The Netherlands NETHERLANDS 2024 - Joost Klein - Europapa

[ESC United Mod Team]

 

[Reinventor]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t most die-hard Dutch fans also kind of supporting the decision to stop participating?

For me, it feels a little bit like a funeral. I don’t really want to let it go, but I have to because it is dead. Eurovision has died and this is me dealing with the grief lol.

As a Dutch (now former) fan myself, I do support the decision to stop participating. I would have a harder time supporting the decision to participate.

 

[Mainshow]

To begin with, it's great to see that the case has finally been closed. It must have been nerve-wrecking for Joost and his team.
Now it's time for the EBU to make ammends for the Netherlands to miss the Grand Final.
The question is... how can they solve this mess?

To be fair, I don't think that the EBU had much choice back in May.
A woman claimed something and pressed charges. That's something serious and rightfully, she has been taken seriously. Imagine a woman claiming a man was aggressive towards her and the police wouldn't be investigating? - The reputiation of Eurovision after #metoo would have been even worse, in my opinion.
The case has been closed because of lack of evidence - I will not assume Joost was agressive towards her but he indeed did harm her/break her camera somehow.. so we can't pretend that "nothing happened" and the EBU had to act.

In May, I read that there's something in their rules saying that participants can't be investigated against? - So what could the EBU have done differently? Breaching their own rules? - Maybe... personally, I think that the EBU has to change their rules - maybe depending on the "severity" of what's been investigating. I'm not 100% siding with the EBU on this one because Joost not performing in the Grand Final was a huge loss.
I still fail to see why "talks, apologies and buying a new camera" wouldn't have sealed the deal but maybe the camera woman didn't want to "just get an apology"? and therefore, the EBU couldn't really act differently since the police had to investigate?

-----------------

The Netherlands have been a hell of a participant - hosting the event successfully during a pandemic, putting so much effort into recent years, serving quality entries and not having given up after not qualifying for 8 years two decades ago.
Also, I read that "if there was a Big 6 rule, the Netherlands would be the one to get that spot" a few years ago.. so clearly, losing the Netherlands would financially hurt the EBU/Eurovision. Thus, the EBU clearly needs to make ammends and get along with AVROTROS.

Moreover, the Netherlands are one of the Top 5 music markets in Europe and thus, artists/broadcasters/labels want the Netherlands to compete - they want Dutch viewers to hear their artists/songs. That's why we got the Big 5 rule in the first place (of course, it's money but it's crucial for artists and labels to have certain people listen and potentially consume their music/stream/buy their songs).

Thus, losing the Netherlands would be a disaster, in my opinion - and can't be compared to "losing countries like Montenegro for a year or two".

The Netherlands are clearly partially "hosting"/"financing" the party and are almost as important as a Big 5 - country.

 

[Miloutchi]

To begin with, it's great to see that the case has finally been closed. It must have been nerve-wrecking for Joost and his team.
Now it's time for the EBU to make ammends for the Netherlands to miss the Grand Final.
The question is... how can they solve this mess?

To be fair, I don't think that the EBU had much choice back in May.
A woman claimed something and pressed charges. That's something serious and rightfully, she has been taken seriously. Imagine a woman claiming a man was aggressive towards her and the police wouldn't be investigating? - The reputiation of Eurovision after #metoo would have been even worse, in my opinion.
The case has been closed because of lack of evidence - I will not assume Joost was agressive towards her but he indeed did harm her/break her camera somehow.. so we can't pretend that "nothing happened" and the EBU had to act.

In May, I read that there's something in their rules saying that participants can't be investigated against? - So what could the EBU have done differently? Breaching their own rules? - Maybe... personally, I think that the EBU has to change their rules - maybe depending on the "severity" of what's been investigating. I'm not 100% siding with the EBU on this one because Joost not performing in the Grand Final was a huge loss.
I still fail to see why "talks, apologies and buying a new camera" wouldn't have sealed the deal but maybe the camera woman didn't want to "just get an apology"? and therefore, the EBU couldn't really act differently since the police had to investigate?

-----------------

The Netherlands have been a hell of a participant - hosting the event successfully during a pandemic, putting so much effort into recent years, serving quality entries and not having given up after not qualifying for 8 years two decades ago.
Also, I read that "if there was a Big 6 rule, the Netherlands would be the one to get that spot" a few years ago.. so clearly, losing the Netherlands would financially hurt the EBU/Eurovision. Thus, the EBU clearly needs to make ammends and get along with AVROTROS.

Moreover, the Netherlands are one of the Top 5 music markets in Europe and thus, artists/broadcasters/labels want the Netherlands to compete - they want Dutch viewers to hear their artists/songs. That's why we got the Big 5 rule in the first place (of course, it's money but it's crucial for artists and labels to have certain people listen and potentially consume their music/stream/buy their songs).

Thus, losing the Netherlands would be a disaster, in my opinion - and can't be compared to "losing countries like Montenegro for a year or two".

The Netherlands are clearly partially "hosting"/"financing" the party and are almost as important as a Big 5 - country.

To be honest, after that statement from the EBU, I don’t think anything can be done anymore to keep the Netherlands in and it seems the EBU either doesn’t care or thinks it’s a lost cause anyway.

 

[Judas]

To be fair, I don't think that the EBU had much choice back in May.
A woman claimed something and pressed charges. That's something serious and rightfully, she has been taken seriously.

"Innocent until proven guilty." Just a claim should not have been a valid reason to take away someone's grand final experience, as well as damage their reputation as an artist. As AVROTROS said, the "punishment" was taken out of proportion. Netherlands received not even a fraction of tolerance that the real troublemaker delegations received. Even if I try too hard, I just can't see the EBU doing what they had to in this scenario. The statement only makes it much worse. I bet the EBU team felt disappointed that the charges were dropped.

 

[Reinventor]

You DQ after proceedings have concluded and you have conclusive proof something happened. Simply because you cannot undo a disqualification. EBU has never shown any conclusive proof, or even said what happened.

 

[Miloutchi]

"Innocent until proven guilty." Just a claim should not have been a valid reason to take away someone's grand final experience, as well as damage their reputation as an artist. As AVROTROS said, the "punishment" was taken out of proportion. Netherlands received not even a fraction of tolerance that the real troublemaker delegations received. Even if I try too hard, I just can't see the EBU doing what they had to in this scenario. The statement only makes it much worse. I bet the EBU team felt disappointed that the charges were dropped.

They could have chosen to show his rehearsal video instead. There were tons of other options they could have gone with. But no, they decided to disqualify him (which is the worst punishment they could give), gave vague statements about “an incident with a female employee” knowing well enough what that would imply and never did anything to deny those false accusations, and treated AVROTROS and the Dutch fans (and frankly lots of other artists, broadcasters and fans as well) as if we’re some kind of idiots.

 

[Mainshow]

"Innocent until proven guilty", though, is a legal principle.
Joost might have been proven "innocent" now when it comes to charged crimes but it seems that something did happen, e.g. hitting/breaking(?) the camera and that's why the EBU acted (I'm not saying disqualifying the Netherlands was the best choice) - the case was dropped/closed because the Swedish investigators couldn't prove that he did it to deliberately threaten the camera woman.

But it's not like an incident didn't happen at all - the Swedish police/investigators simply ruled out that Joost committed a crime, the EBU disqualified for his conduct - which still could have been reason enough to get some "punishment" some sort of (we don't know what really happened).

I agree with @Miloutchi though - Joost was a fan favourite, there wasn't enough time to investigate - they could have shown his rehearsal video instead - not punishing the whole broadcaster and the whole nation.

 

[jatojo]

I still fail to see why "talks, apologies and buying a new camera" wouldn't have sealed the deal but maybe the camera woman didn't want to "just get an apology"? and therefore, the EBU couldn't really act differently since the police had to investigate?

It seems the era of apology is over. We see that with the MeToo cases. It's not enough to say "I'm sorry" to someone you got too close to - at least not if the case has been in the media.

That's sad - to some extent.

On the other hand, if a person gets hit by somebody - with the intent to cause pain -, you can't expect that person to just accept an apology and then "move on". Often the best thing is actually to call the police, because if there is an insurance thing involved, or you find out later that the physical or mental damage is more severe than you thought, then you're in a better position if the authorities know about it from the outset.

It is entirely wrong to suggest that if the case is dropped after the initial investigation, then nobody got hit. Every day thousands of people are victims of violence without anyone being prosecuted for it. And I think if you got an insight into what happens within work places, you would find many incidents where someone is fired for behaving inappropriately towards a colleague even though a judge hasn't looked at the case.

In that way, I fully agree with the statement from the EBU after the latest news. That doesn't mean that I support the disqualification of Joost Klein. I don't have enough details to assess that.

 

[Rasmus0714]

It seems the era of apology is over. We see that with the MeToo cases. It's not enough to say "I'm sorry" to someone you got too close to - at least not if the case has been in the media.

That's sad - to some extent.

On the other hand, if a person gets hit by somebody - with the intent to cause pain -, you can't expect that person to just accept an apology and then "move on". Often the best thing is actually to call the police, because if there is an insurance thing involved, or you find out later that the physical or mental damage is more severe than you thought, then you're in a better position if the authorities know about it from the outset.

It is entirely wrong to suggest that if the case is dropped after the initial investigation, then nobody got hit. Every day thousands of people are victims of violence without anyone being prosecuted for it. And I think if you got an insight into what happens within work places, you would find many incidents where someone is fired for behaving inappropriately towards a colleague even though a judge hasn't looked at the case.

In that way, I fully agree with the statement from the EBU after the latest news. That doesn't mean that I support the disqualification of Joost Klein. I don't have enough details to assess that.

Aren't there some reports saying he hitting her camera, not the camera woman herself?
And ESC are turning comments off and deleting every comments mentioned Joost, which make the whole thing more suspicious.

 

[Rasmus0714]

I think the EBU are happy with the outcome of the report. Nothing was actually proven either way and that's the end of it. Time to move on.

Yep, very hard to prove violence/assault etcin a case like this without clear evidence. If the Dutch want to withdraw than so be it. Hopefully they don't but that's up to them.

The ESC fan media Anti-Jewish conspiracies that say it was a set up need to stop now. It's utterly pathetic.

That's rich since across multiple platforms most Joost avid attackers are Israel supporters...

 

[Rasmus0714]

To begin with, it's great to see that the case has finally been closed. It must have been nerve-wrecking for Joost and his team.
Now it's time for the EBU to make ammends for the Netherlands to miss the Grand Final.
The question is... how can they solve this mess?

To be fair, I don't think that the EBU had much choice back in May.
A woman claimed something and pressed charges. That's something serious and rightfully, she has been taken seriously. Imagine a woman claiming a man was aggressive towards her and the police wouldn't be investigating? - The reputiation of Eurovision after #metoo would have been even worse, in my opinion.
The case has been closed because of lack of evidence - I will not assume Joost was agressive towards her but he indeed did harm her/break her camera somehow.. so we can't pretend that "nothing happened" and the EBU had to act.

In May, I read that there's something in their rules saying that participants can't be investigated against? - So what could the EBU have done differently? Breaching their own rules? - Maybe... personally, I think that the EBU has to change their rules - maybe depending on the "severity" of what's been investigating. I'm not 100% siding with the EBU on this one because Joost not performing in the Grand Final was a huge loss.
I still fail to see why "talks, apologies and buying a new camera" wouldn't have sealed the deal but maybe the camera woman didn't want to "just get an apology"? and therefore, the EBU couldn't really act differently since the police had to investigate?

-----------------

The Netherlands have been a hell of a participant - hosting the event successfully during a pandemic, putting so much effort into recent years, serving quality entries and not having given up after not qualifying for 8 years two decades ago.
Also, I read that "if there was a Big 6 rule, the Netherlands would be the one to get that spot" a few years ago.. so clearly, losing the Netherlands would financially hurt the EBU/Eurovision. Thus, the EBU clearly needs to make ammends and get along with AVROTROS.

Moreover, the Netherlands are one of the Top 5 music markets in Europe and thus, artists/broadcasters/labels want the Netherlands to compete - they want Dutch viewers to hear their artists/songs. That's why we got the Big 5 rule in the first place (of course, it's money but it's crucial for artists and labels to have certain people listen and potentially consume their music/stream/buy their songs).

Thus, losing the Netherlands would be a disaster, in my opinion - and can't be compared to "losing countries like Montenegro for a year or two".

The Netherlands are clearly partially "hosting"/"financing" the party and are almost as important as a Big 5 - country.

If the Netherlands doesn't participate in 2025, I kinda hope AVROTROS is petty enough to not showing the show as well as purge non-Dutch ESC songs/artists from all their platform to prove a point.

 

[Reinventor]

It seems the era of apology is over. We see that with the MeToo cases. It's not enough to say "I'm sorry" to someone you got too close to - at least not if the case has been in the media.

That's sad - to some extent.

On the other hand, if a person gets hit by somebody - with the intent to cause pain -, you can't expect that person to just accept an apology and then "move on". Often the best thing is actually to call the police, because if there is an insurance thing involved, or you find out later that the physical or mental damage is more severe than you thought, then you're in a better position if the authorities know about it from the outset.

It is entirely wrong to suggest that if the case is dropped after the initial investigation, then nobody got hit. Every day thousands of people are victims of violence without anyone being prosecuted for it. And I think if you got an insight into what happens within work places, you would find many incidents where someone is fired for behaving inappropriately towards a colleague even though a judge hasn't looked at the case.

In that way, I fully agree with the statement from the EBU after the latest news. That doesn't mean that I support the disqualification of Joost Klein. I don't have enough details to assess that.

You also don't have enough details to agree with the statement of the EBU. You don't know what happened, yet here you are assuming that he hit a woman. Rather shocking you immediately jump to the conclusion that a person got hit, while there's no proof of that whatsoever.

 

[Miloutchi]

If “the era of apologies is over” for such a minor wrongdoing (based on what we know and it hasn’t been debunked yet by a credible source) then I wonder what kind of holy spirits or robots can enter the contest without having the fear of disqualification hanging over them.

People are emotional beings who in the heat of the moment do stupid things. It cannot be proven that Joost did anything with bad intentions, so let’s assume he didn’t. I believe people deserve a second chance.

 

[Mainshow]

That's rich since across multiple platforms most Joost avid attackers are Israel supporters...

Still, the most liked comment in the biggest FB group "Eurovision Fans United" was saying that the EBU just wanted to get rid off Joost because of the Jews.

That's really shocking and scary to see, tbh.

 

[Miloutchi]

Still, the most liked comment in the biggest FB group "Eurovision Fans United" was saying that the EBU just wanted to get rid off Joost because of the Jews.

That's really shocking and scary to see, tbh.

While I do agree that that is a crude statement, I can’t lie that a similar idea hasn’t crossed my mind.

It seems awfully convenient that all of a sudden a big scandal is there to distract the crowd from the other elephant in the room. Especially when that scandal seems to have been blown out of proportions and when that scandal can prevent Israel from winning. No matter your stance on the topic, you can’t deny many people fearing that a win for Israel would mean the end of the ESC.

We can’t prove it however, so I’ll give the EBU the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think it’s very likely Israel had any say in the DQ though and I don’t think Israel is to blame either.

The alternative is that the EBU is just incompetent or that I am just a more than average aggressive person.

 

[Reinventor]

While I do agree that that is a crude statement, I can’t lie that a similar idea hasn’t crossed my mind.

It seems awfully convenient that all of a sudden a big scandal is there to distract the crowd from the other elephant in the room. Especially when that scandal seems to have been blown out of proportions and when that scandal can prevent Israel from winning. No matter your stance on the topic, you can’t deny many people fearing that a win for Israel would mean the end of the ESC.

We can’t prove it however, so I’ll give the EBU the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think it’s very likely Israel had any say in the DQ though and I don’t think Israel is to blame either.

The alternative is that the EBU is just incompetent or that I am just a more than average aggressive person.

Combination of Incompetence, arrogance and cannot admit any wrongdoing.

 

[Miloutchi]

EBU AND AVROTROS CLASH OVER FILMING AGREEMENTS — Ding-a-Dong, de Nederlandse podcast over het Eurovisie Songfestival

by GJ Kooijman, Gabe Milne, James Stephenson and Sem Anne van Dijk The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and AVROTROS are at odds over whether agreements were made to not film Joost Klein backstage before and after his performances at Eurovision 2024. Speaking with both the EBU and AVROTROS reg

www.songfestivalpodcast.nl

Gosh. It seems like the “adults” are fighting some more.

 

[Mainshow]

I honestly fail to see how an Israeli victory would have been more likely if Joost had stayed in the competition?

^^ If demands like that had been approved or granted by the EBU, the EBU would be such an epic fail. But honestly, any artist who doesn't want to be filmed before/after their performance at the biggest and most successful music TV show, shouldn't be allowed to take part in the first place.

Like Baby Lasagna just said (in a different context), there are cameras everywhere/everyone is taking pics and videos of everyone... of course, it can take a toll on your mental health and put some extra pressure on you, but it's Eurovision/it's meant to be covered on the media/on TV etc.

Anyway, the EBU needs to get their act together and either admit that they didn't follow their own rules (if such agreement did exist) or make it clear that the Dutch broadcaster is trying to make them look bad but the new piece of information is really damaging their reputation.
Artists should feel safe at Eurovision (if such special demands had been granted).

What a mess Oo

 

[Miloutchi]

I honestly fail to see how an Israeli victory would have been more likely if Joost had stayed in the competition?

^^ If demands like that had been approved or granted by the EBU, the EBU would be such an epic fail. But honestly, any artist who doesn't want to be filmed before/after their performance at the biggest and most successful music TV show, shouldn't be allowed to take part in the first place.

Like Baby Lasagna just said (in a different context), there are cameras everywhere/everyone is taking pics and videos of everyone... of course, it can take a toll on your mental health and put some extra pressure on you, but it's Eurovision/it's meant to be covered on the media/on TV etc.

Anyway, the EBU needs to get their act together and either admit that they didn't follow their own rules (if such agreement did exist) or make it clear that the Dutch broadcaster is trying to make them look bad but the new piece of information is really damaging their reputation.
Artists should feel safe at Eurovision (if such special demands had been granted).

What a mess Oo

The televote points could become less scattered among different artists, giving Croatia or Switzerland for example more points to take the win over Israel. But this is just speculation and bordering on conspiracy theory, so let’s just assume this did not happen. I just said it has crossed my mind as a possibility, not that I believe this happened.

I find it harmful to say someone should not be allowed to enter the contest if they have special needs. That’s basically saying that the contest is not inclusive for people with a disability. In the workplace, people with disabilities also have a right to reasonable accommodations. I don’t see why the ESC should be any different. It’s not such a big accommodation that it would completely prevent someone from entering. It’s not like they requested not to be filmed at all. And in the past there wasn’t such a big social media presence either and the contest was fine.

 

[Rasmus0714]

The televote points could become less scattered among different artists, giving Croatia or Switzerland for example more points to take the win over Israel. But this is just speculation and bordering on conspiracy theory, so let’s just assume this did not happen. I just said it has crossed my mind as a possibility, not that I believe this happened.

I find it harmful to say someone should not be allowed to enter the contest if they have special needs. That’s basically saying that the contest is not inclusive for people with a disability. In the workplace, people with disabilities also have a right to reasonable accommodations. I don’t see why the ESC should be any different. It’s not such a big accommodation that it would completely prevent someone from entering. It’s not like they requested not to be filmed at all. And in the past there wasn’t such a big social media presence either and the contest was fine.

It would be hilarious if Joost sues EBU, the camera woman and SVT for violating The Discrimination Act in Sweden.