Then kick out Israel, Armenia, Cyprus and Azerbaijan and even Turkey. Fortress Europe, even for Eurovision. Fact is, Eurovision is a brand name for a TV show, period. The only measure of its adequacy is its success with audiences. If audiences drop massively because Lebanon or Morocco participate, then it will mean Eurovision may not be the right name for the show. Every single year I hear people wondering why the hell Israel's participating, but it doesn't matter.
I consider Cyprus European...
As for the others, well... they now have a history with the contest (some more than others like Israel for instance), and Israel is already taking part officially as part of Europe in different major international events, so it's sort of natural I'd say to see them in ESC aswell. People asking why Israel take part have obviously missed the fact that the country have decades of history with ESC and has been a consistent participant throughout all those years (the country's ties to this contest goes much deeper than many other participating countries for sure).
I'm totally aware of the
current rules for entering Eurovision, but does that mean I have to agree with them? Obviously not... nothing is set-in-stone, it's not some sort of natural-law afterall.
I've always said, and I've been very consistent on this, that I think it's time to change the rules to block any further- non-geographical European expansion of ESC (obviously this would mean that the few non-European states taking part now would be able to stay, afterall it would be sorta weird to kick out countries that have a history and have been consistent participants since their debuts).
People are free to disagree, but I think EUROvision really should live up to its name. It's as simple as that... and with "EURO" I refer to geographics and not ethnics or something like that (just to be clear!).
