations."

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