I have a confession.

As my delightful mutuals probably know, I am Swedish. I am a proud Swede. I live in England though, hence the language (men jag förstår lite svenska också). Therefore, naturally I was happy when my homeland triumphed in the Eurovision Song Contest 2023, mostly because my Swedish relatives FaceTimed me to celebrate the win and they were well and truly LEATHERED (and trust me, that is the truest form of entertainment).

As I’ve mentioned before, us Swedes are fucking FERAL when it comes to Eurovision, so the euphoria of the success coursed through my blood like opium. But much like opium, it skewed my perception of things. It blinded me to the true injustice of it all. It rendered me unable to recognise the truth: the fact that the true winner - Käärijä - was robbed of the title he truly deserved. His act had all the things that Eurovision is about: neon outfits fit for a dr Seuss character, lyrics that seem nonsensical but actually have meaning (and bonus, it’s not a depressing meaning), techno-metal mixed with a highly contrasting genre, slutty backup dancers, singing in Finnish, weird staging, etc. I could go on forever.

The point is, Käärijä slayed. He slayed hard. He slayed harder than Loreen could ever dream of. And I may not have registered it at the time, but looking back now, I realise that from the very first time cha cha cha blessed my ears, I was rooting for Finland, despite my Swedish bloodline. In fact, now I can admit that the aforementioned ‘euphoria’ I felt as the win was announced, was shallow. Deep down, I was actually disappointed. The more I think about it, the more I realise that our ‘win’ was a meaningless feat, fuelled by a jury of so called ‘experts’ who are probably mainly boring old sods with a poor music taste (not like that’s a new revelation - this is Eurovision ffs).

And because of that, I can now fully accept that the only real true winner of Eurovision Song Contest 2023 is Finland. So Käärijä, I speak on behalf of all Swedes (yes, all of them. The ones that disagree just aren’t as self aware and haven’t come to this conclusion yet. They’ll see the truth soon enough. Except for maybe Loreen, which is fair enough) when I say that we collectively give YOU the official title of “Eurovision Song Contest 2023 winner” that you so deserve. We didn’t want it anyway. We have ABBA, it’s not like we can ever beat that.

Congrats on the win, Finland!